As the rain promises to lash down upon the darkened Sunday afternoon, sky, a cool breeze drifts across the lazy verandah and brought this sense of cool melancholy into the dining table. Here the computer screen illuminates my face as I type furiously into the barely visible keys, racing against the deepening dusk.
And when it rains, it almost never pours, the droplets stay onto the leaves as if the Eternity that the passage of time is measured against, will wait before they drop, in this pregnant pause, in the afternoon that brings back a timeless memory of lazy long days, beneath a cool monsoon-laden sky, when the Sunday just will not end, and the night would descend quietly without fanfare, when life is mellow and gracious.
Lord. you have been our refuge from age to age.
Before the mountains were born, before the earth and the world cae to birth, from eternity to eternity you are God.
You bring human beings to the dust, by saying, “Return, children of Adam.’ A thousand years are to you like a yesterday which has passed, like a watch of the night.
You flood them with sleep – in the morning, they will be like growing grass: in the morning it is blossoming and growing, by evening it is withered and dry.
For we have been destroyed by your wrath, dismayed by your anger. You have taken note of our guilty deeds, our secrets in the full light of your presence.
All our days pass under your wrath, our lives are over like a sigh. The span of our lives is seventy years – eighty for those who are strong – but their whole extent is anxiety and trouble, they are over in a moment and we are gone.
Who feels the power of your anger, or who that fears you, your wrath?
Teach us to count up the days that are ours, and we shall come to the heart of wisdom. Come back, Yahweh! How long must we wait? Take pity on your servants.
Each morning fill us with your faithful love, we shall sing and be happy all our days; let our joy be as long as the time that you afflicted us, the years when we experienced disasters.
Show your servants the deeds you do, let their children enjoy your splendour! May the sweetness of the Lord be upon us, to confirm the work we have done!
Psalm (89) 90 New Jerusalem Bible
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New Jerusalem Bible is published and copyright © 1985 by Darton, Longman & Todd, Ltd and Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc,