Lamenting: A Lost Art

In both my seminary education and my preaching experience, I learned that the sermons with the most positive response (just to be clear, positive response does not mean congregants eager to shake my hand and say, “Good sermon, Graham!” but rather, positive response means sermons that the congregation finds the sermon relevant and is thinking about and applying all week) will answer a question or address an issue in the congregants’ lives, whether directly in the church body, or indirectly in the communities in which the congregants live. Almost a third the way through 2020, all the questions needing answering and the issues needing addressing all revolve around the Coronavirus. I hesitate, however, to preach on anything relating to the Coronavirus. It almost seems like every preacher has their own hot take or soapbox rant on the Coronavirus, and that’s a problem for me. See, when somebody reaches the doctoral level of education, midterm papers and final terms papers cease to become summaries of what the student learned in the course. Now midterm papers and final terms papers, just like the eventual dissertation, seek to contribute to the field of biblical studies by adding a new thought or idea, something I struggle to do. Again, here, I struggle to say something that no one has said.


A quick (and unscientific) survey will reveal that every preacher has already said what someone would expect them to say. Some pastors, who mainly picture God as wrathful judge of sin, preach that the Coronavirus has become God’s agent of judgment. As for what the Lord judges, it all comes down to where the pastor falls on the conservative/liberal spectrum. Naturally, the conservative pastor resorts to the typical top three of the conservative church: abortion, homosexuality and Islam. Of course, the liberal pastor resorts to the typical top two of the liberal church: neglect of poor or neglect or environment. Both of conservative and liberal end up with the same application: a call to repentance by doing the opposite. Indeed, a survey of the Bible will reveal God uses plagues and other natural disasters to bring judgment on people. Yes, such acts of judgment occur more often in the Old Testament than the New Testament, but even Ananias and Sapphira paid with their life for lying to the Holy Spirit, and Herod found himself a meal for worms after accepting the praise of a God. At the same time, however, in James 1:17, James teaches that good and perfect gifts come from God, and the Coronavirus is neither good nor perfect. Similarly, in Job 34:12, Elihu preaches that the Lord does nothing wrong, and the Coronavirus has wronged a lot of people, including the upright like Job. Other pastors, who mainly see God as kind and loving, have a nicer approach. Their sermons merely remind the congregation that everything happens for a reason, God encourages not to fear, and God can use this time to teach his people that they need to slow down with the busyness of life and enjoy the finer things of life, like spending time with family. While this view embraces the “intended for evil, God made good” mentality Joseph has in Genesis 50:20a, anyone can see that Genesis 50:20b goes on to say “…that many people should be kept alive…” which the Coronavirus has definitely not kept people alive. God can remind his people that he remains in control, encourages his people not to fear and teach his people to enjoy the finer things in life like family without something so bad, so evil, so wicked like the Coronavirus, none of the kind and loving God explanations sound right.


One of my favorite explanation, or rather, discussion on the topic, comes from New Testament and Early Church scholar N.T. Wright. He argued his beliefs so well, it even got published in TIME magazine’s website. It's already awesome that TIME published an article written by N. T. Wright, a born-again, devout Christian. Even more awesome, N.T. Wright’s sound theology has given the Lord a national (and maybe ever international) stage to hear the will of God. This morning, I would like to expand on some of N.T. Wright’s sound theology.


If you desire to look up the original article, just go to www.time.com and look up the article up by the article’s title: “Christianity Offers No Answers About the Coronavirus. It'sNot Supposed To.” Ladies and gentlemen, the online world calls such a title “clickbait.” The Merriam-Website dictionary defines clickbait as “a headline designed to make readers want to click on a hyperlink especially when the link leads to content of dubious value or interest.” In essence, the headline alone makes a person want to click on the hyperlink, no matter the quality of the content. Clickbait has become a huge problem on the internet, especially social media websites. Facebook did some internal research, and the study revealed that over half the people who liked, commented or shared a link never clicked on the link and read it! This results in the spreading of misinformation. When it came to this article’s sharing on Facebook, anyone can tell who reacted or commented on the article without reading on it. These people would comment, “Oh, here it goes again, liberal media blaming Christians and making Christians look bad.” Well, first of all, if these people clicked on the article and read it, they would not only see a devout, born-again Christian wrote it, they would also see it puts Christianity in a positive light.


In the article, Wright first observes that, for many, the shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders began the same time Lent started. Spending the first ten years of my life growing up in a traditional church, Lent has an important role in my life. If unfamiliar with Lent, Lent is to Easter as Advent is to Christmas. Just as Advent prepares the Christian for Christmas, Lent prepares the Christian for Easter. Whereas Advent has happier overtones, Lent can have more somber undertones. Traditional Lent observations usually involve confessing sins to God or extending social justice to the outcasts of society, but the most famous practice of Lent involves fasting or abstaining from a luxury in life. How ironic that the shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders began the same time that Christians should have practice sustaining from the luxuries of life. I emphasize should. On Shrove Tuesday/Fat Tuesday/Mardi Gras (whatever you call it this year), I ranted a bit that people gleefully celebrate Shrove Tuesday/Fat Tuesday/Mardi Gras, but they don’t observe Ash Wednesday. I even dared to say, “Don’t celebrate Fat Tuesday unless you're willing to observe Ash Wednesday and what goes with it!” How ironic that the shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders forced people to fast from hobbies, interests and like! The athlete forced to fast from both playing and watching sports. The audiophile forced to fast from concerts. The foodie forced to fast from dining at fancy restaurants. The social drinker forced to past from bars. The dancer forced to fast from clubs. Those would not voluntarily give up something now found themselves forced to give up something.


It kind of reminds me of the closing remarks of 2 Chronicles. In 2 Chronicles 36:20&21, the chronicler concludes, “²⁰ He took into exile in Babylon those who had escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and to his sons until the establishment of the kingdom of Persia, ²¹ to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. All the days that it lay desolate it kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.” This passage insinuates that the Lord sent Judah into exile for seventy years for the seventy Sabbath years missed. Most Bible readers know about the Sabbath days. After six days of work, the seventh day became the Sabbath day, a day of rest. Few Bible readers know that the Lord also expanded  this concept to the years. After six years of work, the seventh year became a Sabbath year, a year of rest. God would expand this concept of sevens one more time. The seventh Sabbath year would become the year of jubilee (this is all in Leviticus 25, by the way). From 2 Chronicles 36:20&21 never observed the Sabbath, and Judah most definitively never observed the year of jubilee. From Bible verses like Psalm 82:3&4, the Bible teaches the Lord sides with the weak, the fatherless, the afflicted, the destitute and the needy, in essence, the victim. Interesting enough, 2 Chronicles 36:20&21 makes the Promised Land the victim, victimized by its oppressor the chosen seed of Abraham, the people of God! If the Promised Land takes the role of the victim, then God comes to the aid of the land, rescuing the land from his own people, even if it requires removing them from the Promise Land! God does not shy away from forcing his people to practice what he has commanded. If God can remove the blessing of the Promise Land from his promised people, surely God can remove the modern-day blessings he has given his people, the Christians, like sports, concerts and restaurants. If God’s people won’t voluntarily practice self-control themselves, God will make them practice self-control. I pray that for Lent 2021, Christians around the world will voluntarily give up something for Lent, instead of the Lord demanding it from them.


This theory, however, has just as many holes as any other previous theory mentioned early. If everybody woke up Easter morning to hear every news outlet proudly proclaim, “Good news! The Coronavirus has disappeared! All shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders have become null-and-void. Please continue life as normal! Happy Easter!” then indeed this theory stands true. To the contrary, sunrises services took place on balconies, decks and porches instead of beaches and parks. People attended church online in their pajamas instead of going to church in their Sunday best. Conference calls and group texts replaced large family gatherings. To many, Easter did not feel like Easter. It felt like another day of quarantine, expect with eggs, candy and ham. If Advent is to Christmas like Lent is to Easter, then this year, it felt like Lent had no Easter, or, to borrow the words of C.S. Lewis, it felt like winter without Christmas. Therefore, as stated in the introduction, even this theory contributes nothing new to the conversation. If anything, it continues to propagate poorly thought out ideas.


This leads to Wright’s second observation. The common underlying factor among every theory is that everything needs an explanation. Let me repeat that again with emphasis: everything needs an explanation. If the Coronavirus exists, it needs an explanation. Such an attitude has seeped into the church. Now everything needs a reason with God involved in that reason. Wright argues against this approach, and I would agree with him. How then should the Christian approach the Coronavirus? Wright proposes a spiritual disciple summed up in one word: lament.


Why should Christians lament? Well, for starters, God laments. Yes, every person of the triune Godhead laments. In Genesis 6:6&7, Yahweh regrets creating man so much, that he grieves himself (the Hebrew verb comes in Hithpael pattern, which best equates to the reflexive in English) and he is sorry that he made them. Regrets, grieves, and sorry. Such strong emotion word proves Yahweh laments. Everyone knows John 11:35 as the shortest verse in the Bible, but people forgot to remember that means Jesus lamented over the death of Lazarus! And remember, this is the messiah, whom Isaiah prophesied as a “man of sorrows, filled with grief” (Isaiah 53:3). Paul in Ephesians 4:30 instructs the Ephesians not to grieve the Holy Spirit. This command insinuates that by doing that in Ephesians 4:31 and not doing that in Ephesians 4:32 causes the Holy Spirit to lament. If the process of sanctification seeks to become more like Christ and less like the old, sinful self, it will involve lamenting!


Not only does God himself become an example, but God’s Word also provides examples on how to lament. Look no further than the book of Psalms! A survey of the book of Psalms will reveal five sub-categories or sub-genres of Psalms (a survey on commentaries on Psalms will reveal that commentators and scholars have guessed anywhere between two to a hundred different sub-categories or sub-genres of Psalms). First, the lament psalm, a prayer of petition in which the psalmist calls on the Lord for aid (most often deliverance). In a sentence, “O Lord, help!” Second, the declarative praise psalm praises God by giving a testimony. In one sentence, “O Lord, I praise and thank you for what you have done.” Third, the descriptive praise psalm calls on others to join worship, usually focusing on attributes and characteristics of God (e.g. Creator). In a single sentence, “O Lord, I praise and thank you for who you are.” Fourth, the wisdom psalm seeks to teach other about God himself, God’s relationship to his people or God’s word. Simply put, “Let me teach you something about the Lord.” Fifth, the royal/messianic psalm worships God for his rule (present or future) over all the earth. Simply stated, “O Lord, I look forward to your Messiah and the coming Messianic kingdom. These five sub-genres of the psalms come in this order for a reason: in order of occurrence. Yes, the lament psalm occurs most often out of all the other sub-genres of the Psalms. Imagine flipping through the pages of your hymnal, to find a majority of hymns consist of sad, depressing hymns, begging God for help? Did My Chemical Romance write this hymnal (so few will get that joke)?! This may come as a shock because it reflects the complete opposite of the contemporary praise and worship songs on CCLI. Sure, they may remind of the sinful nature needing paying, but it quickly moves on to outbursts of joying for received salvation. More on that later.


Taking a closer look at the lament psalms, a pattern emerges. The lament psalm opens with a plea to the Lord for aid. The main body dives in detail about the anguish and the suffering, while continuing to call for assistance. Most lament psalm typically closes with a confession of trust with a vow to praise God later, but not always. Some lament psalms do not have this confession of trust. Rather, they finish open-ended, waiting patiently or impatiently for the Lord to come. Note that these lament psalms spend most of its time expressing feelings of grief and sorrow, thus truly earning the title of lament. They neither seek to provide an explanation, nor do they try to take a positive spin on the events. Not even the communal lament psalms attempt to incorporate repentance of sins (with some exceptions, see Psalm 51). They simply express how much it hurts, thus truly earning the title of lament. For some good examples, see Psalms 6, 10, 13 & 22, but Psalm 89 stands out as the most interesting. The fascination with this psalm comes from the fact it does not easily fit into the sub-categories or sub-genres. For the first thirty-seven verses, it sounds like a descriptive praise psalm, praising God of all of his attributes and characteristics. Then, all of a sudden, in verse thirty-eight, it becomes a stereotypical lament psalm! What gives? Some have gone as far suggesting Ethan the Ezrahite remixed two songs to make a single psalm, like a DJ would remix two songs to form a new gon. While somebody might think this throws off my perfect number of five sub-genres, I take Psalm 89 as a lament psalm. Ethan’s confession of trust takes longer simply because he needs extra convincing that God will rescue him, despite his intense suffering.


If the Bible portrays God as lamenting, and the Scriptures provide examples on how to lament, why doesn’t the church practice lamenting more often? I have a theory.


In a class on culture I took in my undergraduate years, the professor handed every student in the class a list of over fifty (probably close to a hundred) -isms, ideologies, philosophies and religions people have held to over the centuries. He asked each student to pick the -ism that they thought best fit the 21^st century American culture. Some chose individualism, other chose materialism, yet some others chose postmodernism. The one I chose I still stand behind to this day: hedonism. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines hedonism as “the doctrine that pleasure or happiness is the sole or chief good in life.” In essence, happiness becomes greatest good in life, and the human’s goal in life aims to achieve happiness. Yes, I truly believe 21^st century United States of America lives on this principle. Don’t believe me? Ever hear of lady by the name of Marie Kondo? She has become quite famous for her decluttering and organizational skills. One of methods of helping people declutter involves the person holding onto the item, and then she will ask, “Does it spark joy?” If the person answers yes, they keep the item, but if they say no, they discard the item. Agree or disagree with this model, acknowledge that the item’s worth relates to happiness. Sadly, this idea sometimes hops from things to people. Constantly on social media, people will advise one another, “Remove toxic people from your life. You don’t need that kind of negativity in your life.” Agree or disagree, but recognize that a person’s worth or value now comes down to happiness. Watch any self-help idea, almost guaranteed the sales pitch will involve happiness. In one self-help video for sales company (mostly likely a pyramid scheme), the speaker mentioned how she had two sales reps under her. The one sales rep sold the company product to pay for her mother’s nursing home bills; the other sales rep sold the company product so she could get her nails painted at the nail salon weekly. The first sales rep struggled to make sales; the second sales rep flourished in the business. No joke, the speaker deduced that her second sales rep sold more because she had the better motivation: her happiness. American have truly fallen hook, line and sinker for hedonism.


Sadly, this philosophy has seeped in the church. Church fear so badly if that Christianity or the church makes a person feel anything but happy, then Christianity and its churches have failed. Under hedonism, a successful Christianity and successful church makes the Christian happy at all times. Any hint of sadness gets removed. The evils of sin get quickly brushed aside, and the joy of salvation become the highlight. Any sin the Christian may still struggle with gets ignored, the good the Christian has done become the main focus. Think of all the other ways this philosophy has sneaked into the Christianity. For example, too quickly and too easily will churches turn funerals into “celebrations of life.” Yes, born-again Christian entering heaven should result in praising God, but that should not equate to a denial of sorrow. Just like family or a friend moving far away, people will miss the deceased, except this time, unlike the family or friend moving away, no one can make phone calls, texts, e-mails to the departed. That loss of companionship alone deserves mourning. Even more, Christians should grieve over the fact that sin has made the traversal from the earthly kingdom of God to the heavenly kingdom of God a painful one, which God did not intend. That too deserves grieving. But heaven forbid the church ever make a Christian sad! Won’t that ruin our witness, though? Listen, the only witness Christians them make is that they turn a cold shoulder to death! Christian can still know how the afterlife works and still believe the process sucks.


This is why so many Christians do not observe Lent, from the start with Ash Wednesday to the (near) end of Good Friday. These two specific days make the Christian sad because it requires them to come face-to-face with their sin and the consequences of it, and that cannot work in a hedonistic Christianity. Come on, Christians can have the joy, joy, joy, joy down in your heart the other 363 days of the year (364 days this year), they can afford to be sad just two days of the year. This is also why the church tends the ignore those lament psalms. Church goers do not want to think their walk with Christ will lead them into dark places and dark times, which will make them grieve, mourn and feel sorrowful. Instead, they focus on the other psalms, which record the aftermath. Earlier, I quoted C.S. Lewis’s phrase, “winter without Christmas.” To sum up the church’s hedonism, hedonistic Christianity wants “Christmas without winter.”  That can be just as dangerous. After all, Jesus himself said in Mathew 5:4, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” To receive the blessing of comfort, one must first mourn.


Do not take these words and go to the other extreme. These words do not mean that the Christians should never feel happy. As a matter of fact, I can safely say that God desires all his children to feel happy. In fact, the head of doctoral studies at LBC/Capital, who is well respected for his Old Testament studies among his fellow faculty and the grander scholarly community, actually feel comfortable at translating the Hebrew word אַשְׁרֵי (ʾǎšrê) and the Greek word μακάριος (makarios), both traditionally translated as “blessed,” as “happy.” His version of Psalm 1 begins, “How happy is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers,” and all his Beatitudes in Matthew 5 start with “How happy are the/those…” With my claim that God wants all his children to feel happy, I put a disclaimer. Christian happiness has at least two rules. First, it may not come at the cost of the anyone else’s happiness, whether God’s happiness or another person’s happiness. That falls right in line with what Jesus declares as the two greatest commandments (Matthew 22:37-39/Mark 12:28-31). Second, as Ecclesiastes 3:1 says, there is a season and time for every matter under heaven, which includes, as seen in Ecclesiastes 3:4, “a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance.” Let not the Christian laugh and dance when Jesus calls his people to weep and mourn.


In conclusion, during these uncertain times, Christians should not feel like they need to provide an explanation, and Christians should not feel like they need to bring a positive spin to all the negative events happening around them. Perhaps the best approach involves the Christian simply lamenting over everything bad happening in the world right. Then you may feel the God all comfort comforting you (2 Corinthians 1:3&4).