Daily Thought for Wednesday 5th March 2025
“Indeed, I was born guilty,
a sinner when my mother conceived me.”
Psalm 51:5 (NRSV)
Absolutely necessary?
Robin Hill
Bob Dylan has a song dating from 1980, right in the middle of his “Christian phase”. In “Saved” he contrasts his lostness with the overflowing grace of God. It is a fine piece of music, featuring a country-tinged electric guitar humming away from start to finish and a set of backing singers who are burning their way through the number with passion and flair. Having heard it, no-one could be uncertain about Dylan’s take on salvation.
“Saved”, however, is not for the feint-hearted. Consider its opening lines:
I was blinded by the Devil, born already ruined,
stone cold dead as I stepped out of the womb.
In its imagery, the theology at work here takes no prisoners, prompting some I know to express distaste, bordering on horror. We might be forgiven for asking in our refined Presbyterian way: “Is that language absolutely necessary?”
On Ash Wednesday, as we embark on a journey leading to the Cross and beyond, we might reflect on what the Psalmist thinks about human sin and divine redemption. This writer was around long before Bob Dylan, yet I suspect the pair would probably have got on well, comparing notes on their lostness from birth (or, indeed, conception).
In neither case, however, is despair allowed to get the upper hand. Each of these wordsmiths starts at the point of need and longing, before launching into a discussion of what it takes to be saved. In Dylan’s case, he points to “the blood of the Lamb”, meaning Christ. As for the Psalmist, he calls upon God to reach his “secret heart”:
“Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and put a new and right spirit within me.” (v10)
As we travel along the road to Jerusalem in the days and weeks to come, let’s keep recalling that this journey is one where our own “secret hearts” can indeed be opened to the overwhelming grace of God.
Shall we pray?:
Give me a clean heart so I may serve Thee.
Lord, fix my heart so that I may be used by Thee.
For I’m not worthy of all these blessings.
Give me a clean heart, and I’ll follow Thee. Amen.
(Margaret Pleasant Duroux: African American Heritage Hymnal, 461)
Thinking it through:
Both Bob Dylan and the Psalmist look at human experience to speak of an in-built lostness from our earliest points of life onwards. Are you troubled by this idea and, if so, why?
As we set off to meet the drama of Holy Week, what are you hoping to gain through the contemplations which lie ahead?
What does it mean to have, in the words of the Psalmist, “a clean heart” in a very murky world?
Robin Hill is minister of Gladsmuir linked with Longniddry, a member of the Presbytery of Lothian & Borders Mission Committee, and founder of the Heart & Soul Swing Band.