Chatfield and Root Prairie
Lutheran Churches
By Pastor Nissa Peterson
Chatfield and Root Prairie
Lutheran Churches
February is always a tough month. We get through the anticipated cold and ice of January and we are emotionally ready for spring. Enter February. Although it’s short in days, February is often cold, dreary, and drags on for approximately a million years. This year we don’t even have Lenten Wednesdays at church to look forward to as a step outside the day-to-day humdrum, since Lent doesn’t start until March.
The middle of winter can be a really hard season. We all go through seasons that are difficult and challenging – whether it’s the literal season of winter, or a season of life such as mourning, illness, or other difficulty.
A great place to turn when you’re feeling that hopelessness, anger, or despair, is scripture. The Bible dedicates a surprising amount of space to lamenting. Lamenting is how we share with God all of our dreariness, our anger, our fear, and everything hard that we face.
We often associate the Bible as something happy, uplifting – it’s good news after all, right? But scripture offers us words to lift up all of life’s emotions – from the joys to the sorrows. Check out these words of lament from the Psalms:
From Psalm 22
My God, my God,
why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far
from saving me,
so far from my cries of anguish?
My God, I cry out by day,
but you do not answer,
by night, but I find no rest.
From Psalm 13
How long, LORD?
Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide
your face from me?
How long must I wrestle
with my thoughts
and day after day
have sorrow in my heart?
We can bring all of our lament to God – because God is big enough to handle it all!
God loves us and supports us, no matter what we are facing! God wants us to bring our joys as well as our sorrows. We share our laments because we know that God is so good, that life can be so amazing. To share our lament is to show trust in God. It’s saying “God, I know you are awesome – and what I’m going through is not awesome. I trust that you will be with me through this ickiness, and help me find the awesomeness in your world.”
The psalmists share both lament and praise, as well! Psalm 13, which begins with “How long O Lord,” ends with praise: But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the LORD’s praise, for he has been good to me.
So as you slog through yet another week of dreary February, as you shovel yet again, as you see the temperatures drop yet again, as COVID surges yet again, as you wonder with the psalmist “How long, O Lord?!?”, I invite you to turn to scripture to share your laments.
Peace, Pastor Nissa