לפני מי אתה עומד
Please read that again. And again, but this time SLLLOWWWLLLY. Now try it backwards. Allow each word to embrace your soul; allow each word to flow through you with every breath. Now, repeat it – all of it – out loud. Repeat it with your eyes closed and your heart open. Abide in that stillness of his His immutable grace. As you breath; feel your skin. Grant yourself the magnificent peace a moment in that silent stillness of His immutable grace. With each allow yourself to remain wrapped in His arms secure in the solace instantaneously recognized by your heart. Then, do it all over again. My hope for you, my prayer for you, is that it moves you the way and it does (did), me. I want your scalp to tingle. I want your socks to feel at least 3 sizes=and your socks feel a teensy bit too small, and your fingernails feel like maybe you can feel them growing and your nose feels like if you pinch it it’ll make that clown noise (kidding about that one). My point it, if you take that sentence, turn it over in your mind, allow your soul to savor and devour it, you just might find the piece (peace) you’ve been missing.
A few weeks hence, as I skimmed Apple News+, a human-interest piece that had been published sometime last Spring piqued my interest. (Full disclosure: I allow myself 15 minutes of news a day as what tends to pass as ‘news’ because subjecting myself to more ‘news’ feels akin to rubbing sandpaper across my eyeballs. This particular morning, the WSJ had published an article, a human-interest piece, really, published in the WSJ out of human-interest about Ruth Wisse, The Iron Lady of the American Jewish Right (WSJ, May 22, 2026)), received the highest honor bestowed by the National Endowment for the Humanities; she was asked to deliver their Jefferson Lecture. As she addressed her audience, her voice joined those of such notables who preceded, men and women like Martha Nussbaum, Ken Burns, John Updike, Martin Scorcese (Yes, thatScorcese.), and Arthur Miller. But this piece isn’t about Wisse’s phenomenal life and accomplishments. Instead, it is about the sentence that precedes our lives, and while I wouldn’t know Ms. Wisse II ran into her in the grocery story, I’d stand on the side of saying that she, too, would breathe in and out and in again to center her life before Him before whom we stand.
“Know before whom you stand,” is often carved above the ark in synagogues. In some Jewish traditions the words serve as a reminder of the posture to be assumed by the p petitioner in God’s Holy Presence, especially the posture to be assumed during prayer. I respect that, find beauty in it, wish I could cup it in my palm and turn it like a piece of carved crystal and find the seemingly infinite rainbows cast by His sun.
I am not Jewish, and so, I think my take on this inherent calling to each of our souls is different. While I heed the admonishment of reverence, what I hear with complete clarity is that in everything I do, in every life I touch, in every word I speak, in every minute action I take – He is there. He is not there and does not love me as any human could because he simply isn’t human. He is not man; he is God. He loves me, but not in the same manner that I love. He protects me, but not in a manner that any human is capable of protecting or even understanding. He hears me, knows me, everything about me – good, bad, terrifying, earthshattering, and mundane. He can heal all of these year after year after year gut-wrenching, dream-crushing illnesses, but has His own reasons for not. And, though it may be through tears and on my knees, it is ultimately with the surrender and the deep abiding thanksgiving that He is God, and I am not.
Please, in love, know before whom you stand because He is for more than you could ever hope.
The Unexpected Life 