READ: Lamentations 1:16
This is why I weep and my eyes overflow with tears.
No one is near to comfort me, no one to restore my spirit.
Have your dreams ever collided with the real world? One night I was fast asleep while vivid dreams flickered in my mind. I found myself frolicking through a field or something silly like that. That’s how I knew it was a dream, as I have never once frolicked in real life. My frolic turned to panic when an earthquake broke out in my dream. The ground shook like a broken washing machine, and the earth cracked open like thin ice. I woke up gasping for air and covered in sweat. “Wait, why is my bed still shaking?” I noticed my phone had vibrated off of my nightstand and under my bed. “Four missed calls, at three in the morning? What’s going on?”
I picked up the phone to hear heartbreaking news. Someone explained that our dear friend just died in a freak accident. My hands started shaking and my ears started ringing. Hannah wasn’t even twenty years old. “She’s really gone? There’s no way this is real,” I argued with myself. I tried to shake myself awake in case this was part of my nightmare but had no luck. This was real life. This was really hard.
While sitting up in bed, I scrolled through my texts from Hannah. Suddenly every single word was packed with meaning and mourning. I studied every emoji, green bubble, and word like I was preparing for an exam. Hannah was witty, sarcastic, funny, profound, and….gone. I couldn’t believe she was gone.
Strangely enough, I didn’t cry for the first few days. I just snapped into action mode. I traveled home for her funeral. I spent time with her mother. I shared old stories at a cluttered table at Waffle House. After a whirlwind of a week, I felt emotionally clogged up. When I should have been sad, I just felt numb.
All of this changed my first night back in my dorm room. Like a tidal wave of emotion, all of my feelings rushed in at once. Tears rolled down my face at a record pace. Ugly crying in my dorm room, I felt broken.
When we lament, we are giving God our broken pieces. He will help you put them back together. In Jeremiah’s first poem of Lamentations, crying is a key theme. The poet points out the tears coming from God’s people. He cries out, “This is why I weep and my eyes overflow with tears’ (1:16). He lists out everything going wrong and he says, “Look at all of this, God. This is why I am crying my eyes out.” His words are brutally honest and void of reasoning or reckoning.
Lamentation is an invitation to grieve with God. It’s easy to ignore the practice of lamenting, as it feels so countercultural to today’s upbeat worship services. However, there are times that we need to cry just as much as we need to celebrate.
It’s my hope that we can learn how to lament together. Cry out to God. Present your pain in tear-filled prayer. Prayers of lament are often messy, uncensored, and difficult. When we cry out to God, it’s not because we are looking for easy answers, as those don’t exist. Instead, we are looking for comfort. If you are going to cry, it’s best to cry in good company. The Spirit provides the perfect shoulder to cry on.
As we start our journey through Lamentations, I encourage you to put words to your pain and let yourself cry about it. Don’t hold it back. Don’t conceal your emotions. Just let it out. Let it mess up your makeup. Whatever you are facing, express your heartbreak, reflect on your grief, and process the pain you are feeling.
Like water cleaning a window, tears can help clean our vision. Crying helps us see things clearly.