“God never allows his people to curse; he encourages them to lament. God doesn’t expect us to bottle up our hurt and our fear, suppressing it unnaturally; he encourages us to turn toward him and pour out our hearts.”- Tina Boesch
With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be.”- James 3:9-10 (NIV)
As Tina Boesch continues Chapter 5 of Given, she talks about the groaning of lament. Such as David did again and again in the Psalms. In addition, while cursing gives voice to our fears, lament expresses our faith. Hence, Tina explains:
“Lamentation is a way to express our frustrations, our discouragement, our terror, and our desire for justice to God, laying all our angst and confusion at his feet, begging him to judge justly and right the wrongs that cause suffering. Lamentation trusts that God hears, sees, is in control , and will respond in his own time. Cursing, on the other hand, is attempting to take matters into our own hands, exercising judgment by damning or defaming another.”
Most noteworthy, we must depend on the Holy Spirit when it comes to communicating blessing. For the Holy Spirit provides us with discernment to speak the truth that someone needs to hear in a particular moment.
Finally, God’s blessing illuminates the future, His words shining a light on what is yet to come. We use the term foreshadow to describe this. However, as John O’ Donahue writes in To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings, “we could say that a blessing ‘forebrightens’ the way.”
Today’s question: What Bible verses encourage you to lament rather than curse? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “Christian blessing – intervention, intercession”
