Ps. 30.19-20 (convergence: hidden and revealed)

“How abundant / is your goodness – that you / have set aside / for those / that fear you – that you have done / for those / who seek refuge / in you – in the sight / of the sons of men.” For the psalmist the covenant has, in a sense, become reignited. The light of Yhwh’s face is now streaming down upon him. This verse begins as the ‘positive’ counterpoint to the previous curses leveled against the wicked. The ‘blessings’ contained here are described as ‘abundant’. There is a lavishness to this description, a sense of Yhwh’s goodness that is overflowing, almost prodigal. This ‘goodness’ is described as being ‘set aside’ and then is, alternatively, described as ‘done for those who seek refuge in you.’ The sense of removal, contained in ‘set aside’, is important because it begins a dynamic that will be fleshed out in the following verses: that of withdrawal into Yhwh and public vindication. Notice, this ‘set aside’ is something that is “in the sight of the sons of men.” The ‘abundance’ of Yhwh is then manifested in this dual action of “taking to himself” and publicly displaying. For one to “in Yhwh” is no private affair, to be covenanted and to have that covenant realized, is a fully public display of justification. The righteous become a spectacle. This dynamic continues in the following verses: “You will / hide them / in the hiding place / of your face –from the conspiracies / of man; - you will / set them aside / in a shelter – from the strife / of tongues.” The images and patterns of the psalm here become very intertwined. The psalm has requested throughout that Yhwh be the ‘refuge’; it has asked that he ‘guide and lead’ him so as to help him avoid the nets the wicked have ‘hidden’ for him. It has, likewise, shown Yhwh’s face to be ‘shining’—and image important to the unstated darkness of the wicked (why he needs ‘leading and guiding’). It has, also, begun a dynamic of ‘refug’e and ‘display’. Here, these various strands come together. The ‘shining face’ becomes here the ‘refuge’. Hence, the ‘shining face’ becomes darkness to the wicked (and light to the righteous)—the wicked will not be able to find the righteous in Yhwh’s face. Now, it is Yhwh will accomplish the ultimate ‘hiding’, thwarting the wicked men’s ‘hidden nets’. And yet, this ‘hiding’ will come to be the greatest of all public displays—it will be “in the sight of the sons of man.” It is here, in this public display, that the psalmist true complaint will find its full answer. His complaint has been, throughout, that he is subject to shame. Shame, as we have said, is the attack on the individual’s public ‘I’. By ‘hiding’ the psalmist in himself, condemning the wicked, and lifting up the psalmist for everyone to see, Yhwh directly addresses this attack on the psalmist and heals in the most profound possibly way—by public displaying the righteous as victorious. One final way these verses pick up on something prior: just as the psalmist has placed himself in Yhwh’s hands, so now will Yhwh accept that gift, and take it to himself (“hiding place of your face”). This ‘hiding place of the face’ is a rather marvelous image of what we have called “the covenantal dark night of the soul” as well that dark nights ‘source’ (the face). The dynamic of revelation and hiddenness, of ‘taking to oneself’ and of giving, seems to me very close to what the gospel of John will describe of Jesus mission: as his ‘abiding’ in the father in so far as he is ‘sent’ by the father (in is simultaneously hidden in the father’s face and made completely public (missioned) at the same time).