The door to the deeper level 4
A bit like Eckhart Tolle who speaks about portals into the state of being present or as he calls it ‘the now’ – what also has been called the sacrament of the present moment – the idea of doors that can open into the deepest levels may also be there in times of suffering. Eckhart Tolle writes that if we can bear to be present to our suffering and open to our feelings then there may be sometimes some consolation and we may be strengthened to bear what seems unbearable.
In a way that’s what we read in some of the psalms and I was drawn to Psalm 124 which was actually in the liturgy for the daily office on 21 October.
The psalm is about looking back with thanksgiving and gratitude that the writer has survived some terrible occurrence and there is the recognition that something more than themselves was present in some form or another to guide and lead them. I would add in the inner world but the writer may have felt sustained also in the external world in some way through their faith and belief in God.
The psalmist may have been referring to external happenings and attacks but it applies equally well to inner trauma and inner attacks. Here it is the inner persecutions that can attack and it is the unconscious – the waters – that can overwhelm us with primitive fears and fantasies. Somewhere deep within is a force that is both part of and beyond us and it is this force that can hold us in times of trial if we can manage to allow it.
Psalm 124
1. If the LORD had not been on our side, let Israel now say;
2. if the LORD had not been on our side, when enemies rose up against us,
3. then would they have swallowed us up alive, in their fierce anger against us;
4. then would the waters have overwhelmed us away, and the torrent gone over us;
5. then would the raging waters have gone right over us.
6. Blessed be the LORD, he has not given us over to be a prey for their teeth.
7. We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowler; the snare is broken, and we have escaped.
8. Our help is in the name of the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth.