Learning to Lament

Only a minority of Psalms focus on praise and thanksgiving, accoding to Eugene Peterson, a recent translator of Psalms; perhaps as many as seventy percent take the form of laments. These correspond to the two conditions in which we often find ourselves: well-being and distress.

King David ordered that his people be taught to lament (in 2 Samuel 1).
The lamenting we see in Psalms has little in common with whining and complaining. We whine about things we have little control over; we lament what we believe ought to be changed. No matter how things appear, we can cry out to God, appealing to his ultimate goodness and justice.

Christian psychologist Dan Allender, asks,

To whom do you vocalize the most intense, irrational---meaning inchoate, inarticulate---anger? Would you do so with someone who could fire you or cast you out of a cherished position or relationship? Not likely. You don't trust them---you don't believe they would endure the depths of your disappointment, confusion. . . . The person who hears your lament and far more bears your lament against them, paradoxically, is someone you deeply, wildly trust. . . . The language of lament is oddly the shadow side of faith.

The process of letting God in on every detail of life is one I need to learn from. Somehow, David and the other poets of Psalms managed to make God the gravitational center of their lives so that everything revolves around him. I am trying to make the prayers of the ancient Hebrews my own. The New Testament writers did this, quoting Psalms more than any other book. Jesus himself did this, relying on the language of Psalms to show us how a human being ought to relate to God.