The Message, July 14, 2024: "Created for What?" Psalm 104:1-24

Author: Rev. Scott W. Cousineau
July 16, 2024

 

“Created for What?”
A Message by Rev. Scott W. Cousineau
Psalm 104:1-24

            I would like to begin this morning’s message with a completely unnecessary admission. The message for today took a slight detour from what I had imagined that my path might be when I did my worship planning a few weeks ago. I say “unnecessary” because nobody in this room knew what that original path was other than me. I suppose that I share it because I want you to share the journey with me.

            Earlier this week, I stumbled upon a YouTube video of Acoustic Physicist John Stuart Reid talking about an amazing discovery that he had made in a visit to the pyramids in Egypt. In 1996, Reid travelled to the pyramids with his father and were in the King’s Chamber. Reid said that he laid down inside the sarcophagus and started to hum. As he did so, he felt vibrations throughout his body. He said that it was an amazing feeling.

            Later that year, he returned and performed some acoustic studies of the King’s Chamber and the sarcophagus. Intrigued by his results, he returned the following year to perform a cymatic analysis of the same space.

            Cymatics is the study of visible sound. Perhaps you have visited a science museum and had the opportunity to explore cymatics without realizing what you were doing. There is sometimes an exhibit that includes a flat surface covered with sand or powder, with a speaker mounted below the surface. Then as you change the frequency that the speaker produces the sound creates different shapes in the sand or powder. That is cymatics, studying the shape of sound. As it turns out, sound is NOT a wave, it is a bubble.

            Anyway, as Dr. Reid was conducting his experiment, he realized that the pain in his back from an injury that he had suffered three weeks earlier had disappeared. It was not simply the case that his body was coursing with adrenaline. It was something more. When he returned to his lab, he tested a hypothesis he had developed. He exposed vials of blood to sound waves of various frequencies and found that certain frequencies the oxygen molecules in the blood would expand!

            Now … I know that I am in danger of geeking out on the physics here. My apologies. The former physics major still resides within me. I hope that you are still with me.

            Those sound and blood experiments began an exploration of music or sound medicine.

            Then, yesterday afternoon as I was mowing the parts of the lawn that are not crispy, burnt and dormant … walking back and forth, back and forth … I began thinking about harmonic resonance. For some reason, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse came to mind. Perhaps you have seen those videos in one of your science classes.

            In 1940, just months after opening, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapsed. The bridge had become known as “Galloping Gertie” because of the way that it would sway on windy days. Unfortunately, the engineers that designed the bridge did not take harmonic resonance into account. When the wind blew, the cables supporting the bridge deck would vibrate. The short ones at a higher frequency and the longer ones at a lower frequency. Just like the strings on Jacqui’s piano. The problem was that the longer cables would vibrate at the same frequency as the steel beams that were beneath the bridge deck. On windy days the cables would vibrate, then the deck would begin to vibrate in the familiar sine wave pattern. On the day in question, a sustained forty mile per hour wind resulted in dramatic undulation of the bridge until it collapsed into the bay.

            Then as I mowed, I realized that this message is going to sound more like a TED Talk than a sermon.

            Speaking of a TED Talk … the algorithm in my brain sent me to a talk offered by Dr. Lee Bartel on the topic of music medicine. His talk explored experiments that he did to further the work of Dr. Reid. Dr. Bartel used sound stimulation … vibrations created by sound at a specific frequency … to help and even heal people with specific ailments.

            And all of that led me back to our psalm for today. Finally!!

            Psalm 104 is an exuberant, effusive, lyrical expression of joy. The psalm is full of wonder and praise. The verses contain the joy of the psalmist AND the joy of God. Psalm 103 and Psalm 104 are typically considered to be a couplet. They are the only two psalms that begin and end with the line, “Bless the Lord, O my soul!” (Or “Praise the Lord, O my soul,” depending upon your translation.) Psalm 103 sings of the abounding and steadfast love of God, and Psalm 104 sings of the innumerable creatures made and sustained by God.

            Psalm 103 ends with the charge to “praise the Lord.” And Psalm 104 tells us why and how … because all of God’s wonderful works bless us. God is the Source, the Author, the Poet of Creation and the faithful … created and sustained by God … will work to care for Creation. Creation is a gift from God, a blessing. It is not an exclusive blessing that is intended only for humans, the blessing is for all of God’s creatures. Our place is in all of this is to work the garden in harmony with all of God’s creatures and created.

            Here is where the harmonic resonance enters into the equation. Humankind is meant to have the same rhythm as Nature. The vibrations of Nature should resonate in our souls, within our very being.

            Which is precisely what happens in cymatics. Sound imprints on membranes … all membranes. Sound imprints upon the membranes in the human body. The very make-up, the composition of our physical bodies resonates with sound.

            As we listen to and read the psalm, we might notice that the psalmist does not assume that human beings are any better or more important than the other parts of Creation. “The Lord God made them ALL.” Rather, we are part of the fabric of Creation. We are threads in the tapestry. The rhythms and patterns of Creation are woven into our DNA. Caring for the Garden, good stewardship of Creation is actually in our own best interest. Any disruptions to Creation also disrupt us.

            The psalm took the scientific knowledge of that age and saw the theological implications. Even the science of three thousand years ago saw the shapes, the patterns, the functions and the relationships within Creation. And these two coupled psalms thank and praise God for those blessings.

            The psalm concludes with the absolute dependence of all creatures upon God. The Spirit of God is the Source of Life in every sense that the word “life” can have. It is the Spirit of God that animates us; that moves in us and through us, that inspires us. The Spirit of God, the Breath of God … ru’ah … is our breath. It is Creation’s breath.

            So then, for what are we created?

            Did God just create the universe on whim? Did God create all that there is then sit back to watch the show? Did God create our earth only to send us spinning off into the universe like a child’s plaything?

            Or did God create everything intentionally? Was there a plan, a purpose, a design in the heart and mind of God? My guess is that all … or most … of us here this morning would answer the last two questions with a resounding “yes!”

            Scientists of this era are rediscovering what has been known for thousands of years. The vibrations of Creation are life-giving and restorative. There is a reason that people find such calm and comfort at the ocean. The ocean resonates with a frequency between fourteen to thirty hertz. Dr. Bartel in his studies determined that our bodies respond to those low frequencies.

            We are created to live in rhythm with, in harmony with all of Creation. We are created through the blessing of God’s love to tend that blessing, to care for that blessing to help maintain God’s harmony. We are created to live as the threads that make up the beautiful tapestry of Creation. We are created to sing our part in the great chorus, in unity and in harmony with all Creation.

            The reality is that we can never even begin to grasp the awesomeness of the nature of God. We cannot capture the intimacy or the power of God’s life-giving Spirit. We cannot see God, but we can see God’s Glory all around us. We can see God’s love, and God’s power, and God’s care, and God’s grace … and then we can sing God’s praise by being God’s song. Let us sing! Amen.

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