Psalms 44:1-16: a reflection

1We have heard with our ears, God; our fathers have told us what work you did in their days, in the days of old. 2You drove out the nations with your hand, but you planted them. You afflicted the peoples, but you spread them abroad. 3For they didn’t get the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them; but your right hand, your arm, and the light of your face, because you were favorable to them. 4God, you are my King. Command victories for Jacob! 5Through you, we will push down our adversaries. Through your name, we will tread down those who rise up against us. 6For I will not trust in my bow, neither will my sword save me. 7But you have saved us from our adversaries, and have shamed those who hate us. 8In God we have made our boast all day long. We will give thanks to your name forever. Selah. 9But now you rejected us, and brought us to dishonor, and don’t go out with our armies. 10You make us turn back from the adversary. Those who hate us take plunder for themselves. 11You have made us like sheep for food, and have scattered us among the nations. 12You sell your people for nothing, and have gained nothing from their sale. 13You make us a reproach to our neighbors, a scoffing and a derision to those who are around us. 14You make us a byword among the nations, a shaking of the head among the peoples. 15All day long my dishonor is before me, and shame covers my face, 16at the taunt of one who reproaches and verbally abuses, because of the enemy and the avenger.

Psalm 44 begins by remembering God's great past deeds. We have heard with our ears, O God; our fathers have told us the work you did in their days: how you drove out the nations, gave them the land, not by their own sword but by your right hand. It is a confident recollection of God's saving hand in the past. But then the psalm turns, sharply, to the present: But now you have rejected us and disgraced us; you have made us turn back from the foe; you have made us a byword among the nations. The confident memory collides with a painful present.

Notice how the psalm holds these two together: the remembered faithfulness of God in the past, and the felt abandonment of the present. The psalmist does not deny either. He remembers, gratefully and truly, what God did for their fathers; and he laments, honestly and painfully, that God seems to have withdrawn now. He brings the tension, the but now, directly to God, neither pretending the past was not real nor pretending the present does not hurt.

That is a model of honest faith in hard times. Many of us know the tension the psalm names: we have heard, and even seen, God's faithfulness in the past, and yet the present feels like abandonment, as though God has withdrawn. The temptation is either to deny the present pain out of piety, or to let it erase the memory of God's past faithfulness. The psalm does neither. It holds both, and brings the honest but now to God. When your present feels like abandonment though you remember God's past faithfulness, do not hide the tension. Bring it to God as the psalm does: remember his past deeds, name your present pain, and cry out to him honestly. Faith can hold both the memory and the ache.

Lord, the psalmist remembered your great deeds in the past and yet cried out, but now you have rejected us, holding both the memory and the ache honestly before you. When my present feels like abandonment, though I remember your past faithfulness, keep me from either denying my pain out of piety or letting it erase the memory of your goodness. Help me hold both, and bring the honest but now to you. Remember your past deeds, hear my present cry, and do not hide your face forever. I bring you both my memory and my ache.