Raise an Alleluia

A Reflection on the First Reading for Sunday, June 25th, 2023:
Twelfth Sunday of Ordinary Time

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Jeremiah
20.10-13 ​

Jeremiah cried out: I hear many whispering: “Terror is all around! Denounce him! Let us denounce him!” All my close friends are watching for me to stumble. “Perhaps he can be enticed, and we can prevail against him, and take our revenge on him.”

But the Lord is with me like a dread warrior; therefore my persecutors will stumble, and they will not prevail. They will be greatly shamed, for they will not succeed. Their eternal dishonour will never be forgotten.

O Lord of hosts, you test the righteous, you see the heart and the mind; let me see your retribution upon them, for to you I have committed my cause.

Sing to the Lord; praise the Lord! For he has delivered the life of the needy from the hands of evildoers.

Pause. Pray. Reflect.

As I type out this passage from Jeremiah so that we can sink into it together, the wind picks up and the pattern of the rain changes. I’m in the attic and can hear a rising crescendo of sound. I can feel the shift in the air through the open windows. Then the thunder comes. The walls feel it, and light splits the sky.

“But the Lord is with me like a dread warrior”
I’ll take that. 

Sometimes that’s what I need. Not my Lord coming in a gentle wind, but a driving storm. A dread warrior rushing with power to my side, helping me fight a battle I can’t win, against an enemy I can’t see. I don’t know if I understood this when I was sixteen and started following Jesus. And time didn’t guarantee I’d learn anything. This enemy isn’t any person I’ve ever stood with, whether for a minute or my lifetime. This enemy isn’t any of the circumstances I’ve ever been through. This enemy isn’t even my own failings. All these are very real, but they are not my enemy.  But I have experienced these things as weapons that my actual Enemy has picked up and used against me. Mainly because I left them lying around for him to grab, or sometimes I even handed them to him.

I can remember a time when I took a particular beating. A trifecta of difficult circumstances, and difficult people, and my own sin. The pain from this finally got bad enough, and I found the way through. Time doesn’t really teach anything, but surrender does. I was sitting in this attic on the floor, cross-legged in the dark. Into the torrent tearing through my soul, my Lord came like a dread warrior. He told me to give Him my pain. I cried out that He could have it. I gave it up. As I surrendered, the Enemy lost his grip and dropped the weapon. I picked up my pain and offered it to Jesus. He joined me cross-legged on the floor and took it from me. As I climbed into His lap the pain was still there, but so was He. Every time the torrent got too much, I’d yell at my Enemy, I’d tell him to get his hands off my pain because it was no longer his to touch. If he wanted to use it again, he’d have to get it from Jesus’ hands because that’s who had it now. As if he ever could. My Lord is the Lord of Hosts. 

The Lord is with me like a dread warrior, and in the eye of any storm I can raise my Alleluia in the presence of my enemies.




Noreen Smith

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LISten to "Raise A Hallelujah" by Bethel Music on Youtube

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