- The Saturday Strategy Session
- Posts
- When to Lament in Worship
Most modern worship music, especially congregational songs, focuses on the "positives":
Overcoming/victory in God
Praising God's majesty as creator and king
Thanksgiving for salvation and promise of eternity with God
Those are great topics to sing of when we praise the Lord... but it's a fairly limited view of capturing our human experience as its affected by God's presence.
To get to the point, we need to sing more songs of lament.
Here's why.
What Is "Lament?"
To "lament" is, "to mourn aloud (i.e., WAIL); to express sorrow, mourning, or regret for often demonstratively (i.e., MOURN); to regret strongly." (Merriam-Webster source here.) When we view it as a noun, it's a complaint or crying out in extreme grief.
Where Is Lamenting in the Bible?
When we think of lament in the Bible, the book of Lamentations is an obvious example, and for the musicians reading this, the Psalms also come to mind. In fact, this book is filled with nearly 50% with some type of individual or collective lament. A notable one comes from Psalm 86, where King David cries out to God for deliverance from an unknown source of pain:
1 Incline your ear, O Lord, and answer me,
for I am poor and needy.
2 Preserve my life, for I am godly;
save your servant, who trusts in you—you are my God.
3 Be gracious to me, O Lord,
for to you do I cry all the day.
4 Gladden the soul of your servant,
for to you, O Lord, do I lift up my soul.
5 For you, O Lord, are good and forgiving,
abounding in steadfast love to all who call upon you.
6 Give ear, O Lord, to my prayer;
listen to my plea for grace.
7 In the day of my trouble I call upon you,
for you answer me.
Psalm 86:1–7 (ESV)
But beyond this, we see lament in historical accounts of the Old Testament and in the New Testament—we especially see it in the Gospels, where Jesus Himself lamented! Consider His plea before the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane prior to being arrested:
41 And he withdrew from them about a stone's throw, and knelt down and prayed, 42 saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” 43 And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. 44 And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground.
Luke 22:41–44 (ESV)
In all of these accounts, we see three things:
A cry for help
An appeal to God's power
Accepting God's will as the pathway to purpose
Even though there's a well-rounded view of the character of God within these accounts, the description of sorrow is particularly vivid, whether in the repeated cries for help from King David or the "great drops of blood" rent by Jesus.
Why Should We Lament?
This intense imagery is a far cry from what you'll hear on Christian radio today or in houses of worship; most of our songs, if they stray into any sorrow, keep it brief at best. I find that some lyrics acknowledge sorrow/suffering, but there's always a resounding rush of deliverance to lift the singers' spirits. Not that it's wrong, but does it always accurately reflect our actual experience?
I don't think so.
My experience in recovery has taught me that in order to see breakthrough in a hurt, habit, or hang-up, I have to face the truth of trauma. That means deeply exploring it and getting to the root of the problem that results in negative behavior. In the same way, when singing in congregational worship, I feel we must fully face sin, its effects on us and the world around us, and come to grips with the magnitude of its destruction before we immediately jump to the happy ending. In doing this, we:
Keep a grip on reality—the effects of sin have consequences.
Admit our need—we cannot deliver ourselves from the effects of sin.
Run to God—only He can bring comfort and justice to the situation.
What Should We Lament?
As I highlighted above, we should lament the effects of sin, whether that's:
From the original Fall and its reverberation in history.
Its influence in injustice throughout the world and in our lives.
Personal sins that keep us from being the people God has called us to be.
How Should We Lament?
In order to grasp the full scope of lament, you need to sing songs that don't skate over the reality of sin. There aren't many songs that do this, but more are being written as worship leaders and pastors recognize their need in congregational worship. One of my favorites is "How Long, O lord," by Jordan Kauflin. It's a resounding question and cry for deliverance and respite, knowing that God is capable—but WHEN? It ends with a plea:
"Lord Jesus, come."
You can listen to it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxWfXtqVsTg
So in the coming weeks, consider where you can invite your congregation to collectively lament together, where they can experience a more well-rounded diet of worship, capturing a fuller scope of their emotions, needs, and God's promise of deliverance.
Be blessed 👊✌️
Bonus: If you want to dig into Psalm 86 even more, I've co-written a 5-day devotion on it over at Malachi Daily. You can sign up through the link below to access it, along with getting other Scripture memorization posts sent straight to your inbox. Once you've done that, you can install the Malachi Daily app to review past verses.
Here's the sign-up link: