The Holiday season is often a time of intense contradiction.
We’re told it’s “the most wonderful time of the year” but for many, it’s the hardest. We lament the loved ones who aren’t with us. We’re reminded of unfulfilled longings. We’re confronted with old wounds.
Fortunately, King David knew this feeling well.
Lament to Bounty
No stranger to intense feelings, David is a useful guide to the conflicting feelings this time of year can bring.
In the 6 short verses of Psalm 13, David offers a path forward for those of us wrestling with this holiday season.
A Psalm of lamentation, it’s full of David crying out in a fit of depression for rescue from enemies, and answer to prayers. It’s a Psalm of vulnerability and intense struggle.
He pours out his heart to God, writing:
How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
2 How long must I take counsel in my soul
and have sorrow in my heart all the day?
How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?3 Consider and answer me, O Lord my God;
light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death,
4 lest my enemy say, “I have prevailed over him,”
lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.
Yet at the very end of it, David writes two beautiful lines.
5 But I have trusted in your steadfast love;
my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
6 I will sing to the Lord,
because he has dealt bountifully with me.
All is not well, David writes.
But that’s not the end of it.
Despite what he feels. Despite his pain and longing. He can write with confidence, “The LORD has dealt bountifully with me.”
An Exercise to Try
I’d like to offer Psalm 13 as a model for how those who are hurting and struggling can face this season.
This year, don’t fight or deny your intensifying hurt in the coming month.
Instead, follow David’s example.
Fully acknowledge your pain. Share it with the LORD and with someone you trust. Cast it on God—he welcomes our pain.
Face your pain head-on like David but don’t stop there.
Take a deep breath and remember this glorious truth, “he has dealt bountifully with me.”
God—in Christ— has dealt bountifully with you.
Your pain, your hurt, and your struggles are not the end of your story or the sum of your being. God is. And through Jesus, he has blessed, chosen, forgiven, and adopted you into his family. Your sins are forgiven and your wounds will one day be fully healed.
Throw your hurt on Christ’s shoulders and he’ll carry them to his tomb.