The end of lament
τὸ τέλος
I've written a fair bit about lament here, and today I want to do something that's not quite the opposite. What's the end of lament?
When mourning turns to joy
Almost every lament in the psalms has a relatively similar structure. Very often there is a turning point, a pivot, where the psalm turns from pouring out the psalmist's cries, to praising God. Sometimes these might be proleptic, that is "the representation or assumption of a future act of development as if presently existing or accomplished" (thank you Merriam-Webster). The psalmist thus anticipates the future deliverance that they are trusting in. Other times we might read the psalms as actually in two parts, with the second response part coming as a response to God's intervention. There are a few psalms where there is no turn, no pivot, and the psalm leaves us still in the pits of despair.
Psalm 13 is my go-to for a short, exemplary lament psalm. It's turn to praise is not especially proleptic, I think it's still forward looking to anticipated deliverance.
Psalm 13:5–6 (NIV)
5 But I trust in your unfailing love;
my heart rejoices in your salvation.
6 I will sing the Lord’s praise,
for he has been good to me.
I’m quite taken by Brueggemann's analysis of laments as songs of disorientation: songs for when things seem wrong in the world (and often are wrong in the world). In light of that, the move out of lament is the movement of new orientation. It is not just "things are right and everything in its place" (orientation), but re-orientation, "things have been made right that were wrong".
In recent weeks I have seen some long-term prayers begin to be answered and some long-term difficulties begin to lighten. Hope is tempered by realism, but the response to answered prayer must be praise and thanks. Which brings to my mind to Luke 17:11-17, where the ten men with leprosy are healed by Jesus. Jesus' words when one returns, "Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine".
It can be all to easy to receive goods things in life, and then simply lack gratitude and thanks. If prayer is born of hopeful helplessness, what need of prayer if you don't have hope, but have the object of your hope? What need of petition, when you don't feel helpless, but in fact capable? It is precisely the moment of receiving what we hope for, that places us in the great danger of forgetting the giver of all good things, like the child so caught up in their gift, that they have to be prompted to remember the gift-giver, and thank them. Lord, preserve us from thankfulness.
When sorrows never cease
The thing about life under the sun is, that though some sorrows may be set right, many will not. One never knows how God will answer prayers, until he answers them, and the answer to some prayers may be, through our whole lives, ‘no’. I am very conscious that there are believers who have gone their whole life in pain, sickness, need, sorrow, distress, slavery, destitution, hunger. And never saw the light of better circumstances. Some things aren't healed in this life, and some things can't be healed in this life.
Death, of course, is the last and greatest of these. Everyone I love, will eventually die. I sometimes wonder if the elderly, having watched all their loved ones die, don't sometimes just die from the grief of it all.
But even setting aside death, life is full of sorrows enough. And so even though in one part of life sorrow may turn to joy, I'm well aware that there are other things that aren't fixed, aren't better, and the need for prayer never goes away. Even while drafting this email, the news came through that a dear friend for whom I have been praying, for months, is not healed as we had hoped, and now faces many more months of treatment. Our joy is never made complete in this world, because this world is full of sorrows. There is always a space for lament. Prayer and praise are a mixed symphony.
When the last tear is wiped away
The end of lament is joy. And yet there is no end to lament in this world. But there is an end to all ends, an end to all lament, when the last tear is wiped away, and every sad and sorrowful thing is undone. But that comes at the end of all things, Rev 21:4, because the old order of things has passed away. It's only when this whole reality is done and dusted, and the world re-created, made new, and Death and Hades, the final enemies, thrown into the lake of fire, then and only then can we enter into a joy unending, praise without lament. And that praise is all the greater for the sorrows of this world.
Which means that for the here and now, we keep on going. Keep on living, loving our neighbours, praying for ourselves, our loved ones and our enemies, and trusting in the God who hears and who answers. Until everything is set right, there is a time to pray.
