Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering the Grace of Lament

by Mark Vroegop

In the day of my trouble I seek the Lord; in the night my hand is stretched out without wearying; my soul refuses to be comforted. When I remember God, I moan. Psalm 77:2–3

every lament is a prayer. A statement of faith. Lament is the honest cry of a hurting heart wrestling with the paradox of pain and the promise of God’s goodness.

Lament is a prayer in pain that leads to trust.

Lament typically asks at least two questions: (1) “Where are you, God?” (2) “If you love me, why is this happening?”

For the purposes in this book, I’ll use four words to help us learn to lament: turn, complain, ask, and trust.

It takes faith to pray a lament.

Despair lives under the hopeless resignation that God doesn’t care, he doesn’t hear, and nothing is ever going to change. People who believe this stop praying. They give up.

Alexander Maclaren writes, “Doubts are better put into plain speech than lying diffused and darkening, like poisonous mists, in [the] heart. A thought, be it good or bad, can be dealt with when it is made articulate.”

Honestly praying this way recognizes that pain and suffering often create difficult emotions that are not based upon truth but feel true, nonetheless.

For the Christian, the exodus event—the place where we find ultimate deliverance—is the cross of Christ. This is where all our questions—our heartaches and pain—should be taken. The cross shows us that God has already proven himself to be for us and not against us.

Jesus bought the right to make everything right.

Once you start to see these questions in the Psalms, they jump off the page. These heartfelt questions have been in your Bible all along, but somehow they’ve been easy to miss. It is almost as if we don’t understand the value of bringing our questions to God. Perhaps we think they’re not allowed.

As we make our bold requests, “Why is this happening?” moves into the shadow of “Who is God?”

God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform; He plants his footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the storm. Deep in unfathomable mines Of never-failing skill, He treasures up his bright designs, And works his sovereign will. Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take, The clouds ye so much dread Are big with mercy, and shall break In blessings on your head! Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, But trust him for his grace: Behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face. His purposes will ripen fast, Unfolding every hour; The bud may have a bitter taste, But sweet will be the flower. Blind unbelief is sure to err, And scan his work in vain: God is his own interpreter, And he will make it plain!

lament allows us to embrace an endurance that is not passive. Lament helps us to practice active patience.

Choosing to trust requires reinforcing what we know to be true. Prayers of lament are designed to remind us that God is worthy to be trusted—even in this!

We know that the ultimate lament cry—“My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” (Ps. 22:1)—led to the greatest moment of redemption. The darkness of the sixth hour led to the dawn of the empty tomb. Jesus’s life of lament led to salvation and eternal life.

While lament is a journey, the wonderful news is that you don’t walk this path in your own strength. It’s not simply a matter of your grit and willpower. Instead, God helps you to keep trusting him. He helps your lamenting.

Lament can remind us that pain has a purpose. God is always good.

Lamentations mourns the effects of suffering on a society, but not simply because of the loss. It is a memorial to the futility of trusting in anything but God.

Practicing lament in the more common frustrations and less severe sorrows not only brings comfort but also develops a fluency in the language of loss.