Learning About Yet Praise

It’s amazing that the Bible in itself is a library. It’s even more amazing to discover that in the library there’s another smaller library known as Psalms.

Taking a stroll through the Psalms should take you a while and in that stroll you discover a variety of different lyrics not just from David either.

There’s a type of Psalm where the writer outlines a range of fairly distressing circumstances. As that’s being outlined the psalmist still says that he will put his trust in God. Even as he questions if God is present while he struggles, he still chooses to put his trust in God.

That’s an incredible aspect to a relationship with God.

There are lots of reasons to question God when things are not going well. Many have used these questions as a reason to discredit and dismiss the existence of God. The pain behind those decisions is palpable, it doesn’t do anything to attend to the pain itself, but for them it’s an act of defiance and rage to close off something that they thought would be there in their time of need but instead turned out to be a huge disappointment.

Meanwhile some stay connected to the faith somehow, but are more distrustful of God. They maintain a relationship out of routine and habit, but the depth of it cannot go any further than the confusion and hurt they feel because of what they believe God has done to them or has failed to prevent from happening.

This is real for people across the world at various stages of their faith journey. Learning the ‘yet praise’ element of the journey is why those Psalms are so important. It’s also why learning about Jesus is also crucial as someone who could very much relate to those sentiments in the Psalms and even referred to them in his dying moments.

My journey in learning about the ‘yet praise’ is at the stage where I’m seeing the benefit in at least being honest with God. The praise I give to God does not ignore the hurt and the questions. The praise I give to God in the middle of the hurt and confusion is the outstretched hand to God to help me in this. I know the dark places that wallowing in those questions can lead to. I know the pits that getting myself hung up on the confusion can result in. I know about it and I don’t honestly like living there. It affects me in a terrible way and impacts my relationships with others.

The praise is about saying that God is still God even if my circumstances don’t change. The praise is about still stretching out in faith that God is still good and still present even when hurtful and confusing things happen. In a lot of ways, the praise for me is like getting a gasp of fresh air so as to not drown in sorrows. The praise reminds me that the human experience is full of suffering, pain, hurt, betrayal, rejection and misunderstanding. The thing about Jesus – who knows all about that – is that He offers hope going through all that. He is there. He empathises. He consoles. He is the living and real personification of hope beyond that. He reminds me and others going through, that what we’re going through is not the full stop. It’s not the end. It’s not the defining aspect of the story of our lives. As He endured, suffered and took on all the weight of that which causes the pain, hurt and suffering – so He rose triumphantly from it all.

That’s not a crumb of consolation to sup on. That’s the light in the darkness of depression. That’s the light at the end of the tunnel of despair leading to a far greater day ahead.

That’s what I’m currently learning about the yet praise. I hope it helps.

(Photo by Syarafina Yusof on Unsplash)

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

C. L. J, Dryden