Alex Swain

“So he shepherded them with a faithful and true heart, and guided them with the skillfulness of his hands” (Psalm 78:72). 

This is the last verse of the last Psalm of today’s daily readings, and reminds us that as we turn to God, so God leads us and guides us - amidst the beautiful moments just as much as the incredibly trying times of life. 

For many moons now (nigh on two years!) we as a community have been subjected to great challenge brought upon by the ongoing pandemic. We have been felled from our places of comfort into what feels like a place of cold and darkness. The immense weight of such hardship weighs at our physical frames and wears at our very spirits. It is easy, in the disorientation of such ongoing upheaval, to get lost in the blackness.

Yet, it is verses like this which remind me that Jesus Christ guides each of us if we but allow Him to. Recently, as I find my mind running in endless loops, chewing on an ouroboros of worry, I have returned to prayer, a mantra, such as this portion of a Psalm. A prayer of remembrance and recollection that God is here with me – with us – amidst the challenges of this world. God the Almighty walks and weeps with us. 

The very God who has fashioned each of us, and calls us by name, does indeed shepherd us with a faithful and true heart, and guide us with the skillfulness of Her hands, tender they be.

This reminds me of a beautiful and sweet song called The Seal Lullaby by Eric Whitacre. I encourage you to listen and find yourself shepherded, guided, and resting in the arms of our Lord, as the seal rests “in the arms of the slow swinging seas.”

Oh! Hush thee, my baby, the night is behind us,
And black are the waters that sparkled so green.
The moon, o’er the combers, looks downward to find us,
At rest in the hollows that rustle between.

Where billow meets billow, then soft be thy pillow,
Oh weary wee flipperling, curl at thy ease!
The storm shall not wake thee, nor shark overtake thee,
Asleep in the arms of the slow swinging seas!

-Alex Swain