Ordained Praise

...out of the mouths of babes, Thou hast ordained praise...

I had a job once. For hours, I would pat babes, crying, screaming infants.
Alone in a room filled with cribs and babies, I would pat.
...out of the mouths of babes, Thou hast ordained praise...
This beautiful 'sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God' helped get me through and turned me into an instrument of praise.

Pat, pat, pat, they gave nothing back but cries and then finally sleep. Then another would need me. Pat, pat, pat, it was a noisy then silent, loud then quiet monastery for me.

The baby house on the kibbutz filled with creatures 6 weeks to a few months old, yet they had already been taught to praise.
Ordained praise.

Ah Lord,
You made me, as much as any flower.
I embody Praise.
My mind, my body, my soul-Spirit;
I embody Praise.
My frets and keys are crowned with glory and honor,
My life, Your stringed instrument silences darkness.
The moon, the stars, Your little daughter;
We are set in place by Your fingers.
The music rises
We embody Praise.

Psalm 8

1 O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! 2 From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.
3 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, 4 what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him? 5 You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. 6 You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet: 7 all flocks and herds, and the beasts of the field, 8 the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas. 9 O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!

Lamentations

Lamentations
3:20 My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me.

21 This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope. 22 It is of the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. 23 They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness. 24 The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him. 25 The LORD is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. 26 It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the LORD. 27 It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth. 28 He sitteth alone and keepeth silence

Oh that quiet waiting, oh that sitteth-ing and keepeth-ing silence,

His Voice

'echoed in the walls of silence'

and our humbled souls find mercy and compassion.

I want to keep that with me all day, that place of silence, where I find Him first, before I jump to fix or decide or judge or

doubt...

Stop. Hear the sitar of His silence spelling out His constant faithfulness.

and then my tambourine will ring with hope in Him.