Slices
Prepare
Grief and loss are inescapable human experiences. Today, recall the losses you have known: people, places or companion animals; maybe the loss of opportunity or even freedom. Sit and weep before God.
Bible passage
Psalm 137
1 By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept
when we remembered Zion.
2 There on the poplars
we hung our harps,
3 for there our captors asked us for songs,
our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
they said, ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’
4 How can we sing the songs of the Lord
while in a foreign land?
5 If I forget you, Jerusalem,
may my right hand forget its skill.
6 May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth
if I do not remember you,
if I do not consider Jerusalem
my highest joy.
7 Remember, Lord, what the Edomites did
on the day Jerusalem fell.
‘Tear it down,’ they cried,
‘tear it down to its foundations!’
8 Daughter Babylon, doomed to destruction,
happy is the one who repays you
according to what you have done to us.
9 Happy is the one who seizes your infants
and dashes them against the rocks.
Explore
lament is the soundtrack of grief, with an impressive playlist in the psalms. It is reckoned that 42 of the 150 psalms in the canon are in this genre. Almost a third of Israel’s songbook consists of songs of loss. And for many of us, that sounds about right. When I add up all the tears, bereavements, losses, disappointments and regrets, a theme of lament is there in the background.
This psalm is one of the more memorable laments, in large measure because of the chart-topping version released by the German band Boney M in 1978: ‘By the Rivers of Babylon’ (v 1). Strange that a song mourning the devastation of ancient Jerusalem in the sixth century bc should top the charts in the 1970s. And it’s the loss of a place that’s the emotional centre of this psalm. Jerusalem, the city of David, the nation’s greatest king. Jerusalem, the place of the Temple, God’s dwelling place, where heaven and earth came together. Jerusalem, home to a dispersed people, now a ruin. Jerusalem, the psalmist’s highest joy. All now destroyed.
Respond
Where are your dear places, where you feel at home and close to God? Think of the faces of those you love and give thanks: ‘Lord of all, I give you praise, my lament of praise.’
Bible in a year
Read the Bible in a year: 1 Kings 20,21; Nahum 1–3
Pray for Scripture Union
Give thanks to God for all Faith Guides. Pray particularly for those who are volunteers like Nadine, and willingly give up their spare time to share Jesus with children and young people who don’t yet know him. (This week's prayers relate to this story)
