Lament
Lament
Dearest Heavenly Father, Lord Jesus Christ, and feminine Spirit, hear my humble prayer.
A wounded heart bleeds.
It feels like the bleeding won’t stop.
The intensity of the pain waxes and wanes yet fails to dissipate.
The loss, the confusion, the unsettledness tear the wound wider.
I should have seen it coming. The knife was visible from miles away.
The truth was right in front of me, but I cloaked my eyes behind a veil of what I wanted to believe.
Beloved Lord, Knower of all things, Lover of all creation, I trust you.
This pain, this hurt, will heal. It will transform my heart and make it stronger.
But God, I need you to help me get through this safely. I need you to help me take care of myself through this pain so I can hear you. So the veil upon my eyes can be removed and I can see the truth you’ve been trying to show me.
I want to see Lord, but the veil and the hurt are getting in the way.
Hold me tenderly, God. Envelop me in your love while I move through this. Help me refrain from emotionally harming myself and those around me. Help me process through this chaos of emotions. Help me get to a new understanding. Help me work towards a new perspective. Help me see and accept the truth and move forward.
Ever-loving God, as I write these words I can feel your Spirit moving through me. She is deepening my understanding and shifting my perspective. The bottled-up tension is beginning to release. There is a long way to go but it will get better because You are with me. Thank you for loving me so completely and unconditionally. Thank you for teaching me what it means to be loved so fully.
Amen.
This assignment was intimidating, cathartic, and interesting. I’ve never written a psalm so I appreciated the lecture that broke down the elements of a lament psalm. I like learning about structure and form. Structure and form give me a place to start. I have no illusions that the psalm I wrote above is at all noteworthy, but it’s a start.
The Costly Loss of Lament by Walter Brueggemann inspired me to try to write a psalm. Brueggemann talked about how neglecting lament conditions people to think that the feelings that lead to lament aren’t valid and a regular part of the human experience. This causes people to hold their feelings in and not express them. Those feelings then metastasize into shame, blame, regret and judgement which can often lead to numbing and addiction.
Feelings are so hard. They are hard to feel and even harder to articulate. Especially when those feelings are steeped in pain. I’m with Brueggemann, it’s important to normalize expressing painful feelings. Not only can it help us process our feelings, it can also connect us with others and help others name and articulate their feelings as well.
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