We are studying the psalms of lament in my OT Writings course. Powerful stuff. If you have the opportunity, I recommend an article by Walter Berueggemann, entitled “The Costly Loss of Lament” from the Journal for the Study of the Old Testament. A great read (email me if your interested in it.)

Anyway, one of our assignments is to write a psalm of lament of our own. Here is my attempt:

Pour on us - on our family -
your grace, O God
You who created us,
who have become our father
who know what we’re made of
and how we’re put together
Visit upon us your sweet presence
and your mighty power.

For you, in your brilliance,
made us who we are as a family
With rings on our fingers,
we were joined by your hands.
In our mother’s womb you formed us as children
Through divorce and through death,
you have raised us
Through the journey of our days
you have shaped us
You have walked alongside us
all through our youth
Through different tongues
you spoke to us as children
And across many borders
you brought us together,
Nothing could diminish your steady
faithfulness to us
No one could distract you
from tenderly loving us
You are unstoppable,
even in our present sorrow,
You alone have encouraged & comforted us

But, heavenly Father,
we cry out to you now for our daughter,
The little girl you have gifted us,
for her brain and for her body
You – who preserved her
in the womb from a stroke –
Surround her with your tender love
and your steady faithfulness.
Guide her recovery,
Grace her with your power in her body.
For what will she do
if she can’t hold her head up?
How will she pray
if she can’t open her hands to you?
How will she praise
if she can’t lift her arms up?
Who will she look to
if she can’t use her eyes?
And how will she know you
if she can’t use her mind?
Or how will she testify about you
if she can’t even talk?

But you have already delivered her from death,
From malformation in her body
you preserved her,
You have given her great beauty in that risa,
Though her sight be diminished,
her eyes shine brightness and life.

So we cry out to you, Jesus,
to meet us in these tough days,
To walk us through all “what ifs” and the worry.
From medical examination to therapy appointment,
To stretching her arms and stimulating her brain.
We just need you
From fatigue in our bodies from
holding her up or working her out,
To the tiredness of wondering & worrying
about what is delay and what will be disability
We just need you
In the frustration of fighting
all of the bureaucratic dragons,
And facing the scorpions who withhold services,
We just need you.
Through the grief of a mysterious kind of loss,
mostly in what we can dream,
And the anger from explaining everything,
everywhere, every time,
We just need you
In the confusion about where
our friends are in this,
And the lonely absence of people
who can understand,
We just need you.
In the fear of not knowing
the “how” or the “when,”
Or what her enjoyment of life will be,
Of not knowing who will be her friends?
Who will enjoy her just as she is?
We just need you.

Yet you have not failed us,
Nor forgotten us in our cries from the past
Isabel is still the gift that we asked for.
“Consecrated to you” since her birth.
We know that you are good, sweet Jesus,
All the time you are good,
we take this to the bank every day.
It is not a question of “why.”
Since you have given us
the child we asked for;
But more a question “how,”
Since we never bargained
for things being like this.

P.S. Just to state what I hope is obvious - this is our prayer to God. It doesn’t represent a lack of faith, but as lament’s do, it represents our need for God to be faithful. As such, I invite you to enter into our prayer of lament with us, or to pray your own prayer of lament, whether for Isabel, for yourself, your family, your neighborhood, etc.

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