A Lament of Love

Last semester when I took a class on the Old Testament Poetic books and we had an assignment to write a lament Psalm. Laments are probably the most frequently neglected part of Bible literature today, yet the most common type of Psalm is lament. While the Psalter contains a lot of beautiful collection of praises to God, it also contains a lot of angry words uttered against God. Thus the mere fact that it is part of the Bible shows not only that God can handle it, but that He values it. As lets be honest there are times when shouting at God in anger is much more open and honest than attempting to cheerly praise God for how everything is great when it is clearly not the case. Finally, the vast majority (but not all) of the Biblical laments take a turn toward the positive at the end.

1 How long O Yahweh will you despise me? - (synonomous)
When O God will you stop tormenting me?

2 You ordained that it is not good for a man to be alone - (synthetic)
So male and female you created man

3 You say finding a wife, O Yahweh is a sign of your favor - (antithetical)
But you have caused me to be alone all of my days

4 All of my friends have abandoned me for their lovers - (synthetic)
As community has given way to dating and double dating

5 Day and night I cried out to You, to deliver me from loneliness - (antithetical)
But I have only gotten wet with tears in Your deafness

6 The light of the sun, illuminates not my search of desperation - (synonomous)
The darkness of the night, conceals not my wanderings of madness

7 Will your favor be ever departed from me O Yahweh? - (synonomous)
When will you remember man should not be alone, O God?

  Selah

8 O Yahweh, my hope in you was failing in the darkness - (antithetical)

But Your broke though with a faint glow renewing my trust in You, O Yahweh

9 Praise Yahweh who has shown favor to His servants (synonomous chiasmus)
Together we shall continue to praise Yahweh

Good News Everyone!!!

Around three weeks ago Paula, a very wonderful Christian woman came into my life. We met online through a free dating site and have been talking for at least a few hours a day ever since. It is amazing how much we have in common our interests and values are with each other. Such as we were both involved with Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts and obtained the highest level of Eagle and Gold and we both enjoy spending time in nature. Most importantly we are both devout Christians who take our faith seriously and want it to play a key role in our relationship with each other.

 

Especially since we feel that God played a big role in bringing us together. Before meeting Paula I have never had a girlfriend in either high school or college despite going to Ursinus College which holds a world record for the highest marriage rate among its students. A few months ago after getting tired about being lonely and depressed about it I decided take matters into my own hands and signed up for a free Christian dating service which turned out to be a depressing waste of time. The vast majority of the women within my age range were divorced with children and thus instantly disqualified. I must have sent over 40 private messages to various women expressing potential interest and asking if they felt the same and got zero responses from them. Finally I got to the point of realizing that the site was only making me feel more depressed so I deleted my profile. A few days later a friend told me about another free dating service which while wasn’t Christian allowed you to use religious filters in your searches so I signed up for it while wondering if I was just making another emotional mistake. Once again I created a profile with a little help from a female friend and almost got scared away by some of the dirty survey questions used for compatibility matching which included questions about your feelings about having sex in various public places including churches and graveyards and many others that I’m not willing to repeat. After answering enough questions for the compatibility ratings to at an acceptable level once again I started searching out profiles for Christian women and sending the same potentially interested to you do you feel the same messages to them. I actually passed over Paula the first time because she outdated information of owning a dog (I’m allergic to dogs) but I was drawn to add her to my favorites list, becoming the only person with a dog that made it that far. A few days later I was drawn to send her an impersonal woo when I felt drawn to contact her but was feeling too lazy to type out a message at the time. Paula in turn responded by sharing her AIM screen name and email address which started our daily talks with each other that lasted for hours. On the other side, Paula had attended Cedar Crest College, an all women’s school without much dating options and had been using the site for over a year without any luck beyond a few creepy messages from guys wanting to have sex with her, which made me stand out to her. It also turns out that Paula since high school had a feeling a pastor would be the right person for her which upon seeing that I was a seminary student on my profile made her comfortable to open up with her real name, AIM and email in her first message in response to my impersonal woo. Looking back now at our common history element I speculate whatever or not God was shielding us from others because they were not the right ones. I also know there were at least two of my friends and likely more, who were praying for me to find the right person for which I am very thankful to know that I had loving friends praying for me about something that I was often unable to bring myself to pray about. So without a doubt the aspect of answered prayer further increases our believe that it was God and not the dating service that ultimately brought Paula and me together. The experience has also changed my views as I used to be skeptical about both love on first site and soul mates, until Paula and I kept on surprising each other with how similar we were to each other.

 

Tonight, two days short of our 3 week mark of daily talks over AIM and cell phones we got to have our first date together. We had dinner together at the Allentown Applebees with one of Paula’s close friends from Cedar Crest and her boyfriend. After dinner, Paula and I went to a nearby park to talk a walk together. At the park we were able to connect with each other, while enjoying the beauty of the park together. We settled down together on a bench with an especially nice view and continued talking with each other and experienced a sense of closeness to each other unlike any that we have had before. It is hard to really describe what happened on the bench as we progressed from holding hands, to holding each other and exchanging a few kisses beyond saying that it was an overwhelming sense of comforting love to feel that close to another Christian. Looking back, I find it surprising in a way that I did not start crying at finally experiencing that after years of longing for something like it, but I can now say that it was worth waiting for what appears to be the right person to be able to experience it with them for the first time. Just as we value maintaining chastity in our relationship because we love each other enough to be patient enough to do things the way God intended them to be.