Learning to Lament

First it was the coronavirus. Wrecking our economy, killing the vulnerable, driving us out of fellowship with one another an into our homes. Then came the restlessness, the yearning to “get back to normal,” which began stirring up debates among friends that spilled over into protests and yelling matches online. Then came the news of a black man, gunned down while on a run by two vigilantes for a crime he didn’t commit. Then came the news of another black man, senselessly killed under the knee of a man who had sworn to serve and protect, which felt to many of us like deja vu.

I, as well as many of you, I’m sure, have heard a lot about what we as Christians ought to “keep in mind” over the last few months. We ought to remember that the Lord is sovereign, and that neither the coronavirus nor the murder of the innocent falls outside of the bounds of His will. We ought to remember that the Lord has many potential purposes for the coronavirus and for these recent events. In light of that, we ought to remember that whatever those purposes, that they are good because He is good, and that “all things work together for good,” for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28). We ought to remember that vengeance is the Lord’s. We ought to remember that the Lord grieves the loss of innocent life. We ought to remember that regardless of the trials that come upon us during this season, whether it be sickness, unemployment, depression, loneliness, oppression, or anything else, that the Lord sees the pain of the sufferers, and hears the cries of the mourning, and He will provide for us in our time of need.

We really ought to remember these things, to treasure them in our heart and meditate upon them. But what about those of us who do not solely need to find comfort and encouragement? What about those of us who behold the carnage and the destruction being wrought upon the world by this microscopic murderer and feel something more than fear? What about those of us who watch yet another unarmed, black man be senselessly killed and want to do nothing but scream? What about those of us who, in our most honest moments, respond in our hearts to this season with anger? Not just any anger, but anger fueled by sorrow.

What does the coronavirus and racism reveal about the world? That it is broken. That things are not the way that they ought to be. These things are a product of the “breaking of the world” (to borrow a phrase from Robert Jordan) which we read about in Genesis 3. Just like death, violence, corruption, and famine. And “sorrowful anger” is a perfectly reasonable response to that.

I have felt this anger. It’s born in sorrow, produced in a context where we behold injustice and brokenness and find ourselves overwhelmed by our own powerlessness against it. 

It cannot be anger at God Himself, lest we accuse him of injustice on His part. Rather, it is an anger at sin. At the ways that it has sunk it’s teeth into this world that God created and corrupted it.

How dare it. How dare it take that which was supposed to be good, and turn it into a twisted version of what it was intended to be. How dare it drive us into our homes, apart from friends and family. How dare it stir up hate and prejudice in the hearts of men. How dare it kill our family and friends. How dare it run our medical providers ragged.

So what do we do with righteous anger in this season? We lament.

Lament is a uniquely Christian response to injustice and brokenness. I say it is uniquely Christian because it is saturated in a true and lasting hope. It is the expression of a groaning that, if expressed in the context of this hope, should cause us to drop to our knees, look upward, spread our hands, and cry out for God to work to correct all that is wrong. Outside of the context of hope, it produces cynicism and bitterness, causing us not to lament, but to lash out irrationally and cast stones of blame towards anyone we think may be responsible, including God.

What is our hope? That God Himself is as moved to anger and sorrow by the brokenness of the world as we are. More so, even. Not only that, but that He has actually taken action to correct it by coming into the world Himself, being subjected to this brokenness and injustice, and giving up His own life in order to break the power of sin and usher in His Kingdom.

God was even so gracious as to give us language of lament in His word. The Psalms are full of prayers of lament (13, 74, 102, 130 are a few examples). Jesus expresses lament on the cross (Mark 15:34). The Lord even gave us an entire book of lament (The Book of Lamentations)!

The gracious thing about lament, is that it is a place where God meets us where we’re at. We don’t need to posture ourselves or pretend to be okay. We can be honest with Him, and He is faithful to draw near to us and whisper “I understand.” He does not turn away our lament, nor is he disappointed and condemn us for unbelief. He invites us to draw near and be vulnerable in the safest place we can be.

For those of us like me, who feel that sorrowful anger during this season, may we not be as those who do not have any hope. Yes, we ought to remember the glorious truths found in Scripture, but may we also learn to lament. To go before the Lord in our sorrow and anger and cry out. May we be vulnerable before the Lord, and let the Spirit work in us to remind us who He is. May we not hide. May we find in that lament the strength in knowing that our prayers are heard and that the Lord is working to correct all that is wrong. Including viruses and racism.

Resting in the Green Grass

Over the last several months, (perhaps longer) my prayer life has been a struggle for me. I haven’t had any problems sitting down to read God’s word, or even to meditate on it. But for some reason, when it comes to responding to God’s revelation or to the beauty and majesty revealed in my meditation, I stall. Perhaps that says more about my motivation in coming to the Word of God. Am I approaching this gift for the purpose of expanding my knowledge about God, and to check another passage off of my list, or am I approaching it for the purpose of beholding God and coming to know Him.

So last week, as I sat down to do my morning devotional at the beginning of the day, I felt a tug at my heart to do something that I hadn’t done in months. I felt the Lord inviting me to pray through a Psalm. It wasn’t a part of my plan, or a part of my normal routine, but I knew before opening my Bible that it was something that my soul needed. So I did, without any sense of which Psalm I would pray through, and start “scrolling,” if you will, until I landed on Psalm 23. Not surprisingly, it was exactly what I needed to hear that morning.

As many of you already know, Psalm 23 came up in Pastor Todd’s sermon a couple of weeks ago. It seems as if the truths in this short passage are something that I, and I think all of us, ought to pay attention to during this present season.

Like many of us, I have found that if there is one thing that this pandemic has forced me to do, it is to be still. Almost frustratingly still. There is nowhere to go, nothing to do, nobody to see. It may not be a sustainable way of life, but perhaps it’s a grace that we have been given for a time. We live in a culture that values “busyness,” and it’s a value that has bled into the church and infiltrated our own value system. It’s a point that has been made by many before me, so I won’t belabor it now, but it’s a valid point. The truth is that God did not save us so that we could be busy. He saved us so that we could rest. So that we could be still, and know that He is God.

And if we weren’t going to obey His command on our own, maybe, by His grace, He forced us to obey it. He made us lie down in the green grass.

Why? So that our souls could be restored. It’s in the stillness, the quiet of a green pasture by a still, gleaming lake that we enter into a space where God’s grace binds the wounds of our hearts and restores to our weary souls the strength and fullness that has been drained away by our “busyness.” It’s what we need, and perhaps one of His purposes in this whole pandemic is to lovingly ensure that we get the soul-care that we can’t go without.

“Yes,” one may object, “but what about the economy? What about my need for social interaction? What about X, Y, or Z?”

I shall not want.

Let those words wash over you. You shall not want. Why? Because the Lord your Shepherd will provide for your every need. That is not to diminish the significant trials of this present season. Lost jobs, greater struggles with depression, or COVID-19. These are real and terrible trials, but in this midst of these trials, this truth remains; Though you may walk through the valley of the shadow of death, in the shadow of economic collapse and an increasingly fragile state of mental and physical health, the Lord is with you. You shall not want. All you need, He will provide. Perhaps this is a truth that we would not otherwise believe, if not for these present trials.

We don’t need to be busy, we can rest. I can’t speak for the Lord as to what he is doing during this unprecedented time, but perhaps He wishes to teach us this lesson. That no matter how long this lasts, He will provide for you. He will protect you. You are commanded to be still, and let your soul be restored by the grace that is at work when we aren’t. I’d invite you to pray through this Psalm, as I did, and praise God for these glorious truths, repent of your disobedience to sit in the green grass, and ask for the grace to do so and to believe what He has promised you. My hope for me, and for you, is that when this is all over, we would be more obedient to this command.