Salvogesis

With school coming back and the covid-19 coronavirus cases on the rise and the number of personal crises that have been shared with me over the previous week or so, I have had the 23rd Psalm running through my mind. Especially the line, 'Yea, though I walk through the Shadow of the Valley of Death"   Now the Valley we live in is more like Eden than Death in its natural beauty. I don't know that there is anywhere in this world that is more beautiful than our Island for sure. The number of waterfalls, rivers, mountains, lakes, forest trails, animals: bears, eagles, deer. I am certain I have seen more bears since I have been living in the Valley than I have in the rest of my life combined - certainly more than when we worked in inner city Toronto and inner city Vancouver. And the deer: sometimes I think there may be more deer than people in my neighbourhood and sometimes I think I can recognize the deer that live in my neighbourhood more than the people who are my neighbours!

Psalm 119 is a unique psalm for a couple of different reasons: 1)       It is the longest Psalm in the Bible 2)       It is like an Alphabet Book of Sorts (It is the most developed instance of an acrostic poem in the Old Testament) [1]   For Christmas or for Susan’s birthday a year ago we made her an ABC recipe book. Psalm 119 is like an ABC Psalm book. Each of the different sections is based on another letter of the Hebrew alphabet, i.e.:   ·         A is for Apple and Alligator, ·         B is for Bear and Barium, ·         C is for Canada and confetti, and so on.   The ABC Psalm has 8 lines dedicated to each letter of the Alphabet. And – this is really neat – each line starts with the same letter (in Hebrew, not in English). So for example if this was a contemporary English language ABC book it may start out something like this:   Aa An alligator ate a lot of apples, apricots, and acorns Apples were green and red Apricots were orange Acorns were hard a

Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save. No matter what you have done the Lord can save you. Horrible things happen. Some of the things I have heard in the previous couple of days alone: ·          PTSD ·          Doctors playing with medications ·          People are OD-ing at an incredible rate ·          AA groups aren't meeting ·          People's children are missing ·          People are dying of cancer ·          People are having their legs amputated ·          I have heard of spiritual abuse  ·          People are losing their sight and people are losing their mind The Lord’s arm is not too short. God can save you. I remember when Susan and I were with 614 Vancouver on the DTES (downtown eastside). We had just finished a Bible study in one of the buildings there and when we were leaving we accidentally walked out the wrong door. It locked behind us. We were trapped. All around us was barbed wire fence and everywhere on the ground wer