There are seasons where prayer stops sounding like praise and starts sounding like an argument. Where are you? Why is this happening? Do you even see this? I have prayed those prayers more times than I can count, usually late at night, usually about something I couldn't fix and couldn't explain.
I used to feel guilty about that. Like a good pastor shouldn't talk to God that way. But then you actually read the Psalms and realize half of them are laments. David asks God how long He will hide His face (Psalm 13:1). He accuses God of forgetting him. He doesn't clean it up first. He just says it. And somehow those are the words we still pray three thousand years later.
We spent some time on this in our Hope Workshop on lament a couple months back. During that time Pastor Mark mentioned that sometimes our quiet time with God looks less like a peaceful morning devotional and more like a rage room. It was a reminder that God isn't asking for our composed prayers. He's asking for our honest ones.
So for a long time I settled into that. Questioning God felt honest. It felt like faith, actually,
because you don't argue with someone you've stopped believing in.
Then a few weeks ago I was reading through Job, and I got to chapter 38. Job has spent thirty seven chapters demanding an explanation, and God finally shows up. But He doesn't answer a single question. He asks His own. Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth? (Job 38:4, 18). Chapter after chapter of it. And Job, who wanted answers, ends up with his hand over his mouth.
I didn't know what to do with that at first. It felt like a different God than the one who listens to David's laments. But I think it's the same God, and I think we need both chapters.
There is a way of bringing our hurt to God that is honest and welcomed. He is not fragile. He is not offended by our tears or our confusion. But there is also a way of forgetting who we're talking to. Of treating the Creator of galaxies like He owes us an explanation, when He's already given us every reason to trust Him without one.
I don't think those two things resolve into a formula. I don't think you graduate from Psalm 13 to Job 38 and stay there. I think most of us live somewhere between the two, some weeks closer to the lament, some weeks closer to the silence and the awe. Both are still faith. Both are still prayer.
I'm not fully sure where I land on any given day. Some days I still ask why. Some days all I can do is remember that I wasn't there when He laid the foundations of the earth, and somehow that's enough.
peace,
Nick
I used to feel guilty about that. Like a good pastor shouldn't talk to God that way. But then you actually read the Psalms and realize half of them are laments. David asks God how long He will hide His face (Psalm 13:1). He accuses God of forgetting him. He doesn't clean it up first. He just says it. And somehow those are the words we still pray three thousand years later.
We spent some time on this in our Hope Workshop on lament a couple months back. During that time Pastor Mark mentioned that sometimes our quiet time with God looks less like a peaceful morning devotional and more like a rage room. It was a reminder that God isn't asking for our composed prayers. He's asking for our honest ones.
So for a long time I settled into that. Questioning God felt honest. It felt like faith, actually,
because you don't argue with someone you've stopped believing in.
Then a few weeks ago I was reading through Job, and I got to chapter 38. Job has spent thirty seven chapters demanding an explanation, and God finally shows up. But He doesn't answer a single question. He asks His own. Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth? (Job 38:4, 18). Chapter after chapter of it. And Job, who wanted answers, ends up with his hand over his mouth.
I didn't know what to do with that at first. It felt like a different God than the one who listens to David's laments. But I think it's the same God, and I think we need both chapters.
There is a way of bringing our hurt to God that is honest and welcomed. He is not fragile. He is not offended by our tears or our confusion. But there is also a way of forgetting who we're talking to. Of treating the Creator of galaxies like He owes us an explanation, when He's already given us every reason to trust Him without one.
I don't think those two things resolve into a formula. I don't think you graduate from Psalm 13 to Job 38 and stay there. I think most of us live somewhere between the two, some weeks closer to the lament, some weeks closer to the silence and the awe. Both are still faith. Both are still prayer.
I'm not fully sure where I land on any given day. Some days I still ask why. Some days all I can do is remember that I wasn't there when He laid the foundations of the earth, and somehow that's enough.
peace,
Nick