1I will praise you, LORD!You saved me from the grave
and kept my enemies
from celebrating my death.
2I prayed to you, LORD God,
and you healed me,
3saving me from death
and the grave.
4Your faithful people, LORD,
will praise you with songs
and honor your holy name.
5Your anger lasts a little while,
but your kindness lasts
for a lifetime.
At night we may cry,
but when morning comes
we will celebrate.
6I was carefree and thought,
“I’ll never be shaken!”
7You, LORD, were my friend,
and you made me strong
as a mighty mountain.
But when you hid your face,
I was crushed.
8I prayed to you, LORD,
and in my prayer I said,
9“What good will it do you
if I am in the grave?
Once I have turned to dust,
how can I praise you
or tell how loyal you are?
10Have pity, LORD! Help!”
11You have turned my sorrow
into joyful dancing.
No longer am I sad
and wearing sackcloth.
12I thank you from my heart,
and I will never stop
singing your praises,
my LORD and my God.
If we’re spending time thinking and reflecting, do we also in that time think on what God had done, and spend some time in praise. To really stop and remember – and say thank you.
Yes there are tragedies in the world, and we cry out to God in pain, but we also need to spend some time in praise, for it grounds our lives and the realities of the world, it balances out our experiences.
When we think where we could have been, what good things we have known, that God is always with us – what can we do, but cry
The Book of Lamentations is a collection of poems lamenting the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC. Mourning, sorrow and grief are poured out. This passage is one man’s response to the stark reality of desolation – being in the wilderness.
What today are we mourning – in the valley, in the wilderness?
Being caught up in our troubles can be so traumatic. Sometimes we just cannot face the pain and anguish, it is too much for us to bear.
Yet, at some point we need to be with it. To feel it. Until we do, it is always there – waiting.
The same is true of other things in our lives that we try to avoid – our fears, those things we know shouldn’t really be there. Until we take the time and space to face them, they always have the potential to leap out at us and trip us.
Jesus went into the wilderness to face his demons, to prepare his life. In facing his demons he knew what they were, and how he was going to live with them. If he had not done that they would always have been his Achilles heel, an opportunity for the devil to come at him and trip him up.
Facing the wilderness within us is painful. But at some point we have to do it.
If Lent is our opportunity to take time out to reflect, to spend some time in the wilderness, knowing that God is there, perhaps this is the time.
Thinking of our troubles, and wandering alone in the wilderness do make us miserable, but so much more does living with those things in our lives unchallenged. In that truth, hope returns:
“The Lord’s unfailing love and mercy continue”
Sweeping things under the carpet leaves a huge pile to fall over, facing it in the light and truth of God gives him the power over it all. Troubles in our life will still be there, but they are faced in the knowledge of them, and the love and mercy of God.
However desolate we feel, God’s love continues. He does not always lift us straight out of that place, but he is most definitely with us in it.
In which Lazarus falls ill. His sisters send for Jesus, who stalls for two days, then sets off to see them. In the meantime Lazarus has died.
Why if Jesus was going to do something miraculous didn’t he go and do it straight away? Surely it wasn’t because he was worried about being stoned, or to put on a great show – after all a resurrection totally trumps a healing doesn’t it. Was it just so Jesus could make a good point?
I can’t imagine so. But Jesus works in his time and his way, not the bidding of his followers.
Martha is distraught, because she thinks that Jesus could have saved Lazarus. But Jesus can reach beyond that. Then Mary also tells Jesus that if he had been here “it would never have happened”.
How often do we cry that to God. “If you’d only been here God this would never have happened.”
Why isn’t Jesus doing something?
Eventually they go to the tomb. A tomb with a four-day corpse in it in the heat of the hills around Jerusalem!
And there is life…
And there is faith…
God is there.
Who knows what the reaction would have been if Jesus had got there sooner, before Lazarus had died. What would people have seen and done then? How would they have reacted? Would they have seen all that God can do, or just a small part?
God can be so annoying when he goes at his own pace! We can try to force his hand, but what do we miss?
