I say to God my Rock, “Why have you forgotten me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?” – Psalm 42:9

Today’s Scripture Reading (June 22, 2019): Psalm 42

Why? It is often the unanswerable question. It is the child’s question of a tired mother; the unending query of the curious. And sometimes the tired mother’s answer is the only one that is available to us – “because.” There is no other answer, at least no answer that will ever satisfy. But why is also the beginning of finding the answers to those questions. Why is part of our struggle for truth, even the answers seem to be so far away.

The Psalmist offers us three why questions in this passage. The first is directed at God. “Why have you forgotten me?” The words are an echo of the opening questions of Psalm 22, words that are repeated by Jesus from the cross; “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish” (Psalm 22:1)? The answer to this why question, both for the Psalmist and Jesus, is that God had never forgotten or forsaken any of us. Sometimes, amid the stress and struggle of life, we can’t feel God’s presence, even though he remains with us. But by faith, we know he stays with us, even when we can’t feel his arms wrapped around us.  

The second why question is self-directed. “Why must I go about mourning?” And the answer is that mourning is simply the reality of living on this planet. Life means transition and loss, and both of those things require grief. But mourning is not actually bad. Mourning a person we have lost means that that person made a genuine difference in our lives. We would have been experientially poorer if they had not been part of our experience during this life. Mourning a life situation gives us a reason to struggle to get back to where we want to be. Mourning is a positive response to the realities of living.

The last why question is directed at the unnamed “them.” “Why must I be oppressed by my enemy?” This might be the unanswerable question. But the truth of our reality is that someone will always oppose us, even though we may struggle understanding why. The Psalmist’s last why query might be the hardest for us to understand, but that is also okay. Because we know that God is with us, even when we can’t feel him, and their opposition will only make us stronger

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Psalm 43