SPEAKING THE LANGUAGE OF LAMENT

Seeing such suffering recently, I am reminded again how important it is for the Church to talk about + welcome + shepherd the process of lamentation. That is, cries that find their trust in God. As Americans, we often don't know what to do with grieving. 

I know I get labeled as the "feelings" guy, and get asked "can't we just talk about happy things" (ha!) -- but I've felt compelled to study grief (including my own) and how to best walk with others in times of sorrow (and the resulting life changes), because it helps avoid the 3 traps I've seen: 

1- SELF-MEDICATION = when we deny our grief and pain, and we turn to only outside things to fill the void (entertainment, food, alcohol, sex, working out, etc) -- and it doesn't fulfill in the end. 

2- PAIN-COMPLICATION = when we bottle it all up inside, and at the next loss or the one after (which will happen), we explode in anger or extreme despair -- wrapping it all into one. 

3- SELF-IDENTIFICATION = when we no longer remember our identity as a child of God or follower of Christ, but instead give in to blame, bitterness, isolation -- labeling ourselves solely as victim. 

Having someone beside us through LAMENTATION, offering presence + perspective + prayers (i.e. hope) can mean a world of difference. Some things I've learned in healthy grieving: 

1- NAMING THE LOSS = It's important to acknowledge-- naming what has been lost. This includes grieving the primary loss, and realizing the scope of the secondary losses (which ripple from and often re-awaken the grief). The loss doesn't define our lives, but it does become a part of our story. 

2- HONORING THE PROCESS = Grief has different timing and length, depending on the person and loss. It's good to be around those who remove fear of judgment (and not demand you grieve "their way" or "move on") and give freedom from embarrassment (for when you revisit things you feel you should "be over by now"). Though I'd note, if all you hear is "Praise God!" and "I'm good"--be sure they feel permission and room to grieve, and are not trying to mask with forced faith or strength due to perceived pressure or felt timeline to "get over it" or "be superhuman." Jesus wept. 

3- SHARING THE EMPATHY = When you face loss, you gain a newfound empathy...and often, community. You identify deeply with others in their sorrow--and often get a new voice and new relationships, as you embrace a new normal (while reconnecting with spiritual community, responsibilities, and everyday life). Giving to others is part of personal healing. Comfort comes to us, so that it flows through us (2 Corinthians 1:3-5). 

I'm a big fan of recovery programs, but if we first walked (or just sat) better with others during sorrow and suffering--we wouldn't always be speaking to only sin and symptoms. It's okay to cry out. It's okay to grieve. {To God, in hope. -- that's the eventual and eternal aim.} Worship is also offering God my broken heart, and watching Him lovingly accept the pieces (Psalm 51:17). And having God continue to bring the sad, lonely, and hurting into my path has also been one of the greatest privileges in my life.

 

Thanking God for Revealing the Hidden Things

I recently read this beautiful prayer of Daniel from Daniel 2:19-23, and it made me “think a thought I’d never thunk before”:

“Blessed be the name of God forever and ever

to whom belong wisdom and might.

He changes times and seasons;

he removes kings and sets up kings;

he gives wisdom to the wise

and knowledge to those who have understanding;

he reveals deep and hidden things;

he knows what is in the darkness,

and the light dwells with him.

To you, O God of my fathers,

I give thanks and praise,

for you have given me wisdom and might,

and have now made known to me what we asked of you,

for you have made known to us the king's matter.”

That thought was: it’s a good and holy thing (which I need to practice) to thank and praise God after He teaches me something new (i.e illuminates the timeless truth of His Word) in Bible study and at church.  It’s the result of His grace.

After all, Daniel’s not the only one to praise God for opening the eyes of his heart.  Jesus, rejoicing in the Holy Spirit, took time to thank the Father for revealing to us “little children” the things that are hidden (Luke 10:21-24).  He told the disciples: “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.”

Paul says it this way (in 1 Corinthians 2:6-16): “Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God… The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned…. ‘For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?’ But we have the mind of Christ.”

Wow!  We can know and understand the truth of God’s Word because God has given us the Spirit, who searches out the wisdom of God, and reveals it to the mind of Christ who is able to discern it… which was also given to us, as His body!

Yet unbelieving minds have been blinded to truth by the god of this world, Satan (2 Corinthians 4:4).  That’s why Paul also instructs Timothy to “not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will” (2 Timothy 2:24-26).

So that’s what hit me: Don’t take the Bible for granted.  Don’t take access to and study of the Bible for granted.  Don’t take faithful and anointed expository teachers for granted.  And surely don’t take His grace for granted, which allows us, the redeemed in Christ, to see things into which even angels long to look (1 Peter 1:12).

May the “eyes of our hearts be enlightened” (Ephesians 1:18), and may we thank God for teaching even us, the “uneducated and common” (Acts 4:13) and the “weak and foolish” (1 Corinthians 1:27).

Finding the Light in the Dark

If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me, 

and the light about me be night,” 

even the darkness is not dark to you;

the night is bright as the day, 

for darkness is as light with you. 

Psalm 139:11-12

I love documentaries. Especially those about the ocean depths.  Experts say we know more about space than we do the depths of the oceans and our planet core.

I was watching one show where they sent exploration crafts to the bottom of a sea, expecting that they would find utter nothingness.  It was assumed that in the absence of light and the life-giving process of photosynthesis, nothing could survive.  However, when they arrived at the bottom… there was not only life… it was teeming.

There was abundance.  And it was discovered that chemosynthesis (using energy derived from reactions involving inorganic chemicals) also brought about life.  Hence, maybe the creation story wasn’t so crazy after all—there could still be life before the fourth day.

And all this got me thinking about the darkness we fear in our own journeys.  Not a day goes by that I don’t encounter a friend (new or old) facing prolonged singleness, isolation, or loneliness; sadness, hurting, or grief; change, separation, or uncertainty.

One of the greatest comforts I have found, and that I try my best to share, is that there is life in the unexpected places too. It may look different, even scary (have you seen the creatures they pull from there?), and the sources which sustain you may be surprising (not the sunshine above, but what’s bubbling up around)…

But we can find His light in our dark. We have a God who still loves and leads us on the unknown paths and the rough roads—when we feel blinded, afraid, surrounded by the fog.

He declares: “I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know; in paths that they have not known, I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground. These are the things I do, and I do not forsake them.” (Isaiah 42:16). 

Just as in the depths, where we might expect nothingness, God delights to reveal His glory—His handiwork, His artistry, His imagination—and it is often an unexpected sight.  Yet the deep (as Psalm 42:7 says) calls out to deep: “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!” (quote: Abraham Kuyper) 

It’s a little like Elijah—where the presence of God was not out in the earthquake, or the wind storm, or the fire.  Instead, the voice of God came to him in the darkness of the cave—that still, small voice amidst the solitude (1 Kings 19).  Or perhaps like where Elijah expected to find provision—at his feet, at the river, which soon dried up.  Rather, it came from the sky—where the ravens dropped it (1 Kings 17:6-7). We don’t always know where to look—only that God does indeed provide all that is necessary for life.

Nevertheless, it is true there is no life apart from the Son.  But here’s the amazing thing I’ve found—He is with us in the valley of the shadows too.  There is no place we can go or find ourselves, where His presence is not there with us.  The darkness is not dark to Him. The night is as bright as day. Deep cries out—He is here! Do not be afraid, for the dark is as light to Him.  Jesus is our light—and He is life. 

If you are feeling profoundly alone, sad, or uncertain today—know that I am praying for you. And that there is life in the dark. Even at the bottom, you can find abundance.