Lamenting Current Events

Kay >> Hi. I am Kay Daigle of Beyond Ordinary Women Ministries. Welcome to our podcast. In this episode we are going to talk about lament. We’re going to talk about lamenting current events. And our special guest is Jodie Niznik. Welcome, Jodie. Thank you for being here with us again.

Jodie >> It’s great to be with you again, Kay. Thanks for having me.

Kay >> Well, we always love having you. Jodie is an author, a teacher and a speaker, and we have had her discuss many things that you can find on our website by just searching for Jodie Niznik if you go to BeyondOrdinaryWomen.org. So she is—I‘ll tell you a little bit about her. She has an undergraduate degree in broadcast journalism from the University of Colorado, and she has a degree in Christian education from Dallas Seminary with an emphasis in Christian Education, the same one that I have with Women’s Ministry emphasis.

So we trust you, Jodie. We are so happy to have you talking with us about lament. Just tell us a little bit about what lament is.

Jodie >> Yeah. I’m glad that we’re talking about lament, especially in our current cultural climate that we’re finding ourselves in. Lament really is first and foremost, prayer. It’s a way to take the things that are really painful, the things that are confusing, the things that we’re grieving to God. And to be really honest with him about wrestling through those things.

And the thing I love about lament is it’s modeled for us in Scripture. A third of the Psalms are lament Psalms. I just heard somebody say, “Maybe God knew that about a third of our days were going to be tough, and we needed to know how to lament.” And I thought, oh, yeah, I think he’s probably right.

So lament is modeled for us in Scripture. It’s a way for us to process things that are confusing and painful with God, but it always leads us back to God. And the purpose is to lead us back to trusting God, even when we don’t understand what’s happening.

Kay >> Absolutely. And, you know, lament is found all over the Bible, not just in the Psalms.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> So, you know, if you wonder about lament, it is very biblical. It’s not just an Old Testament thing. It is all over the Bible.

And don’t you feel like our culture is not very good at knowing how to deal with grief, sorrow, and these current events that we’re talking about now, we don’t know what to do with our emotions.

Jodie >> Yeah. I mean, and I think, I, I don’t think we know what to do with our emotions. And I think unfortunately, the Christian church in particular does not know what to do with our emotions, and we should be the ones that actually know the most what to do with them, because we do know that there is a bigger story happening. And we do know that even though things feel really disconcerting, perhaps in our own life, or because of things that are happening around the world, we know how the story ends.

So I do think that Christians should know how to lament a little bit better. I think it’s something we need to actually incorporate as maybe even a spiritual practice, if you wanted to call it that, into our lives.

And I think one of the things that happens is when we don’t lament, we fall into one of two things happening. We either move to denial, so we show up and we’re like, no, everything’s fine. God’s going to take care of everything. It’s all good. And that is yes, that is in the end what’s going to happen.

But that is not actually processing some of the pain that we’re going through right now. So it can lead us to a place of denial. Or on the flip side of that, I think it can lead us to a place of despair. So if we can’t actually process with God, our faith then can’t hold up under things that are happening.

And I think a lot of times that’s why people are either questioning their faith or perhaps even leaving the church is because they don’t have a good vehicle for understanding how a good God can allow and stand by when some really terrible things are happening.

Kay >> Yeah, yeah, I think that’s very true. In fact, I was thinking that just yesterday, as I was preparing a little bit for this, it just came to my mind that knowing some people who have deconstructed and left a lot of their faith behind, I was just wondering if maybe if they had lamented some of the things that had caused them to make those decisions, if it could have been avoided.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> So I totally agree with you about that.

Jodie >> Yeah. I mean, and I don’t have evidence to back that up that that’s the reason.

Kay >> I don’t either. This is not scientific. It was just a thought.

Jodie >> Yeah, I agree, it’s interesting that we were both kind of thinking that same thought. It’s just well, and I think I’ve heard it from people, you know, “God wouldn’t have let this happen.” Or “this shouldn’t have happened.” And there’s an anger because there’s not a solid theology of who God is and the bigger story of Scripture to understand.

Yeah. God is good. God is sovereign. And still he has allowed there to be sin and free choice. And we know we have an enemy who’s prowling around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. So both of these things are true. And I think we have to figure out and lament helps us hold them both at the same time.

Kay >> It does. And we’re talking to God about it instead of just sitting around and going, “Why is God doing this?” And “Why would a good God do this?” We’re not just talking to each other. We’re actually speaking to God about it.

So what are the areas if you, if you were to want to sit down and lament something that’s happening today, what would that include?

Jodie >> Yeah. Well I think the first thing is there’s a and I think the question that you’re asking first is what can we lament or what should we be lamenting. There’s what we see. Biblical lament is and then we see a process of how almost like a formula. But it’s not a formula because it is not step one, step two, step three.

Kind of like grief, right? You know, like there’s this whole process of grief and people go through it in very different ways. I think lament, the process of lament is the same. But we also see that there’s these categories of biblical lament, and that is the personal pain that we’ve experienced in our own lives. So just I mean, I don’t need to explain that to you.

We all know what personal pain feels like. And it’s just, you know, crushing. And if we can’t take that to God and say, this feels terrible and I don’t understand it. So there’s this personal pain.

There’s also national tragedy. And that’s kind of what we’re even thinking about with these current events. But also national or natural disasters, people being displaced, human trafficking, I mean, things that are just terrible atrocities that are wounding untold numbers of people.

And I think that God invites us to lament those things. And then I think the third category that we largely see is seeking justice. So we see a lot of injustice in our world. We see a lot of evil people getting away with evil and actually, like, that’s the effect of sin. And sometimes that very personally affects our lives.

But sometimes we see it more on the global scale. So yeah, so it’s justice seeking as well. So I think those are the three categories. So it’s personal pain. It’s national tragedy and it’s seeking justice from God.

Kay >> Yeah. So thinking of you know we’re talking about a bigger a bigger sphere of concern than just our own personal concerns here.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> We’re talking about sometimes worldwide concerns as you talk about displacement, I mean, there are more people displaced now in the world, I think, than have ever been displaced.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> It’s a huge issue worldwide. But we’re talking about looking at what’s going on and seeing the hurt that other people have sometimes. It’s not always just our heart. There’s a hurt in the world and there’s a hurt that we feel nationally. I mean, I think that we came close to this in 9/11 that we had a hurt that was so large that the entire nation grieved over it. Now, I’m not saying everybody knew how to lament, but I do think we all felt the grief of the loss of so many people.

Jodie >> And I think even the global pandemic was a global opportunity for us to realize that we were all going through something that nobody really knew how to manage and handle. And I think that did help us lift our eyes and go, okay, this is really hard for me because I’m scared. But I can also recognize that there’s a lot of other people going through really scary things as well.

So I do think it gives us a way to take those things to God, because a lot of times we don’t have agency to impact a war that’s happening or, you know, a larger policy. We have some agency, right, because we live in America and we get to vote? And so that is a small amount of agency that we can use, which is very important.

But a lot of times there’s things that are just so beyond our control, and it can make us feel like, well, again, denial or despair, right? Like I can’t do anything about it, so I’m just going to ignore it or despair where we just get sucked into the tragedy and it immobilizes and crushes us. And this actually gives us a way to do something and to actually process it with God and really leave it at his feet.

And remember, okay, this is what is true. This is who you are. I do not understand this. I don’t understand how you, as a loving God, could allow this much suffering in our world. I don’t understand God and/or but I trust you. That’s the only place I can go. I have to go back to that.

So that’s part of. Yeah, it gives us a way to hold some of that.

Kay >> Yeah. So how does the lament differ from just complaining all the time?

Jodie >> Well, you know, I was thinking about this too. I think it is complaint to God. But there is a complaint that is very self-centered and self-serving. “I deserved better than this, God” You know, and that’s almost, you know, kind of veers into somewhat of almost like a prosperity theology. I did this right, and therefore you should have done this for me.

It’s more of a transaction that we thought we did something to get something from God. So I think that kind of complaints, which is, self-serving, it’s—oh what the other words I wrote down, entitled, you know, you owe me. It’s a very selfish kind of complaint. I don’t think that’s the kind of complaint we’re talking about.

In fact, I think that veers on the edge of sinfulness. And we could go down that road.

But I think the kind of complaint we’re talking about is just saying this is bad. I don’t understand it. And I think it can even maybe sound almost like some, you know, it can feel a little selfish, like, I’m in pain.

I don’t want to be in pain. I want you to make it stop. You know, there can be something that feels like maybe we’re being selfish, but I think it goes back to, again, moving toward trust. And it’s also prayer. It’s also seeking God to begin with.

So the movement of lament, as I see it, are really three movements.

And the first is the protest, which is the complaint piece that we’re talking about. So we’re laying our case. It’s almost like a legal case that we’re laying before God. You are a good God. And yet this not good thing is happening and I’m confused by it. So this is my complaint that I’m making to you.

And so then there’s this petition. There’s this asking piece where we’re saying to God, “This is who you are, and these are the promises that I see in Scripture. This is how I need you to solve this for me. This is what I’m asking.” And usually to make our ask the most biblical, it would be in line with Scripture.

So, you know, “I’m not asking you to pay all my bills because I ran into credit card debt because I was frivolously spending.” Right? It’s more along the lines of, “I’m in pain, and I need you to help me figure out how to live in a place of peace again.” Jesus says that he has come so that we would have. He gave us his peace. So I know that that peace is available to me. That’s a promise I can ask from God. Very biblical promise.

So we complain, we ask, but then we move into a place of trust and praising God. So we’re turning back to God. So there’s three P’s. You could say it’s protest, petition and praise.

But I do think instead of praise, I like the word trust better, because I think sometimes praise might be hard for us. It may just be getting to a place of opening our hands back up to God and saying, “I don’t get it. But here’s what I do know. Here’s what I do remember is true. Here’s the promises I see that you’ve fulfilled in Scripture.” you know?

And so it’s reminding our soul of what is true to lead us back into a place of trusting him.

Kay >> So this isn’t something that we’re used to doing.

So what do you say practically to us about lamenting?

Jodie >> Yeah. I mean, I think practically speaking, I would encourage people to find a psalm of lament to read and model after.

And I’d love to just look at Psalm 13. It’s only six verses, and I think it’s one of the most concise, lament psalms. And people can go back and read it for themselves. But I just want to read the pieces and so that we can see and then encourage you as a way to model your prayers around this.

So Psalm 13 says, “How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart?”

So you can hear this is the question. This is the complaint that is coming before God. “How long Lord?” So I think that, practically speaking, we can model some of these questions.

We can ask God, some of these questions. Oh, and there was one more verse. “And how long will my enemy triumph over me?” That’s a big one. So that is the complaint.

The petition, the ask of God, is in verses three and four. And the psalmist says, “Look on me and answer, Lord my God, give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death. And my enemy will say, I have overcome him, and my foes will rejoice when I fall.”

So here the psalmist is saying, “God, answer me, bring light back into my eyes. So give me some life. Give me something, something positive.”

And then the final part is returning to trust. And I love this because it says in verse five, “But I trust in your unfailing love.”

And it’s that word right there. But that is this pivot word, but God and we see it all over Scripture. So it’s “I’m holding these really big questions and I’m asking you to do something about it. But I trust in your unfailing love. My heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the Lord’s praise, for he has been good to me.”

And so it’s this return to remembering. Even though this particular situation, even though this particular war that does not make any sense to me, all of these people that are displaced, all of these people that are being taken advantage of, maybe through human trafficking. Even though I can’t understand that, I do remember these things are true about you. And so I will return to trust.

So I love Psalm 13 as a model for that. And I was reading in Psalm 77 this morning as well. And I love this because it’s again another practical way you can see all these really bold questions that the psalmists are asking. The questions that I like, I cringe a little bit when I read these because I think, is it okay to say that to God?

There’s like 5 or 6 questions in Psalm 77, verses seven and nine it says,

“Will the Lord reject forever? Will he never show his favor again? Has his unfailing love vanished forever? Has his promise failed for all time? What? Has his promise failed for all time?” What? That is an audacious question to ask God. We know the answer to that is no.

“Has God forgotten to be merciful? Has he in anger, withheld his compassion?”

These are the questions that this psalmist is asking. And yet he does not just that’s not the end of the story, right? He goes on and he says, “But I will remember the deeds of the Lord. I will remember your miracles. I will consider your works. I will meditate on who you are.”

So he’s asking these questions that are plaguing his heart, knowing that those aren’t the that it’s okay. It’s okay to put those on the table, but that’s not the end of the story.

So I think I just really want to encourage people, be honest with God. There’s nothing that you can say to him that he honestly didn’t already know was in your heart and that you were thinking.

And I think there is something I mean, therapy tells us this and science tells us, behavioral science tells us that when we speak out loud, sometimes things lose their hold on us. And so there is an essence of being open and honest with God as a way to start processing some of this pain. So I think practically you speak it out loud and practice.

I think the other practical thing I would say is don’t wait for a massive implosion in your own life. Start with the things that are just the little things that feel painful and wrestle with God over those things and lament those. And that’s okay. He cares about those little details in our lives, just like he cares about the massive things that we see all over the world.

And that’s hard for our finite brains to hold that that matters to him as well as this matters to him. So I think part of it is just starting to practice lament. So grab Psalm 13 and just model your prayer after it.

Kay >> Yeah.

That’s good. And I do think that, you know, we’re afraid is this really okay to do with God? But I remember when I was in seminary that my professor who taught the Psalms to us said, some of these laments are screams. They are screaming out to God in their pain.

And you know, I don’t think I’ve ever screamed out to God, but sometimes that’s what your heart feels like is screaming out to God. And it’s okay.

It’s okay to do that.

Jodie >> And I think it’s also okay to remember we don’t have to move to the trust piece in the same breath. A lot of times we may get stuck in the screaming out to phase when something really confusing is happening. I think, you know, a lot of times we see this like Psalm 13, it’s all neat and tidy in six verses, you know, it’s a very quick process, but I think sometimes we could get stuck in that, you know, beginning complaint process for a season even before we can move back to trust.

And I think, just give yourself a little grace. Remember, you’re complaining to God, so you’re at least taking it to him. And that is a beautiful thing. Instead of just, you know, stuffing it inside and kind of imploding on it.

Kay >> Right.

So let’s pivot a little bit. What do we know? How do we know what to lament? I mean there’s so you have listed many, many things going on in our world right now. It’s overwhelming. All the things.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> It really is. And that’s one reason we need to lament, but we how do we pick from all of these things?

Some that we can really, really focus on and pray about?

Jodie >> Yeah. I’m so glad you asked that because I do think, again, we can get overwhelmed to a place of being immobilized and throwing up our hands and saying, “I can’t pray about all this, so I’m going to pray about none of it.”

And I would say a couple of things. One is what pulls at your heart. We all have things that God has placed on our heart that really matter to us.

And that may be the fact that, you know, the war in Iran is going on. And there was a school of girls that died. And it may be that that just leveled you. And I would encourage you then to just lament for those families and those children, siblings who didn’t get their sister back that night or, you know, I you know, however that worked, if it was a boarding school, you know, I mean, just I think it’s okay then to just say “I will lament that and I will hold that and let that be the thing that I’m going to lament.”

Or you might be really leveled by the fact that, you know, they found another sweatshop that was employing, you know, ten-year-olds to make goods that we consume here in the United States. And that may just level you then lament that, you know.
So like, it’s we’re not responsible for all of this. And I love the passage that says, you know, we’re all a part of the body and there are so many parts.

So I think part of lamenting is realizing that when one part hurts, whether that’s a part all the way over in Iran or another part hurts, and that’s just down the road for me, or even in my own body, physically, I can be a part of holding that together, but I’m still not responsible for the whole of it.

God is the one who’s holding all of that together. So I would say just choose something.

The other thing I have done personally in my own life is I’ve really done an audit on how I’m consuming the news, because the news can really derail and consume. We are consuming things almost faster than real time. Like, I mean, I know that’s not possible, but maybe it is actually because we’re anticipating and we think this is going to happen.

And so we’re reading a headline about something that hasn’t even happened yet but might happen. So we’re, you know, and our souls are not made to handle all of that.

So I personally have said, I can’t read all that anymore. I don’t want to stick my head in the sand. I don’t want to be uninformed. But I can’t be over informed either because that’s not helpful for my soul.

So I’ve actually found a news source that I love called The Pour Over. And just like, you know, you’d pour over a coffee or something and it’s just it’s a— they kind of highlight just a few stories, but they do it from a neutral perspective. And then they offer you a scripture and a way to pray. And that’s been really helpful for me because I feel like I haven’t totally lost touch with the world, but I’m not in the nitty gritty of every nuance of everything that’s happening.

And they’re just reminding me, whether you think this or this, our God is still good. And I’m like, yeah, that’s what my soul needs right now. So that’s what how I’m choosing.

Kay >> I think that’s really wise because it is just overwhelming and the truth is, you know, there’s so many different versions of what’s going on out there. You know, it’s almost impossible to know what’s really happening.

Jodie >> That’s right.

Kay >> It’s just very difficult right now.

Can you give us an example of what God has put on your heart to lament?

Jodie >> Yeah. I mean, I will say, I mean, there’s a couple things that come to mind. One is a very personal example of a young woman that I’m walking alongside who is being really wounded by a leader in a church, and it angers me to be honest, and it confuses me because I don’t understand why God continues to allow those things to happen in his church.

And so that is something that I have very personally been lamenting on behalf of this young woman because, well, I’m carrying some of that pain with her. So that’s occupied quite a bit of my personal prayer time.

On a more global level. I have been lamenting, like I said, the school, the girls. That’s something that I just—it breaks my heart and it’s things like that and they keep happening. So that is something that I have been taking to the Lord with “I don’t understand I don’t understand why this is okay.” His response is it’s not okay. It was never okay. And yet that’s why Jesus came. That’s why I sent him because this world is broken, the systems and structures are broken.

And while there are glimmers of goodness because we are God’s people and we can bring his kingdom, that is our calling as his people—it is still a very broken world. That’s the system you live in. So that’s a little bit of what’s on my heart right now.

Kay >> Yeah. I haven’t zeroed in so much on like the school of girls, but just generally the war and all the people being displaced, all the people who have died, all the people who have been injured, the soldiers, the families of the soldiers. I mean, it’s just so many. I feel like there’s just so many people impacted by a war like this, like for any war, really.

And so that’s really what’s been on my heart lately. That’s what I’ve been lamenting, is just the various aspects of what war is doing. And if we don’t lament it, I think that our hearts can become hard against people where we don’t even care about them anymore.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> Because it’s too hard to care about them. If we don’t take it to the Lord, if we don’t lament it, I think our hearts can get hard and we just begin to be more selfish and not want to deal with other people. We just write them off that they don’t matter as much to God as we do somehow.

Jodie >> Yeah, I think we can even get to a place of so being detached from humanity that we believe they deserved it in some way.

Kay >> Yeah.

Jodie >> That’s terrible because we have all been created in the image of God. Now, whether we accept Jesus as our, you know, part of the triune God that we worship, or not, that doesn’t change the fact that God still created, his fingerprints are still on us, and he still deeply loves each and every human soul that is on this planet.

So yeah, I think lamenting does keep us tender to that truth.

Kay >> I think it really does. And I feel like there’s a lot of noise out there as to how everybody brought this on themselves, and that’s just not the case. You know, there certainly are leaders who bear more of the consequences and should bear more the responsibility for what’s happening. But we have to remember, most people are just like us.

They’re as overwhelmed by this stuff, if not wanting more so, because they are losing their homes, they’re losing everything they have. Things like that.

Jodie >> Yeah. And I think generally, I think it’s good to remember that while there are evil characters that are causing a lot of this, most people want the exact same things we want. We want to live peaceful lives. We want to be productive citizens in our community. We want to, you know, have loving relationships with the people around us.

Most people want that. And so I think it is good to remember even people that feel so different than us because of a cultural context or religious context aren’t maybe as different as we could paint them to be.

Kay >> Yeah, yeah.

Well, thank you so much, Jodie. I think this has been really helpful, and I pray and hope that many of you out there will sit down today or soon and really take some time to ask God, you know, to lay some things on your heart if you don’t already have something on your heart, and just tell him what’s what you really feel about it, and be honest.

And you know God, God is there. And at the same time, remember all the things you love about God and all the ways that he has loved you.

Jodie >> That’s right.

Kay >> So. I know that in studying lament, you can just sort of study it, but I want this to be a reality for people. And I think that we need to learn to do this. And whether you have an issue right now going on or whether you’ve thought about the world situation or the country’s situation or whatever, there’s something that should tug at your heart to call you to begin lamenting.

And if you don’t feel like you have a personal need right now, you will someday have a need to have a personal one as well.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> I have just finished actually writing a study on lament that I would just suggest if you need some guidance, if you need some guidance in doing this for yourself, that that might be something that you would want.

Just go to our website BeyondOrdinaryWomen.org and go to Bible Studies. And I don’t want it to be a study of lament, but a study to show us, to lament. So we learn to lament, not just study lament.

Jodie >>I love that Kay, I’m so glad that you did that, because we do need tools to help us just practice.

Kay >> We do.

Jodie >> Yeah. So that’s amazing.

Kay >> Yeah. And we also have some more lament recordings that Nika Spaulding did a few years ago. And you can find those as well, if you go again to the Godly Living page, go up to the resources at the top menu, pull down to the Godly Living page. You can find those as well. So all of these resources are there to help you, and you can always contact us if you have any questions.

So thank you Jodie. And hopefully next time we can talk about something that might not seem quite so sad.

Jodie >> Yes. Only happy topics.

Kay >> Yeah, yeah. That’s what we’ll do.

Jodie >> But that’s not real life.

Kay >> It isn’t real life. And we have to deal with these other things too.

Jodie >> Yeah.

Kay >> Thank you for joining us and we’ll hope to see you and our audience back again next time.

Jodie >> All right.