In Downers, Hope

BY WAY Of method: selected verses from Psalm 88 (BCP ’79 translation – a personal fave) interspersed with the refrain from Psalm 136. Language was ironed out to be in the third person to match the refrain. Not all the verses of Ps 88 are used, just the ones that match my current #mood. The reader is referred to Romans 8:28. Cribbing on the Psalms is either poetry or meditation. This Psalm is used for Friday’s Night Prayer. Its final line is haunting but today felt like a good day to claim it as my own.

By day and night I cry to the LORD, my God, my Savior.
– For his love endures for ever.
Let my prayer enter into his presence;
– For his love endures for ever.
He will incline his ear to my lamentation.
– For his love endures for ever.
I am full of trouble; and my life is at the brink of the grave.
– For his love endures for ever.
I am counted among those who go down to the Pit;
– For his love endures for ever.
I have become like one who has no strength;
– For his love endures for ever.
Lost among the dead, like the slain who lie in the grave,
– For his love endures for ever.
He has laid me in the depths of the Pit, in dark places, and in the abyss.
– For his love endures for ever.
His anger weighs upon me heavily, and all his great waves overwhelm me.
– For his love endures for ever.
He has put my friends far from me;
– For his love endures for ever.
He has made me to be abhorred by them;
– For his love endures for ever.
I am in prison and cannot get free.
– For his love endures for ever.
My sight has failed me because of trouble;
– For his love endures for ever.
I have stretched out my hands to the LORD and called upon him daily
– For his love endures for ever.
I cry to the LORD for help; in the morning my prayer comes before him.
– For his love endures for ever.
Why has the LORD rejected me?
– For his love endures for ever.
Why have he hidden his face from me?
– For his love endures for ever.
Ever since my youth, I have been wretched and at the
point of death;
– For his love endures for ever.
I have borne his terrors with a troubled mind.
– For his love endures for ever.
His blazing anger has swept over me;
– For his love endures for ever.
His terrors have destroyed me;
– For his love endures for ever.
They surround me all day long like a flood;
– For his love endures for ever.
They encompass me on every side.
– For his love endures for ever.
My friend and my neighbor you have put away from me
– For his love endures for ever.
Darkness is my only companion.
– For his love endures for ever.