Angry Prayers

Posted by benfabie on Sep 2, 2010 in Daily Bread | 2 comments

Excerpt from www.explorefaith.org

Psalm 88 is pretty depressing. The psalmist not only cries out to God the passion of his misery, but also lays his circumstances upon God as the source of his suffering. Such boldness is not unknown, or even that uncommon in Hebrew tradition. But the unusual thing about this Psalm is that the prayer never mitigates the completeness of his plight with any hint of hope or praise.

There are other psalms of lament, but they usually find some expression of relief, even if only a verse. “But I put my trust in you, O Lord, and you will come to my aid.” Not so in Psalm 88. This is a cry of unbroken distress. No pious words of trust or hope soften the words of grief, accusation, anger, and questioning. It ends alone and dark: “My friend and neighbor you have put away from me, and darkness is my only companion.” That is the closing image— “darkness is my only companion.”

No gentle encouragement. No “it’ll work out.” No “Take heart, God is with you.” This is the cry of unbroken misery.

I’m glad we have Psalm 88. There are times and conditions that we experience as unmitigated sadness. There are circumstances that are hopeless.

This Psalm stands to affirm that such expressions of grief are legitimate. It is not faithless to cry out in helpless and hopeless anguish. It is not wrong to place responsibility for such wrongs at the feet of God. And you don’t have to appease God with some word of piety, hope or praise.

We can be completely honest toward God with our thoughts and feelings. And God is big enough to take it all. God won’t punish us for being hurt and angry, even hurt and angry at God.

In fact, only God can take this kind of suffering. To give it to God might restrain us from internalizing our angry grief into a depression or externalizing by lashing out at someone else. Only God is great enough to take this kind of misery and not compound it.

–Lowell Grisham