The Lord Hears Your Cry

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9 February 2010 View Comments

Recently I was overwhelmed by a feeling of sadness. All the difficulties of our life seemed to weigh heavily on me. Financial concerns, professional concerns, thoughts about my failures, etc. All morning I tried to do things to ignore it, but the more I did, the more overwhelmed I became. I try not to complain and not to focus on the negative. I didn’t want to talk about it with my wife because I didn’t want to bring her down. But she knew something was wrong and was growing frustrated too since I wouldn’t share with her. This of course added to my frustration. The more frustrated I became the more overwhelmed – you no doubt know the drill – everything just begins compounding on top of each other.

In the midst of this frustration I finally just told my wife how I felt and cried out to God in prayer. I just said what I was feeling. I even said the things that I knew were not of God – I just let it all out. It was one of those “WHY GOD?” moments. I lamented out loud to my God and he heard my cry. Truly it was within minutes that I felt the feelings of anxiety and despair leave me and I was surrounded by great peace. All of those negative thoughts and things I knew were not of God or even true just left me. In fact as I thought about it later that day it was almost as if those thoughts never happened.

Lament

I hear all the time from other people that they are unable to pray when they are in despair, or struggling. I’ve even heard from a few of you recently that you are even unable to ask for prayers. We need to come to understand that God wants to hear our cries. In fact, he longs to hear our cry.

I think of my own children. I do not like it when they cry but I most certainly want them to be in my arms when they do. I want my daughter to come to me when she comes unglued. There are days when she is just irritable, as are all children and I sometimes just have to hold her and let her cry. I want to be the one she comes to when she is sad. It would break my heart if she could not come to me.

Throughout scripture we see that God hears the cry of his people. The Psalms are full of prayers of lament:

“Your arrows have sunk deep in me; your hand has come down upon me. My flesh is afflicted because of your anger; my frame aches because of my sin.” – Ps. 38: 3-4

“Listen, God, to my prayer; do not hide from my pleading; hear me and give answer. I rock with grief; I grown at the uproar of the enemy, the clamor of the wicked. They heap trouble on me, savagely accuse me. My heart pounds within me; death’s terrors fall upon me.” – Ps. 55: 1-5

“How many are my foes, Lord! How many rise against me! How many say of me, “God will not save that one.” – Ps. 3: 2-3

“Have pity on me, Lord, for I am weak; heal me, Lord, for my bones are trembling. In utter terror is my soul – and you Lord, how long…? Turn, Lord, save my life; in your mercy rescue me.” – Ps. 6: 2-5

“How long, Lord? Will you utterly forget me? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I carry sorrow in my soul, grief in my heart day after day?” – Ps. 13: 2 – 3

These cries to God sound a lot like my own cry and like many of those I’ve met along the way:

“God, why are you allowing me to suffer like this? Why do I have to struggle with so much anger?”

“God, why do I have to struggle just to make enough money to get food on the table, why can’t I get a break, every time things seem like they’re getting better it only get’s worse. How long will it be like this God?

“Jesus, you said your grace is sufficient, but why do I still have this same burden in my life? Why can’t I get over this addiction?”

“God, I thought you had a plan for my life. But, it seems like I’m going nowhere and like I have no purpose. I don’t think I’ll ever find a husband, I can hardly find a good guy to date, let alone someone I would marry.”

“Oh God, I am so sinful, I know you will never forgive me. I hate myself and I know you hate me too. Why did you have to make it so hard to be a good person? Why do I have to deal with so much temptation? Are you trying to make me fail God?”

Any of these sound familiar to you?

For many of us – these cries are very familiar, at least they sound like things we think – but never say. That’s where the problem lies. God wants us to cry out to him. He wants us to “lament” when we need to. Yet, so often I hear from many people that they are afraid to go to God.

Call out to God

My wife told me once, “sometimes I know the things I’m feeling aren’t true or reasonable, but I just need you to hold me and love me and let me get it out.”

God wants to do the same for us, he wants to hold us and love us through our moments of terror, fear, anxiety, worry, doubt, anger, sadness, temptation and whatever other “unlovely” moments we may have.

Sometimes we need to let it all out, to say what we feel – even if it sounds irrational, sometimes we need to let God know how we really feel in that moment.

Lament is not complaining – it is a sadness that is directed to God. When we cry out to God we prevent ourselves from heading down the path to despair and hopelessness.

If you open your Bible and go to the Psalms that I quoted, you will notice that all but one ended on a note of praise. Why? Not because the person was a glutton for punishment – but rather because the Psalmist cried out not in despair but in hope, in faith that God’s promise would come true and that God would never leave his people. In doing so, the cry turned into a song of praise. The anger, anguish, fear, despair, all of that left and what was left was trust in God.

Consider the Psalm that Christ himself uttered on the Cross,

“My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? Why so far from my call for help, from my cries of anguish? My God, I call by day, but you do not answer; by night, but I have no relief. Yet you are enthroned as the Holy one; you are the glory of Israel. In you our ancestors trusted; they trusted and you rescued them.” – Ps. 22: 2 – 5

Even here the Psalmist cries out in anguish with feelings as if God had left him, yet turns back to praise and trusting in the Lord who saves.

I hope that you will allow yourself to cry out to God. Do not be afraid to pray, to ask for prayer, to cry out to your loving God who wants so much to hold you and tell you it is going to be okay.

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