Words for the unwell

Columns in magazines are by and large written by well people for well people. It cannot be helped, I suppose. But it seems a shame. It leaves a sizable subset of humanity out in the cold, people whom God cares for too. Fortunately, God is not so elitist an editor.

When I felt cast off from the land of the living I picked up the book of Lamentations, by some instinct, and found the door ajar. I read without a seminarian's scalpel, in pure despair, and it yielded its secrets. Have you ever felt too far gone for God? Is there a greater terror than the terror that the door has been shut tight and double-bolted?

The lament begins in a miserably distant, third person droning of indictments: "Bitterly she weeps"; "All her gateways are desolate"; "All who honored her despise her"; "The Lord has rejected." It is as though our sun had receded in the sky to many more than its 93 million miles, and shines with only a faint, cool light. That is God's distance from me. But I know myself to be guilty, and I accept my banishment.

Then toward the end of chapter 1, a mad hope: "See, O Lord, how distressed I am!" He addresses God directly! It's not much of a statement but it's everything-it's communication. The sun is back in its right sky.

More words follow: "I called on your name, O Lord, from the depths of the pit. You heard my plea. Do not close your ears to my cry for relief" (3:55,56). This is all I need. Gloom is receding. Slay me if you want, if only you will listen.