The Lord your God is in your midst,
a mighty one who will save;
he will rejoice over you with gladness;
he will quiet you by his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing.
Normally, I like to do my
research and explore a little bit (or a lot) into context, cultural
significance, and translations from the original language when I find a verse I
like (or don’t like). Sometimes, though, I prefer to just read the words that
are on the page as they are, and let that be the truth that is spoken to me. Although
it might not be academically correct, sometimes it’s just what I need. The case
of this particular verse is one of those times.
I know nothing about
Zephaniah, although I can assume he was a prophet—I’m not sure from where, or
who his audience was, or the intricacies of his relationship with those people,
or with the Lord, and although a quick google search, or even flip through the
pages of my study bible could give me those answers quite quickly, I really don’t
care.
I’ve had a really rough
couple of days, and anxiety has been mounting as I’m trying to figure out where
I should live and what I should do for the next stage of my life. I’m
second-guessing myself a lot, and God. I’m wondering if he really knows what he’s
doing. I’m wondering if I can ever live the life I want to live, given my history
with mental illness, and if it’s ever going to really go away. I’m wondering if
all I’m worth is this lifelong sentence of depression, anxiety, loneliness, and
feelings of worthlessness and filth, and why God has allowed me to sit in those
feelings for so long. I wonder why I choose to sit in those feelings when I
know there are better choices to be made. I wonder about hurtful things people
have said to me in the past, and how much truth they hold, why they said them,
and if those relationships can and should be reconciled. I wonder, and it eats
away at me.
Sometimes scripture is
comforting during these times, and sometimes it’s kind of infuriating to read
about all of these wonderful attributes of God that I just don’t see. The nice
part about that is that there is truth there, whether or not I feel that it is
true in the moment—the fact that this is something else to believe as truth
other than the flawed perception of myself and others as imperfect humans is a
gift in itself. I just like to read that God is with me through these times,
and saves, rejoices over his children with gladness, and quiets with his love—I
just love that image, it reminds me of a parent lovingly holding and comforting
a crying child. He also exults over his children with loud singing—not just
some under-the-table, empty sympathy smalltalk of “hey, I think you’re really
nice” but a loud, beautiful, majestic, genuine declaration of elation in our
success of merely existing: “this is my child whom I love!”
Sometimes, I just need to read
that, straight up.
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