Passage: Psalm 77 Speaker: Pastor Lukus Counterman Series: Summer in the Psalms
Speaker: Lukus Counterman - Everyone who has known the enveloping pressure of a dark mood or deep grief can appreciate the candor of the Psalms. With brute courage and blunt verbiage, the poet bemoans his sorrowful state of affairs. He cries and groans, but not like the rest of the world. You see, he cries and groans to God – or in other words, he laments. As he practices this historical and biblical protest, it is as though he is wrestling through the seeming paradox of pain and promise. The psalmist is standing in the gap between the fact that life is hard and the truth that God is good. While many people are unfamiliar or even uncomfortable with lamenting, it is important that we don’t excuse ourselves from the real tensions of life. We’re not supposed to rush to the “bright side of things.” We don’t need to change the subject or escape from the awkward silence of grief and sorrow. Perhaps we just need to sit in the ashes and learn to lament. With more than one third of the psalms being categorized as “laments” it is important for us to understand and employ this pathway to grace in the midst of pain. May the Lord use Psalm 77 – a lament – to help us embrace a divinely given liturgy leading us to worship and trust Him.