Does anyone hear me?

(Originally posted on July 7, 2008)

"Record my lament; list my tears on your scroll -- are they in your record?" Psalm 56:8

The Bible doesn't just offer clean, easy advice for rosy situations. It speaks to the most difficult and trying times of our lives. David cries out to God in a time of pain and just asks "Do you hear me? Do you notice my pain?"

Somehow in the mystery of God's providence over the world, pain and struggle still persists. Some of it is God testing us, but not nearly all of it. Some of it is just the result of how messed up and twisted the world is. God has chosen for us to be free beings with free choices and real consequences. So we go through hard times.

But what this verse says to me is that especially in the midst of our deepest pain, God feels every bit of it. Our tears are recorded in God's eternal scroll. Where is God in all the hard times? Right there with us, every step of the way. Sometimes what we need most immediately in those times is not an end to the pain but the knowledge that we are not alone or abandoned.