by Ryan T. biblical lament soothes the suffering and disrupts the comfortable Bad news swirls around us blowing our hopes and dreams like leaves in the fall wind. A long awaited for baby born to parents who have already seen their share of hardship only to be taken away days later, Eleven Jewish worshipers gunned down during Shabbat services, neighbors who have the calling to protect one another and work for the common good together instead choose to ignore, violate and even attack one another. These are just a few examples of the violence and loss from this past week for me. I deeply struggle to sit with the pain, betrayal, loss, and fear that wash over me. I have learned to stuff and avoid these uncomfortable emotions. Dan Allender articulates it this way, Ignoring our emotions is turning our back on reality. Listening to our emotions ushers us into reality. And reality is where we meet God…Emotions are the language of the soul. They are the cry that gives the heart a voice…However, we often turn a deaf ear—through emotional denial, distortion, or disengagement. We not only have our own suffering but can easily be overwhelmed by the numbers of people who are forgotten by our society—the last, the least, and the lost among us—and wonder who is there to help and to save them from drowning. It is hard to keep our eyes open to suffering. It drains the soul and numbs the heart. It is in these times that lament can become a precious companion. We can take great comfort in the loud cries and mourning that have echoed throughout time and history as captured in the poems, songs, and statements of lament. Indeed, a great portion of the Hebrew Scriptures comes in the form of lament, both individual and communal lament In the psalms of lament, the anguished cries of the prophets, and in the life and ministry of Jesus, there are pioneers who have gone before all who grieve and suffer. They have experienced the terror of all the twists and turns, the drops and descents of human life. They gave voice to their lament. A biblical lament cries out to God. This is not an internally focused process of grieving, it is first and foremost a prayer, a conversation. A lament deals with a specific situation that is painful, or unjust and expresses our raw emotional responses: sorrow, anger, disappointment, etc. Below is a lament written by Ann Weems that is helping me learn to lament. O Holy One, I can no longer see.
Blinded by tears that will not cease, I can only cry out to you and listen for your footsteps Are you, too, O God, blinded by tears? Have you watched this world pile its hate onto the faces of your little ones until your eyes are so filled with tears the you cannot see me waiting for you? Are you, O God, deafened by the expletives of destruction and death? Have you heard so many obscenities that you cannot hear my moaning? O God, if you are blind, can't you hold out your hand to me? If you're deaf, can't you call my name? How long, O God, am I to sit on the plain of blindness? How long am I to listen to the profanity of my enemies who mock: "Where is your God now?" Show them, O my God, that you remember. Reach out your hand and dry my eyes that I might see a new beginning Open your mouth and call me by name that I might know you remember me. Claim me that I might announce in the marketplace that my God is here. O my heart, give thanks! My God is here even in the midst of destruction -Lament written by Ann Weems
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