Day Ten
Wednesday, December 6
Psalm 30
“Sing praises to the Lord, O you his faithful ones, and give thanks to his holy name. For his anger is but for a moment; his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.”
Psalm 30: 4-5
Psalm 30: 4-5
I love the word linger. To me it feels wistful, like you simply have to take a romantic pause to spend more time with something. One of my favorite things from this year has been that my generation has re-discovered the song “Linger,” The Cranberries’ first hit from 1993, and people really have had no choice but to let it linger. Lingering in practice is also something I enjoy regularly. I love to linger over great sentences in books, after dinner with my family before driving home, or with the cat who’s always on the sidewalk outside of my office. I love to linger after worship, eyes closed after a song ends, after the last prayer at life group.
A habitual lingerer, I tend also to linger in the hard stuff, in my weeping. Lately, it feels impossible not to linger, on the tear-filled eyes of another child whose parents lie under rubble, with another person on the hotline who has experienced violence, on another life violated by police brutality. In this lingering is where my disappointment, anger, and sadness have often turned to despair, cynicism, and bitterness.
Psalm 30 offers a merciful reminder that “weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.” Darkness is not permanent though it may feel that way, and weeping can only linger – it does not remain. As I linger in darkness, there is the opportunity to know overwhelming peace, with the reality that joy always comes with the morning, that God, in his mercy, faithfulness, and love, draws us up, restores, and hears us as we cry. I will cry out to God, I will remember that God hears and works, I will praise God, and I will not despair. Weeping will not dwell, for our Father daily calls the sun to rise, and joy comes with the morning.
A habitual lingerer, I tend also to linger in the hard stuff, in my weeping. Lately, it feels impossible not to linger, on the tear-filled eyes of another child whose parents lie under rubble, with another person on the hotline who has experienced violence, on another life violated by police brutality. In this lingering is where my disappointment, anger, and sadness have often turned to despair, cynicism, and bitterness.
Psalm 30 offers a merciful reminder that “weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.” Darkness is not permanent though it may feel that way, and weeping can only linger – it does not remain. As I linger in darkness, there is the opportunity to know overwhelming peace, with the reality that joy always comes with the morning, that God, in his mercy, faithfulness, and love, draws us up, restores, and hears us as we cry. I will cry out to God, I will remember that God hears and works, I will praise God, and I will not despair. Weeping will not dwell, for our Father daily calls the sun to rise, and joy comes with the morning.
Lucy Sato is a domestic violence survivor advocate who loves to laugh with friends, writes most things in her journal, and (sometimes) makes an effort to not use too many exclamation marks.