Daily Manna, Year Two · Day 221 · August 9
Out of the Dust
“He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill;”
He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill. Hannah said that first, on her feet in Shiloh, having handed her only son to a priest she hardly knew and walked home without him.
Generations later the psalm says it back to her with nobody's name attached. He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill. One voice is a woman's own case, the other a congregation's liturgy sung by people who may never have been near a dunghill. Then notice where Psalm 113 chooses to finish, after all its height, the LORD is high above all nations, and his glory above the heavens: He maketh the barren woman to keep house, and to be a joyful mother of children. Hannah's exact situation, placed last, as the example the psalm ends on. Centuries later a young woman in Nazareth picks up the same tune unprompted. He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree.
Psalms 113 to 118 are what Israel sang at Passover, which makes this ordinary congregational singing, learned by children, sung by people in every condition at once. So, a line old enough that it was being sung over you before you were born. Somebody in your building who has been where verse seven starts and can still get through it without stopping. A God described as having to stoop to see anything at all, in heaven or on earth, and looking at the dust when he does. And your own case, if it is ever sung, ending up in somebody else's mouth long after you have stopped needing it.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 221 is The LORD on My Side (Psalm 118:6).