Stories, whatever form they take, have a way of capturing our
imagination and illustrating a truth that we may feel, but may struggle to
articulate in our own words. Perhaps it is because we do not have words that
are close to plumbing the depths of our emotions, maybe it is because we do not
want to feel them so we dare not speak them with the hopes of forgetting,
or maybe we simply we have forgotten to
feel in our hectic lives. And yet expressing one’s emotions is something that
is done on a regular basis in the Bible. The prophet
Jeremiah regularly gives voice to somethings we all know quite well, the emotions of
sadness, anger, frustration, and lament. In Jeremiah 15:15-21 he prays a prayer of anger to
God and if anything, this tells us that we too can do the same.
Have you ever been in a situation where your words could not
express how sad, mad, or low you were feeling? Have you ever felt that these
feelings may not be appropriate for church or might even be harmful to your
faith? If so, you are not alone. Throughout life we experience high and lows
and it is easy to express one’s joys within the church with celebrations like
holidays, the birth of a new child, weddings, etc. However it is often much
more difficult to express one’s pain other than in a funeral setting.
But the Bible has plenty of examples of expressing one’s
sorrow. One of the primary instances is in the lament psalms, or prayers asking
for God’s help. Furthermore, these psalms express deep pain and desire for
God’s healing or saving action. These psalms speak to the low points of life in ways that
are tangible and easily identifiable through metaphors and pleading. We have
all likely found ourselves in the shoes of the psalmist at one point or another
in our life, plainly telling God how things are and asking for help.
The same can be said of Jeremiah. From a young age he knew
that he was called to be one of God’s prophets and readily did so, speaking
God’s message to the people. Yet the people did not like what they heard from
Jeremiah and so they rejected him as well as God’s word to them. After living
like this for a number of years, it is understandable that Jeremiah would be
upset! And so he comes before God to voice his frustration, likely through some
yelling and tears.
But texts like lament psalms and this brutally honest
discussion between God and Jeremiah are often not lifted up in the church for and number of reasons, likely because we choose to not talk about difficult matters and
instead focus on the lighter sides of faith. But Jesus too knew of our pain. He
asked God for his future crucifixion to pass from him if it were possible, he
was betrayed by Judas and beaten, he was crucified, and he lamented on the
cross, “My God my God why have you forsaken me?” (see Psalm 22). Lament scripture
deserves a space within all places that claim to be a church.
Old Testament theologian Walter Brueggeman once wrote of the
importance of sustaining a space for people to lament, “A community of faith
that negates laments soon concludes that the hard issues of justice are
improper questions to pose at the throne, because the throne seems to be only a
place of praise” (Brueggemann, The Costly Loss of Lament, 107). Brueggemann is
arguing that if we are to lose our lament and find them to be improper prayers
to God, then God becomes only a God to whom good things are prayed, perhaps
even only praised. However, if we retain lament as a form of valid, true, and
right prayer as expressed in the Bible, we will find that laments are to be
lifted up in the life of faith and not ignored.
Laments really boil down to a difficult question, “What is
our relationship with God like?” If we experience this relationship to be one
of openness, then laments should be lifted up whenever they are being felt. But
if this relationship is one of God holding power over us, lament becomes
unnecessary in hopes of holding divine favor. I hope that the latter is not the
case because I understand God to be one who is intimately involved with us and indeed
pays attention to all of our needs. It seems to me that we need not hide lament.
One of the most powerful people to teach us how to lament is
Elie Wiesel. He was a Holocaust survivor, who became a professor at the
University of Boston. In his book “One Generation After” he recounts a story of
a local Jewish religious leader during times of deportations and executions of
Jewish people.
It was the beadle’s custom to rush to
the synagogue each morning, to ascend the bimah and shout first with pride, and
then with anger: “I have come to inform you, Master of the Universe, that we
are here.” Then came the first massacre, followed by many others. The beadle
somehow always emerged unscathed. As soon as he could, he would run to the
synagogue, and pounding his fist on the lectern, he would shout at the top of
his voice, “You see, Lord, we are still here.” After the last massacre, he
found himself all alone in the deserted synagogue. The last living Jew, he
climbed the bimah one last time, stared at the Ark and whispered with infinite
gentleness, “You see? I am still here.” He stopped briefly before continuing in
his sad, almost toneless voice, “But you, where are you?
At its core, the lament is witness to a profound faith that
takes God seriously and takes our relationship with God seriously. This means
there has to be dialogue. There has to be exchange in open and honest ways.
There can be no holding back. Everything is on the table: doubt, anger,
despair, guilt, resentment. There is no requirement of politeness. There is no
need for gentility. If the relationship is authentic, then it can endure and
even thrive on the honest and candid expression of all of the hurtful feelings.
These feelings have to be spoken in order for them to be dealt with. Silence in
the face of hurt does no good. The anguish of life calls for speech, for words,
for prayer.
In the life of faith, the lament remains difficult as it
should. There is nothing easy about lament. But prayed in its fullness and
voiced from the depths, it provides a bold act of faith. From out of the
depths, the lament teaches us—and has taught us—that the darkness will not
overcome us. Our pain can be spoken and named. Our hurt can be lifted up and
heard. Our cries can come from our heart. We can rest assured nothing, nothing
at all, can separate us from the love of God.
