Be Always In Good Heart
“PRAYER BEFORE MEAL,” PAINTING BY VICENTE MANANSALA
From my reading in the last week, I was startled into attention by this line from Psalm 22: “May you always be in good heart!” Notice the exclamation mark. This is a big declaration, apparently, of what the Psalmist thinks our lives can be, should be. I’ve been going around repeating this line: “May you always be in good heart!” Is that possible, especially in our day?
When there is so much that drags us down, our spirits often feel broken. Good heart, really? As I stumbled into my day this morning, opening my Twitter first to check the news, it feels more like: “Always be ready for battle.” Sometimes it’s battle against personal odds, limitations, struggles, but often it’s the battles against the forces of chaos that seem to grip our world. Open your day with the news—it’s unlikely you’ll find directions toward good heart.
How might I arrive at this “good heart” today, throughout the day, regularly? I’d like to know.
The Psalmist doesn’t help me much at first. Even as we seek God, in our prayer time, we hear no answer: “My God, by day I cry to you, but there is no answer; / in the night I cry with no respite.” It feels that way sometimes, doesn’t it?
How are we going reach this place of good heart, a kind of peacefulness, contentment, hopefulness, a new place of loving others, a new posture, a new practice, a whole new outlook? Is it possible for a good heart to become the habit of our heart? Is that really possible, or just something more I might feel guilty about, not measuring up to good heart, just as I have not measured up to so many things?
Well, the Psalmist offers some suggestions how we might get closer to a good heart:
Let the humble eat and be satisfied.
Let those who seek the LORD praise him.
Good heart seems to be connected with humility, simply to “eat and be satisfied,” to be content with our lives, to offer praise and gratitude for what we are given? Could just this note of humility and simplicity and gratitude be what it takes to begin to turn our hearts around? I’m not sure I’m fully getting at this turnaround, but this begins to make sense to me.
Recently I was reading Kathleen Norris’s exhaustive treatment of acedia, that “noonday demon,” as the ancient monastics called it, that fearful downer that comes to those who pursue the good heart. I confess I am at times plagued by that demon, thinking often that nothing is going right, that the world is coming apart at the seams, thinking about all my regrets, what I have done and what I left undone, thinking about how I never quite get over the bar I set for myself, daily, hour by hour, not quite eating the right things, not exercising enough, not praying enough, not loving enough, not becoming spiritually vital enough. This isn’t good heart. This is more like acedia, the demon of downers.
Stop, wait, humbly, simply, “eat and be satisfied.” Is that a new path? We’ve got so much to worry about, we say constantly to ourselves. No, stop, wait, with humility “eat and be satisfied,” give praise to God for all we have.
“Trouble is near,” the Psalmist continues, and I need a helper. And that’s my prayer this morning: Come near, Lord, be my helper. Help me to “always be in good heart.” I keep going around saying it, reminding myself, this is the way I want to live. This is the way I want to be among people I love. Lord, be my helper always to be in good heart.