Ready or Not: A Riff on Psalm 78

In the Hebrew Bible, Exodus 16 tells the story of the people of Israel being led by Moses through the wilderness. The group had been liberated from slavery about a month and a half before. Still, they were anxious. They complained to Moses that they were starving and hopeless; if they were going to die in the desert, maybe they’d be better off back in Egypt.

Theologian Sarah Bessey points out that if we’ve been given a faith of simplicity and certainty, the experience of unknown wilderness is going to be profoundly disturbing. We might even think that it’s wrong of us to be confused, a terrible insult to injury. But moving through wilderness is as faithful an experience as it is uncomfortable. The trip itself, and not just the destination, is a vital dimension of our lifelong spiritual formation.

The days the Israelites spent following Moses were a time of both being lost and being guided. In the story, God provides sustenance in part in the form of a weird unknown food-like stuff the people called manna, a name that means, roughly, “What is this?” They couldn’t store it, but it landed faithfully like dew in the morning for them to eat in the moment.

Psalm 78 sings a hyperlink to that story in Exodus.

Our covenant God gave them what they craved.

(Of Psalm 78:29)

This psalm serves as a synopsis of God’s complicated history with the people of Israel. It sings of grace, help, and punishment, and of the people’s regular ingratitude and rebellion.

The word manna itself is a kind of meditation, one that you and I can use today when we find ourselves on the verge of Deep Change. In such moments, here are some questions we can ask ourselves:

• What is the change I’m noticing?
• Can I be sure what this change is about?
• What precisely am I hungry for? Am I sure of that?
• Where do I think I’m headed?

In the Exodus 16 story, the people are rescued with manna, meat, and the winds from the east and south dividing the Red Sea so they can escape from Egypt.

Ready or not, Way is opening to some new path.

Praying the Lord’s Prayer, “Give us today our daily bread” (Matthew 6:11), means trusting that our needs will be met. It’s a petition of trust. Alternatively, when we are suffering, or in touch with others who are, the world can feel like a place of lack, not of generosity. Psalm 78, with all its manna-ness, holds space for both perspectives.

Being immersed in deep change is perplexing. In these moments, our instruments need recalibration, and we’re tired out. As in any time of anxiety, we can find ourselves considering whether we can make do with what we have or if we need something different. Psalm 78 opens possibilities of meeting the unknown with “what is this?” zero-shelf-life food and also guards us against greed, keeping us from feeling entitled to particular outcomes and sliding into bitterness or aggressive ingratitude. It’s helpful to remember that there’s more ahead than we can now see.

Reprinted with permission from Dangerous Songs: The Psalms and a Gloriously Disrupted Life by Richard Bruxvoort Colligan. Copyright © 2026 Broadleaf Books.

Dr. Richard Bruxvoort Colligan is a spiritual director, musician, and lover of laughter. He brings his passion for lifelong spiritual formation and the arts, along with enthralled curiosity for the Great Mystery we are in together. His ongoing project is composing congregational songs at PsalmImmersion.com. He is the author of Dangerous Songs: The Psalms and a Gloriously Disrupted Life  (Broadleaf Books). Richard serves as Director of Spiritual Formation at Mount Olive Lutheran Church in Rochester, MN and lives with his wife Trish and dogs Winifred and Jack. Visit Richard online at Worldmaking.net and Patreon.com/RichardBC

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Our featured self-study this month is Earth, Our Original Monastery. This retreat companions my book and we updated this retreat last spring, adding all new content from Cassidhe Hart on writing your own earth psalter and Polly Paton-Brown on the spirituality of trees. There are also wonderful songs that go with each week’s theme and a dance prayer led by Betsey Beckman. 

Here is an adapted excerpt from the book:

Earth and her creatures teach us how to pray, how to worship and praise, but only if we listen and pay attention to their rhythms in this world. 

Monks know this rhythm well, as the ancient practice of the Liturgy of the Hours immerses them in the rise and fall of each day. On this liturgical rhythm, Thomas Berry writes, “From an early period Christians adopted a liturgy that carefully observed the correspondences of human praise with the numinous moments of the dawn and sunset and with the transitions of the various seasons of the year. This liturgy was carried out most faithfully in the Benedictine and Cistercian monasteries of Europe up through the medieval period. The social order was itself governed by this basic rhythm of life.”  The threshold times of day, especially dawn and dusk, have long been considered numinous—times of special awe as the world moves from light to dark or dark to light. This fundamental rhythm is the foundation of this prayer practice and reveals Earth as the original liturgy. 

The Hebrew and Christian scriptures present us with a vision of nature whose primary function is to engage in a continual act of praising the Divine. Contemplatives who wish to learn how to follow St. Paul’s invitation to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thes 5:17) would do well to pay attention to the natural world. 

Each time you go for a walk, see if you can begin with a sense that you are stepping into a landscape that is animate and alive, that is participating in the great unfolding of a liturgy of praise. Then let your body join in with this ongoing hymn, knowing your body is intimate with this already ongoing song. We have separated ourselves from creation by claiming consciousness only for ourselves. All elements of creation participate in this primordial cathedral, scriptures, saints, spiritual directors, icon, sacrament, and liturgy offering wisdom to us with each turn. These sacred places of encounter with the Divine are profoundly embodied. 

The psalms see all of creation itself as offering continual praise to God. The sea, the sky, the trees, the animals, the stars—all these are seen to be singing God’s glory without human words but with another kind of language. All of creation is called to praise the sacredness of all things, never exhausting this possibility. The psalms exhort, “Let everything that breathes praise the Lord!” (Ps 150:6). This is a continual and ever-unfolding chorus of celebration happening all around us, and we are invited to join. Praise should arise from our hearts as spontaneously as it does from pines and panthers, from the sea and sloths. 

In an old Irish poem about a mistle thrush, the bird is celebrated for its beauty and described as giving an “impromptu sermon” that teaches his listeners much about the goodness of God. The bird is not only sacrament but also preacher and liturgist, offering his own perspective on celebration of the Divine Source. 

The psalms of praise often describe nature as alive and in perpetual celebration. Thomas Merton saw his call as a monk to listen for the song being sung through all of creation. He was invited to join in with this original liturgy already happening all around him. In the forest he could tend to “the sweet songs of living things,” whose celebratory choirs he joined. In these moments he touched the paradise that pulses all around us. 

In Way of the Pilgrim, a nineteenth-century Russian Orthodox text, it is written, “And while I prayed in the depths of the heart, everything around me seemed transformed: the trees, grass, birds, earth, air, light—every created thing seemed to proclaim that bears witness to God’s love for humanity. Everything was praying. Everything sang glory be to God.”  All of nature sings glory to God, even the seasons themselves. The liturgical calendar reflects the seasonal cycle of dying and rising. Nature has her own liturgy, which we discover when we begin to anticipate the return of the salmon each fall in the Pacific Northwest, the migration of swans and geese each winter flocking by the thousands, the first snowdrops growing in Ireland as a sign of spring, and the lush bounty of fruits and vegetables that arrives each summer around the world. These are feast days in the calendar of creation’s unfolding, times to celebrate as nature offers up her signs of what is to come. Even the sun’s return each morning elicits the birds to sing their praises.

The self-study version of the Earth Monastery companion retreat to the book is on sale during September for 20% off. Use code EARTH20.

I will be teaching for two other organizations this month: 

I am delighted to be invited to join the Center for Action and Contemplation this Friday, September 11^th for an online event on the question of “What Do Women Do with Christianity?” I am sure it will be a wonderful and engaging conversation. Carmen Acevedo Butcher and Cassidy Hall are also both involved. 

Then on Friday, September 25^th, I am leading an online mini-retreat on a spirituality of blessing for Mercy by the Sea (registration closes on September 21^st at 12pm Eastern Time). 

And finally, I will be back teaching with the Abbey starting Monday, September 28^th when we begin a 7-week series on the fairy tale The Handless Maiden, a powerful story about wounding and healing that has guided me for the last twenty years. I will share more about that in the coming weeks. 

With great and growing love,

Christine

Christine Valters Paintner, OblSB, PhD, REACE

Image: Paid license with Canva

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That night as predicted, there was the beautiful huge, very larger-than-life moon lighting up the night in an ever-so-peaceful and quiet time. I felt an instant, overwhelming rejuvenation in the sight of that large moon seemingly close enough to reach out and fearlessly grab!  

Then I looked around at my surroundings, so well-lit for a change in the darkness of normal nights in the desert. Just a short time ago here was a slight wind with cars, people, birds, dogs and other animals wondering about.  But not now! The world was unworldly quiet, void of all the normal comings and goings.  

All was quiet and still as if awaiting the opening notes of a concert. The surroundings seemed to be focused – the lines sharper, but in a friendly, inviting fashion. Everything seemed to be at its best and more confident in its shape and manner.

I was drawn to its quiet, majestic manner – such perfection in its simple form. More like a finely crafted exhibit than the normal, oft hap hazard landscape. Were the boulders always that sculptured? Do all the trees in the pecan grove always lean to the south? Was the mountain range always that well defined in so velvety softness?  

And where were all the night creatures? Were they, like me, afraid to even move or breath too heavily for fear we would break the spell? I lingered far longer than wise – alone at the edge of the town, alone in the desert night. I soaked up all the soul-nourishment that nature gave as if there might not be another. That night, only dawn broke the spell, but my being remembers all that was offered for the receiving.

Martha Van Vactor is a retired educator whose academic career centered around English literature, language arts, speech/communications, theater/drama, and special educational needs. She currently resides in Green Valley, AZ, USA.

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What a gift to be among other monks in the world, who know that praying is something we can do wherever we are and that the earth is our original monastery, offering us gifts at every turn. 

Here at Abbey of the Arts we don’t prescribe a structure to follow, but more of a spirit or rhythm to integrate over time. Our Monk Manifesto and prayer cycles, our programs and books, our book club and self-study offerings, all help to support this way of being. One that values silence and times of solitude, moves slowly when possible and savors, cherishes community and kinship with creation, offers hospitality to the holy other both within and without, creates for the joy of it, knows we are on a lifelong journey of always growing, always learning, and more. 

As the world continues its burning and cruelty, we will lament together the places and policies that enact harm, and work in the ways available to us to resist and bring justice. And we will continue to remember beauty as nourishment to guide us and love as the foundation of everything. When we waver or feel wobbly, we can turn to one another and be reminded of the goodness of people. 

I think we can sometimes underestimate the value of kindness and beauty in times like these. How much we need tenderness and places of vulnerability, where empathy is cherished, and we lift up another world together. Beauty helps to light the way toward a new world, helps to inspire our imaginations to see a life that centers care for the everyone, especially the most vulnerable. Benedict’s Rule highlights that the most vulnerable in the community are to be cared for by those who are more able. The ancient monks sought out the contemplative path to deepen their expression of love in the world. 

I am imagining us joining hands and hearts across the globe, living in resistance to the dominant culture that demands speed and productivity, exploitation and extraction, and a projection of strength at all costs. In our little cloisters, wherever we are, we can create a vision of a new way of being. We can live this out as much as possible with our families, friends, co-workers, and communities. 

If you are able to help us support and sustain this work—especially our free resources like our prayer cycles (the video version of Cultivating Seeds of Liberation will be released this fall) and our Lift Every Voice book club, and the many partial and full scholarships we offer to maintain full financial access—please consider joining our Sustainers Circle for 2026-2027. The doors are closing for this tomorrow. There are a range of support levels offered and we are enormously grateful for whatever you are able to offer to help us continue to keep this work going and practice radical hospitality. 

If this is out of your financial means right now, please know of our gratitude for all the other ways you support us through participation in our programs, sharing about us with friends, posting reviews about my books, and a hundred other small but significant ways of expressing your love for this community. 

With great and growing love,

Christine

Christine Valters Paintner, OblSB, PhD, REACE

Image©️Christine Valters Paintner | Galway, Ireland

The post I Will Live as a Monk in the World ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess appeared first on Abbey of the Arts.

We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our bodies. — Letter to the Corinthians 

These are troubling times. Uncertainty emerges in ways I never expected. I am sure this is what many of the Desert Elders felt about the Roman Empire in their day. Rather than escape to a monastery or a retreat, I choose to be monks in the world. Occasionally, I am faced with the reality of lost hope. If you experience the same, sit with that feeling. Know that in all things, God remains constant and will deliver. As I am reminded in 2 Corinthians 4:8-10 hope is in Christ’s example of grace. For me, I have seen this hope modeled by my ancestors over generations of triumph. I found their voices in this poem.

Just a Taste

Somewhere amidst the headlines
And the deep dives,
The cold view from 30,000 feet
Into that rabbit hole
I lost my hope for justice

I’ve been hungry for it
For so long
I forgot its taste
My eyes peer over my lonely mouth
Searching for the savory
Satiation of justice while settling
For sweet peace

Peace that passes understanding and
Sits with the pain of grief and
The hopelessness of
Justice denied

Oh, I’ll renew my search for justice
Wait and see—
That’s what we do
My mother, my grandmother
Her grandmothers, and aunties
We bake for it, ache for it
Prep, chop, and baste for it

We hungrily serve it to others
With just a taste of justice
Just a morsel in our silent mouths
To make sure it is right
For anyone and everyone else
Not too hot, not too spicy, not too bland
To serve mankind

Yes we lick the taste of hope
A memory stuck on our
Parched hungry lips
And wait for grief’s peace to sit

Dena Jennings, D.O. is a luthier, musician, writer, Virginia Master Naturalist, and an Internal Medicine physician with certification in Ayurvedic practice. In addition to over 30 years of  medical practice, she completed a 4-year apprenticeship with a sculptor and luthier in Ontario, Canada where she learned to design and built the gourd instruments of cultures around the world. In 2013 Dr. Jennings married her best friend Donald Jennings and moved to their organic herb farm and wildlife preserve in Nasons, VA which they lovingly call the Farmashramonastery. There, she practices medicine and counselling, hosts contemplative retreats, hikes, and meditation, and raises angora rabbits. 

In the larger community, she conducts conflict transformation workshops including one for artistic ambassadors through the US State Department in Washington, DC. She has developed accredited curricula of meditation for racial justice, and for cultural sensitivity in artistic performance. In 2019, she was appointed to the Virginia Commission for the Arts where she serves as the chairperson.

Since 1996, Dr. Jennings has been the Executive Director and founder of Imani Works, a human rights advocacy group that enjoys consultative status with the United Nations Department of Social and Economic Affairs. Through Imani Works, she provides evaluations for asylum seekers. You can reach her for bookings, consultations, and counselling by visiting ImaniWorks.net online.

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