The Lord answer you in the day of trouble! The name of the God of Jacob protect you! May he send you help from the sanctuary, and give you support from Zion.
May he remember all your offerings, and regard with favor your burnt sacrifices.
May he grant you your heart’s desire, and fulfill all your plans.
Psalm 20:1-4
In her amazing book God is a Black Woman, Christena Cleveland weaves stories of her sacred four-hundred-mile walking pilgrimage across France to the ancient shrines of Black Madonnas with her reckoning to dismantle the cultural “whitemalegod”. The reader discovers with her a new path of connecting with the divine and honoring the sacredness of Black women.
She reveals in her book that research on religious and spiritual beliefs across cultures tells us that when a culture believes in a solely or dominate male god, that culture believes that this god only deals with spiritual matters, not physical matters. While worthy and deserving of praise, the male god is transcendent; he isn’t found in the mundane, physical world.
Additionally, the same research points out that when God is feminine, “the Divine Mother comes to us from the safety of heavenly detachment into the misery and glory of love.” The Divine Mother is with us in the messiness of life.
David perhaps describes for us in Psalm 20 a Divine Mother that answers us in the day of trouble…protects us…sends us help…strengthens us. God remembers our offerings and regards us with favor. She’s not distant, but present. The Divine Mother “loves us where we are, taking great pride in their mothering role when we need them most.”
I am grateful for the full spectrum of gender expression of God. How often do we need answers, protections, help, strength? When do we need to give praise to the one in highest heaven? When are those times when we need to feel Immanuel rather than look to sky? Hear David’s words… God is with us. Here, now, and forever.
Let us pray.
Divine Mother, Loving Father, Open Non-Binary… We are grateful that you come alongside us in our mess. We give you glory that you reside in the heavens and call us to praise. We feel your full acceptance in the place and identity where we find ourselves. May all of these be true to us. Amen.
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