From Anguish In Circumstances To Hope In God
BRD REFLECTIONS
Lamentations 1 and Psalm 55 (NIV)
(Phoebe Yee, Missionary Associate)
READ:
Lamentations 1 and Psalm 55 (NIV)
OBSERVE:
Anguish. Despair. Shame. These are the words that came to my mind after reading Lamentations 1 and Psalm 55.
In Lamentations, the people of Jerusalem are devastated after their homeland was conquered by their enemies, the Babylonians. Each of the five songs/chapters in the Book of Lamentations employs the 22 Hebrew letters to poetically express the grief and despair of the people.
The Jews experienced deep loss – they lost what was familiar and beloved to them. Their loved ones and friends had forsaken them (v2). They were experiencing deep shame (v8 and 9). They lost even the basic means of survival – they were hungry and had no food to eat (v11). Even God seemed to be nowhere in sight and it appeared that He had turned his back on His people (v13, 15 and 17). The Jews had little or no hope in their lives.
Similarly in Psalm 55, King David experienced anguish and despair as he faced opposition and taunts by his enemies (v3). What made it worse was that he was betrayed by a trusted friend (v12-14)! He wished he could escape this suffering (v6-7) and wanted to see justice done against those who opposed him (v9 and 15). Unlike the Jews in Lamentations, King David had more hope and trust in God.
APPLY:
Aren’t the words of the people of Jerusalem and of King David familiar as we fast forward in time to the days of our Lord Jesus Christ? Jesus Himself experienced such intense anguish and despair, even to the point of death (Matthew 26:38). He asked for God to take the cup away from him three times as the burden was too great to bear. He was eventually betrayed by one of his closest friends, Judas, and shamed by being tortured and killed in the most brutal Roman punishment of crucifixion.
Growing up in a family which does not really talk about emotions, I learnt to suppress my feelings and not express myself too much. As I grew older, I became more and more aware about the psychosomatic effects of suppressing my emotions. When I was going through an extremely stressful season several years ago, I experienced bad body aches, itchy skin rashes and severe stomach aches (the writer of Lamentations 1 mentioned about a churning stomach in v20 which I can well relate to!).
DO:
Eventually, I learnt that it is okay to verbalise my emotions and to talk about them. It is in naming my emotions that I found liberation and healing. Even when the problems do not go away, I gain greater inner strength to face them. Up to today, I consciously practise talking about my emotions as it does not come naturally to me.
The people in the Bible, from the Jews to King David and Jesus, did not withhold expressing their inmost negative thoughts and emotions. It is in acknowledging and verbalising pain that healing can be found. It is in experiencing darkness, that we can experience light and hope.
PRAY:
Dear Heavenly Father, thank You for giving us Your Bible which so wonderfully documents not only the good, but also the bad times that Your people had gone through. The raw emotions expressed by Your people in the Bible are comforting reminders that we can also approach You directly without any inhibitions through Jesus Christ, who Himself had emptied Himself by taking the form of a servant and born in the likeness of men (Philippians 2:7), experiencing the whole gamut of emotions from anguish, despair, pain, to joy and hope. We can also cry out to You to express our emotions when we face challenges. May the healing and restoration of Jesus Christ come to us as we experience this truth and live in the light and hope that You have given us. In Christ’s name we pray, Amen!
