Saturday, October 17, 2020

Looking for the Face of God


 


Today my lectio divina and Psalm prayers collided. I am pondering the space between these paradoxical contradictions.

 

In the lectionary for Sunday from the Hebrew Scriptures in Exodus 33:12-23, Moses asks to see the Lord’s glory, to which the Lord replied (vv. 20, 23).

“You cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live. … Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back; but my face shall not be seen.”

 

In the anthropomorphic imagery in this account, God almost seems to be a giant supernatural being who hides Moses behind an oversize hand until he can turn away and let Moses see his backside, almost a cosmic mooning.

 

After contemplating this, I came to Psalm 17 in my Psalm prayer rotation to find this in verse 15.

“As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake I shall be satisfied, beholding your likeness.

 

A number of Psalms speak of looking at the face of God, but this juxtaposition today prompted me to probe my contemplative yearning for a glimpse of God. I am not seeking a logical explanation to make rational sense of the paradox. Rather I am gazing into the space between for something more mysterious.

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