As I was walking through the grocery store this week I felt raw.  I was doing the things I normally do.  I was upright and walking and functioning……on the outside.   I was worried, could people tell by just looking at me that I was feeling so broken inside?  Then I looked at the woman standing behind me.  I thought to myself “Is she broken too?”  I looked around and wondered how many other people meandering through the store were finding it hard to even breathe at that exact moment.  I stood there searching every face.  If there were any other broken people there, their faces did not give them away so I was hopeful mine didn’t either.

You see this has been one of those weeks, a week that my soul has been so heavy that it, at times, felt hard to even take a breath.  Have you ever had one of those days, weeks or maybe even months?  Times when you wonder if God is even hearing your desperate prayers or if, for some reason, his answer is just no?  These are my least favorite moments.

For reasons I cannot understand, God is often silent at times when we need to hear him the most.  No one could describe the longing to hear God and feel his presence better than King David:

“My God, My God, why have you abandoned me?

Why are you so far from my deliverance and from my words of groaning?

My God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, by night, yet I have no rest.”

-Psalm 22:1-3

Did you know that God created a language uniquely made to wring out the burdens of our heart at his feet?  It is called Lamenting.  I had heard the word lament over and over in the bible but until last summer I had no idea what a powerful and intimate language this can be.  I read a book called No More Faking Fine by Esther Fleece.  This book gave me permission for the very first time to cry out to God from the depths of my soul.  For years I, in my flawed theology, was afraid to complain to God because I didn’t want to seem like the Israelites whining their way through the desert.  That never really worked in their favor, and I didn’t want to realize their same fate.  This book helped me see how wrong my thinking was.  God wants us to come to him in our sadness.  He remembers our sins no more, our good works are like filthy rags so he would not keep track of those.  But our tears, those he counts.

“You keep track of all my sorrows.  You have collected all my tears in your bottle.  You have recorded each one in your book.” Psalm 56:8

Friends, God has a book for your tears!  He has a place specifically for you to bring the brokenness in your heart.  You do not have to carry your brokenness alone.  When your heart is heavy you can go lay at the feet of Jesus and speak the beautiful language of lament.  With each sentence (or groan) I think you might feel that it gets easier to breathe.

Even during this dark week, I know that Jesus has been here.  He has not abandoned us, that is not who he is.  He showed up in late night visits from our pastor, in a friend who drove an hour just to come give me a hug, in phone calls from a friend many states away crying quietly on the phone with me, and even in free coffee (thank you Starbucks rewards program) when I needed caffeine to get me through the day.  The hope I have in Jesus is the light I keep walking towards when the darkness wants to surround me.

King David was extremely fluent in lamenting but he was also fluent in hope! Just 5 chapters after crying out begging for God to hear him, he wrote this:

“I am certain that I will see the Lord’s goodness in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord, be strong, and let your heart be courageous.  Wait for the Lord.”

-Psalm 27:13-14

People you may pass in the store may not be able to see the brokenness your soul is weighed down with today, but there is one man who does.  Jesus sees the hurt in your heart.  The good news is that he is already waiting, with a jar, ready for you to become fluent in the language of lament.