Date: June 9-10, 2012
Series: You are Here
Message: Lament
Passage: Various
NOTE: This week you will be guided through an experience of a lamenting prayer. There will be discussion questions provided, however they are designed to set up an experience so this will be different than your usual weekly flow question curriculum. You will want to complete your discussion time with at least 20-30 minutes of group time left for the experience.
Discussion
Were any of you among those who were prayed over for healing this weekend?
Did you pray for others?
What was your experience?
For those who didn’t, what were your feelings as you stood in the crowd?
Observation
Read Mark 10:46-51 and Mark 14:32-39. What do you learn about lamenting prayers?
Commentary:
They are brought to God in surrender
They are offered in desperation
The release is in the surrender, not in God’s answer
They are not in vain
God’s plan is bigger than the request (Jesus wasn’t relieved of the pain and suffering ahead – but the world’s salvation was made possible because of it)
Understanding
When have you been a part of the “crowd”? When have you been like Bartimaeus? What keeps you from crying out for mercy?
For those who were prayed over for healing this weekend, how did your lamenting prayers look like those from the Mark passages?
Application
Read Psalm 3. Write a prayer of lamentation using the psalm as your guide (a format is provided below – however feel free to do this on your own).
Leader note: If you are not in a place of lamenting, pray as an intercessor for someone in your life who is. As you do, ask the Holy Spirit to give you empathy so you can actually feel the pain and desperation as you pray. Experience the pain and then experience the release in the surrender.
After you complete the experience, come back together and debrief. What was your prayer? What did you experience as you prayed?
Thoughts on a lamenting prayer
In a classic lament there are three parts:
1. The lament — the honest complaint or cry of your sorrowing fearful heart
2. Remembering God’s goodness in the past. The Spirit brings remembrance God’s faithfulness. He also brings to his remembrance God’s character. The Spirit does not explain the why of the circumstances, but only the heart of God.
3. The prayer, based now on faith in God, or the resolve, based on faith in God.
Experience
- Find these three parts in Psalm 3. Which verses are for each?
- Pour out your sorrowing or fearful heart. Do it for God — if writing it down won’t change your cry, then write it here. If you are not in a time of pain, pray for those who are.
- Warm your heart at the fire of God’s love by meditating on remembers things about God. If one of the verses sparks something in you, then God has spoken to you — and stay there, meditating. You can reread those verses in psalm 3 if that is helpful, especially if praying for others.
- Write your request, or resolve.
Sample Prayer
(Again, if you are not in a time of pain, pray for those who are).
Lord Christ, you know our suffering deeper than we know it. You rose from the dead, but you still carried your wounds. Will you teach us how to bear our wounds to you? We do not want our pain to close us off from you or from others any longer. Heal us oh Lord.
Your presence is all that sustains us, and so allow us to experience your presence in our pain. Your strength was shown in weakness, and so we come to you, surrendered in our weakness. And so our weeping lingers for right now, but may relief and even joy come in the morning. Death and destruction come for us all, we cannot deny them or the wounds they have left. But they will not have the last word, because you did not let them have the last word. We surrender all to you Lord, and we cling to the promise of glory with you in eternity.