How many times have you, or someone you know, pressed down the overwhelming grief inside them, judging their own lament? Betraying the truth of their own sorrow, their need to cry? It happens so often—but what if we think of these expressions as love songs? I think we’d accept, even welcome, their expression. Jesus quoted the psalms, and I’ve been moved by the assertion that Jesus sang the psalms as he grew up. A part of daily Jewish life, people knew them by heart. I let my imagination wander. What did Jesus sound like when he sang? You know his voice was beautiful. But not at that end. Not at that hour of torment. It was undoubtedly a gruesome and gut-wrenching sound. The lesson for us is this, I think—if Jesus turned to the psalms in his deepest hour of pain, why wouldn’t we?
— from the book What Was Lost: Seeking Refuge in the Psalms
by Maureen O’Brien
