Old Words

We have boxes of baby wipes and something else which I cannot quite remember still to get for back-to-school shopping for the three younger children. This is good going for one trip. The middle schooler list has yet to be published so I have one more to go. I have a sense of satisfaction - enhanced by the fact that I have done this so many times that when the children ask where are the binders I can point them to the right aisle without looking. The routine is always the same in the store where we shop (even in different towns I hasten to add!).

My son is learning about routine too, he has tidied his room and is enjoying the freedom of organization - I said I might join him myself one day!

These thoughts are not so random - this morning I was reading the words of the psalm when it struck me just how many people must have said these ancient words - how many hearts must have dwelt on them and held them dear. How the voices of centuries in the praise of God had been distilled and magnified by these few words.

I read a book a while ago which dealt cynically with the idea of repeating words. It was a habit and not a devotion the author claimed, a duty and not a love. Sometimes this can be true, anything can becomes difficult but hearing in the words I was reciting the voices of all those who had gone before, all those pilgrims on the same path of grace which I now persue, that reassured me and opened up a new path of light and grace.

God gives us wonderful and special things - they can never replace Him - but they often, if we let them, point to him and not simply in their obvious meaning, but in their place in history, in our forebears, in our tradition and in our family of faith. We are not isolated in our faith from one another or from those who have gone before us. When old words resonate holiness of the ages then we are priviledge to be invited to use them.