Praising our Laments: A Reflection on Psalm 56

What is your first response when you’re in a tough spot? Whether it’s something as gut-wrenching as a loved one struggling or as insignificant as spilling coffee all over your clean white shirt, both lamentations and complaints constantly crop up throughout our lives. Often we might:

Distract ourselves.

Maybe call a friend? (Or if you’re like me, your mom)

We go on walks or runs, blare cathartic music, and search for anything that will help us vent that restless energy.

Often we do not immediately turn to praise. Yet, more than seeking to respond in praise, how often do we lament and adore our God simultaneously?

In the midst of being entrapped by the Philistines in Gath, David writes this beautiful Psalm:

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Psalm 56: Prayer for Relief from Tormentors

Be merciful to me, O God, for man would swallow me up;

Fighting all day he oppresses me.

My enemies would hound me all day,

For there are many who fight against me, O Most High.

Whenever I am afraid,

I will trust in You.

In God (I will praise His word),

In God I have put my trust;

I will not fear.

What can flesh do to me?

All day they twist my words;

All their thoughts are against me for evil.

They gather together,

They hide, they mark my steps,

When they lie in wait for my life.

Shall they escape by iniquity?

In anger cast down the peoples, O God!

You number my wanderings;

Put my tears into Your bottle;

Are they not in Your book?

When I cry out to You,

Then my enemies will turn back;

This I know, because God is for me.

In God (I will praise His word),

In the Lord (I will praise His word),

In God I have put my trust;

I will not be afraid.

What can man do to me?

Vows made to You are binding upon me, O God;

I will render praises to You,

For You have delivered my soul from death.

Have You not kept my feet from falling,

That I may walk before God

In the light of the living?

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As David is lamenting his troubles to the Lord and asking for a reprieve, praise for the word is constantly spilling out of his mouth. It’s not just this constant refrain of “I will praise His word” that mirrors David’s heart, either. By crying out to God and turning to Him first, David is in fact praising Him.

By coming to Him first we can fully acknowledge that He is the only one with the power to raise us out of a valley of suffering. And as God simultaneously “bottles” our very tears yet allows us to stay in seasons of suffering, He has blessed us with the ability to praise and lament in the same breath. This gift of expressing diametrically different feelings together allow us to lay both our prosperities and disappointments at the feet of the Father each moment.

I pray that every emotion and experience we have, whether that be a victory or a struggle, will be given as honest, if hard-wrought, adoration to our precious Lord.