If we wish to invite a dying culture-that flirts with knowing life is neither easy, nor good to consider the gospel, then we must learn to sing songs that face life with both honesty and hope. We need to learn to lament. We will consider the language of lament and the place for lament-the community of God. We need to learn to get out of the way of those that cry out, stand as a vessel of God's truth, not as a God.
A lament is the battle cry against God that paradoxically voice a heart of desire and ironic faith in His goodness. We fear lament as a quick slide into doubt and despair, failing to see that doubt and despair are the darker soil that is necessary to grow confidence and joy.
When our doubt and despair are turned towards our neighbors, they mock us we miss the gift of the cry. Isn't it God who is behind the permissions and direction of our suffering?
Dan Allander says "Radical pain is required before we are prone to surrender to His goodness. The pain and the struggle are not to be glorified, but it seems to be provoked by God; therefore, it is part of the process of our transformation."
