Psalm 46.1
God is our refuge and strength,
   an ever-present help in trouble.

Reflection: Ever Present Help
By John Tillman

The “ever-present” help that most people are used to, is the technology platforms we have attached to our hands and wrists.

These platforms were designed for profit. That profitability hinges on addiction and ubiquity. To continue their financial growth curve, the most powerful corporations ever to exist on the planet must make their products increasingly addictive and ingrained in our day to day life. Technology, it seems, is a jealous god.

In an article for the New Yorker, Jia Tolentino wrote about the difficulties of putting down one’s phone, when it is filled with technologies that, from the start, were designed to keep us from doing so:

“Sean Parker, the first president of Facebook, has called the platform a “social-validation feedback loop” built around “exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology.” Tristan Harris, who worked as a “design ethicist” at Google, has said that smartphones are engineered to be addictive.

Technology promises freedom of movement and ease of work, but, more often than not technology chains our hands to a borderless, invasive, all-encompassing workday that never ends. Workers clock in, but they can’t clock out.

Technology promises emotional fulfillment and freedom of expression, but often we find ourselves chained to the emotional highs and lows of reactions, comments, and likes on social media. All of this is numbing to the connection and community that we truly need.

The technology that we have designed to help us connect has had disastrous, unexpected consequences. Our world is one of shattered relationships and loneliness despite more “connectedness” than ever.

We aren’t the first to think this. In a recent interview with Kris Boyd on Think, author, Jenny Odell, discussed how 400 years before the time of Christ, Epicurus started a garden school outside the city because he thought life in the Greek empire was becoming too hectic and people were disconnected from what was important.

The solution of cultivation, retreat, and pursuit of community is one we can apply toward our spiritual pursuits. Walking in a park is the key metaphor we use to refer to exploring God’s word, and cultivation is how we picture the growth of the seed of the gospel in our lives.

Technology is capable of aiding us in these things. May we use technology to tie God’s Word on our hands and integrate it into our lives. The Park Forum is dedicated to encouraging this kind of usage. For in connection to the gospel, we find freedom, fulfillment, and community that technology can’t deliver.

Prayer: The Request for Presence
I call with my whole heart; answer me, O Lord, that I may keep your statutes. — Psalm 119.145

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Numbers 10 (Listen – 4:11) 
Psalm 46-47 (Listen – 2:15)

Today’s Readings
Numbers 11 (Listen – 5:22) Psalm 48 (Listen – 1:28)
Numbers 12 (Listen – 2:12) Psalm 49 (Listen – 2:10)

Thank You!
Thank you for reading and a huge thank you to those who donate to our ministry, keeping The Park Forum ad-free and enabling us to continue to produce fresh content. Every year our donors help us produce over 100,000 words of free devotionals. Follow this link to support our readers.

Read more about Where Our Hearts Are
Our devices can be tools to lead us to God’s heart, not away from it. This ministry’s mission believes in that. But there is danger.

Read more about A Restoring Sabbath
Think and pray about ways in which you can abstain from technology’s addictive elements, while still using its powerful tools to spur your spiritual growth.

Psalm 42.2
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
   When can I go and meet with God?

Numbers 7.89
When Moses entered the tent of meeting to speak with the Lord, he heard the voice speaking to him from between the two cherubim above the atonement cover on the ark of the covenant law. In this way the Lord spoke to him.

Reflection: Prayer, Our Tent of Meeting
By John Tillman

In today’s reading from Numbers, we get a description of Moses talking with God in the Tent of Meeting. The Tent of meeting described here is not the first tent of meeting, but the one that replaced it, in the newly finished tabernacle. There in the Holy of Holies, Moses hears the voice of God from between the cherubim above the place of atonement.

Scripture tells us that the conversations of Moses with God were intimate. God spoke to Moses as a man speaks to his friend. But this communication was not only personal—it was communal.

Moses entering the Tent of Meeting was a communitywide event. When Moses entered, the entire community would come and stand at the entrances to their own tents as Moses spoke with God on their behalf.

The design of the Tabernacle and the Tent of Meeting was a tool for community prayer and connection. Prayer—even individual prayer—is an act of community, because God is a God of community.

At the center of this community are the symbols of the atonement that God has set in motion. It is through the atonement that Moses heard God’s voice. The voice from between the cherubim came from the spot where the blood of the atonement sacrifices were placed by the high priest.

For us, prayer is our tent of meeting, where the deepest thirsts of our souls may be satisfied. When we pray as Jesus taught, we enter into God’s presence through the torn curtain of the Tent of Meeting, and hear his voice because of his atoning sacrifice.

This week, on Thursday, The United States will observe a National Day of Prayer. As you pray this week, be reminded that you are entering the tent of meeting in priestly capacity and carry the ability to bring before God the sins and concerns of your nation.

May we all be empowered to pray beyond a personal conversation and approach God on behalf of our communities and our world.

Like Moses, we approach prayer as an individual, speaking to God through the atoning sacrifice of Christ. But we bring with us all the concerns and cares of our communities and our world. As we pray, the world stands at our backs waiting for us to exit the tent of prayer, and act.

Prayer: The Morning Psalm
Look upon me and answer me, O Lord my God; give light to my eyes, lest I sleep in death… — Psalm 13.3

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Numbers 7 (Listen – 12:50) 
Psalm 42-43 (Listen – 2:32)

Thank You!
Thank you for reading and a huge thank you to those who donate to our ministry, keeping The Park Forum ad-free and enabling us to continue to produce fresh content. Every year our donors help us produce over 100,000 words of free devotionals. Follow this link to support our readers.

Read more about Sewing up the Veil
The scriptures tell us that the veil of the temple was torn in two. Mark and Matthew add the helpful detail that it tore “From top to bottom” implying heavenly agency in its destruction.

Read more about Praying as Priests
Blessing others may go beyond simple kindness as we take on our role as a royal priesthood. Just as the family of Aaron were priests under Aaron, we are priests under Jesus, our high priest.

https://theparkforum.org/843-acres/praying-as-priests/

Psalm 37.7
Be still before the Lord
   and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when people succeed in their ways,
   when they carry out their wicked schemes.

Reflection: Prayer Amidst Evil :: Guided Prayer
By John Tillman

As we celebrate the Easter season, we seek to continue to “throw our hats in the air” in celebration of the victory won by Christ. Yet we still sojourn in a sin-scarred world, filled with loss, sorrow, and pain.

We grieve this week with Christian brothers and sisters across our world. We lift up the burned churches in Louisiana, the burned cathedral of Notre Dame, the bombed churches of Sri Lanka, and the churches of Nigeria whose members are being gunned down in violent attacks. These are our churches, too, for we are one in Christ.

Christ promised we would have trouble in this world, and many people are willing to aid that promise coming true. The world’s powers and governments, in vain, promise us that they can prevent future suffering. But in Christ’s promise we know that until he comes to end this world and begin the next, there will always be a “next time.” Often the perpetrators of “next time” will be the very governments who, in the name of protection, ask for our unwavering support and pressure us to yield to them unrestricted power.

The inevitable next tragedy will come. Whether it is the result of unthinking violence, tragic accident, or premeditated and targeted hatred, we turn to God in prayer, trusting that in past, present, and future sufferings, his grace is sufficient for us.

Prayer Amidst Evil
Lord, we come mourning.
Our eyes flow with tears and our hearts bleed
On behalf of our brothers and sisters.

Be still before the Lord
   and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when people succeed in their ways,
   when they carry out their wicked schemes.

Lord, when we suffer…
When our houses of worship are burned
When our sanctuaries flow with bloodshed
When our fellowship is disrupted by violent killers
May we turn to you.

Refrain from anger and turn from wrath;
   do not fret—it leads only to evil…
A little while, and the wicked will be no more;
   though you look for them, they will not be found.
The Lord laughs at the wicked,
   for he knows their day is coming.

We don’t need vengeance, Lord.
Vengeance belongs to you.
We don’t need worldly power, Lord.
Yours is the power we need.
We don’t need violent reprisals, Lord.
Repentance and revival is needed.

Work in us, to bring this to pass.
Pass by us, and call us to follow.

Prayer: The Request for Presence
O Lamb of God, that takes away the sins of the world, have mercy upon me.
O Lamb of God, that takes away the sins of the world, have mercy upon me.
O Lamb of God, that takes away the sins of the world, grant me your peace.

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Numbers 3 (Listen – 6:01) 
Psalm 37 (Listen – 4:21)

This Weekend’s Readings
Numbers 4 (Listen – 6:11) Psalm 38 (Listen – 2:14)
Numbers 5 (Listen – 4:39) Psalm 39 (Listen – 1:49)

Thank You!
Thank you for reading and a huge thank you to those who donate to our ministry, keeping The Park Forum ad-free and enabling us to continue to produce fresh content. Every year our donors help us produce over 100,000 words of free devotionals. Follow this link to support our readers.

Read more about Truth Unwanted :: A Guided Prayer
Making Jesus known will lead to suffering and rejection. As the world investigates Jesus in our lives, we can expect the same treatment that Jesus received. May we do so, knowing that he is with us in all our suffering.

Read more about The Prayer From the Cross
Join Christ in his suffering, praying excerpts from this psalm prayed on the cross, ending with excerpts from Psalm 30 from our reading for today.

Psalm 36.7-9
How priceless is your unfailing love, O God!
   People take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
They feast on the abundance of your house;
   you give them drink from your river of delights.
For with you is the fountain of life;
   in your light we see light.

From John:
During Holy Week we looked at a section of this work by Nicetus of Remesiana. We will read the middle part of it today, and the rest on our next Throwback Thursday reading.

Reflection: Names of Jesus—Justice, Bread, and Doctor :: Throwback Thursday
By Nicetas of Remesiana (335-414)

He is called justice because through faith in his name sinners are made just; and redemption, because he paid the price in his blood to buy us back— we who had been so long lost.

He is called bread, because by his gospel he fed the hunger of our ignorance; and a stone, both because on him the serpent left no trace and because he afforded us protection.

He is the doctor who came to visit us and cured our weakness and our wounds; the fount of living water, because by the “bath of regeneration” he cleanses sinners and gives them life. He is peace, because he brought together those who lived apart, and reconciled us to God the Father. He is the Resurrection, because he will raise all bodies from their graves; and the judge because it is he who will judge both the living and the dead. He is the door, because it is by him that those who believe enter the kingdom of heaven.

These many names and titles belong to one Lord. Take courage, therefore, O man of faith, and plant your hope firmly in him. If you would learn of the Father, listen to this Word. If you would be wise, ask him who is Wisdom.

When it is too dark for you to see, seek Christ, for He is the Light. Are you sick? Have recourse to him who is both doctor and health. Would you know by whom the would was made and all things are sustained? Believe in him, for he is the arm and right hand. Are you afraid of this or that? Remember that on all occasions he will stand by your side like an angel.

If you find it hard to meet face to face the high majesty of the Only-begotten, do not lose hope. Remember, he was made man to make it easy for men to approach him. If you are innocent, like a lamb he will join your company. If you are saddened by pagan persecution, take courage. Remember that he himself went like a lamb to the slaughter, and, priest that he is, he will offer you up as a victim to the Father. If you do not know the way of salvation, look for Christ, for he is the road for souls. If it is truth that you want, listen to him, for he is the Truth. Have no fear whatever of death, for Christ is the Life of those who believe.

Prayer: The Call to Prayer
Know this: The Lord himself is God; he himself has made us, and we are his; we are his people and the sheep of his pasture. — Psalm 100.2

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
Numbers 2 (Listen – 3:47) 
Psalm 36 (Listen – 1:29)

Thank You!
Thank you for reading and a huge thank you to those who donate to our ministry, keeping The Park Forum ad-free and enabling us to continue to produce fresh content. Every year our donors help us produce over 100,000 words of free devotionals. Follow this link to support our readers.

Read more about Names of Jesus—Priest, Lamb, and Vine :: Throwback Thursday
In the Holy Scriptures there are many names and titles which are applied to our Lord and Saviour, Jesus.

Read more about Remember Jesus Christ
Jesus Christ, as he is attested for us in Holy Scripture, is the one Word of God which we have to hear and which we have to trust and obey in life and in death.