Embracing Lament: Naming our enemies, then calling on God to conquer

It’s easy to read a psalm like today’s and say, “This one doesn’t apply to me because I don’t have any enemies.”

Oh, sure, we may know some people who don’t like us. The neighbor whose dog we chase out of our yards. The work colleague who resents our relationship with the boss. The sister-in-law who cannot abide our political choices.

But enemies? Enemies are for warfare, right? Soldiers and tanks and battleships, all of them lobbing death against the armies I support. I don’t have enemies like that!

But commentator George A.F. Knight broadens our definition:

“Our personal enemies, in their thousands, may in fact be those evil thoughts, decadent and destructive, that crowd in upon our minds, thoughts of meanness, jealousy and greed, of lasciviousness and self-justification, even while we say our prayers.”

And while any of us might have encountered such enemies, caregivers can name a few more: Loneliness. Fear about the future. Anger and disappointment at the negative turn life has taken. Worry about finances or our own health.

The psalmist confronts the fearsome foes bearing down upon him and cries out, “Arise, Lord! Deliver me, my God!” That phrase Arise, Lord appears more than once in Scripture (including the Psalms), each time calling on the God of the universe to intercede in a battle that seems almost hopeless.

The psalmist finds comfort just in the act of demanding help from God. He prays, and then he sleeps well with the knowledge God will not let him down. As Knight puts it, “Our poet now knows that God is already present in tomorrow (a great gift from God).”

“From the Lord comes deliverance,” the people reply in the last stanza of a psalm used as a congregational hymn.

We can rest with the same assurance, if we’ll pursue two strategies: Be frank and specific about the evil intentions of our most-present enemies. And then remain bold and insistent with God to conquer them.

Read: Psalm 3
Listen: “Thou, Oh Lord Psalm 3 (Salmo 3),” Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir
Pray: “Lord and Savior, I am facing so many troubles. . . . be my glory—give me confidence that you are with me and will bring me through this. Help me!”*

* From The Songs of Jesus by Timothy Keller with Kathy Keller.