Two weeks into college, my body finally broke. Trauma I’d been suppressing for years was bubbling to the surface in a way I couldn’t ignore. I was suddenly overcome with mental and physical symptoms I’d never encountered before — rapid heartbeat, cold sweats, fast breathing, flashbacks, physical shaking, and so SO many tears. I didn’t know what to do, but in that moment, I especially didn’t know how to lament.
My template for prayer was based on praise and gratitude, which both felt so far away. I didn’t want to be disrespectful to God’s holiness, nor did I want to wallow in self-pity, but it became painfully obvious that I didn’t have a template to engage with God through this pain. I was used to sugarcoating my suffering and skipping right to the praise part. But that tactic suddenly felt impossible. In this wave of deep hurt, I needed Jesus more than anything. But I simply didn’t know how to talk to Him about it. That was, until my friend introduced the concept of lament.
What is Lament?
Lament is historically what God’s people do, but in my western “positive encouraging K-love” environment, I must say it felt like a completely foreign concept to me. Lament is what results when we decide to talk to God even when we don’t have a tidy testimony yet.
It’s the honest prayer of someone who’s in pain but still believes God is listening. It’s not grumbling or giving up. It’s turning toward God in our hurt rather than away from Him.
In the Bible, lament shows up everywhere: in the Psalms, on the lips of Job and Jeremiah, in the tears of Jesus. These are not people who had it all together. They were people who knew what it meant to suffer, and who chose to process their grief with God instead of apart from Him.
Lament gives us permission to bring our disappointment, doubt, anger, or heartbreak into the presence of a holy God and still be held. It’s not about fixing our feelings. It’s about expressing them faithfully.
If you’ve ever felt like you don’t know how to pray when everything hurts, lament is the language Scripture gives us for exactly that.
Where do we see Lament in the Bible?
Lament isn’t just tucked away in a few sad verses; it’s woven all throughout Scripture. In fact, according to The Gospel Coalition, nearly one-half (65) of the Psalms are laments. These aren’t polished prayers; they’re raw, gut-level cries to God in the middle of confusion, injustice, and grief.
We see lament in David’s trembling honesty (Psalm 13: “How long, O Lord?”), in Jeremiah’s weary sorrow (Lamentations 3), and even in Job’s anguished questions after losing everything (Job 3).
Jesus Himself lamented. He wept at Lazarus’s tomb. He groaned in Gethsemane. And on the cross, He cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken me?”—quoting Psalm 22, a psalm of lament.
Lament doesn’t mean you’re turning away from the straight and narrow path. Though sometimes it feels like a detour or rebellion from a faithful life, it’s actually an integral part of the journey. The guttural tears and questions, and even shouts of anger in lament don’t make us “bad Christians,” they are actually one of the most Christian things we can do. The Bible doesn’t hide pain or rush past it. Instead, it gives us words to bring our hurt into conversation with God.
If you’ve ever felt like your sorrow or anger disqualifies you from prayer, Scripture tells a different story: lament is not only allowed—it’s modeled, honored, and heard. It’s woven into the identity of our Christian heroes and Biblical patriarchs (and matriarchs). Throughout our entire history, God’s people have been a people who wrestle and grieve with God.
Why Does Lament Feel Wrong?
The first time I tried talking to God through lament, it felt… wrong.
Not because it was wrong, but because I’d learned, both subtly and explicitly, that prayer should be about praise and adoration, not grumbling or whining (what I feared lament would turn into). I worried I was being self-centered by focusing so much on my own wounds. I remembered all the pastoral warnings about “navel-gazing,” and this felt dangerously close.
But here’s what I’ve realized: the uneasiness I felt wasn’t a moral line I shouldn’t cross; instead, it was discomfort with something that would engage with my relationship with God beyond what I’d been taught. It was stepping out of my comfort zone and learning to flex spiritual muscles I had never used before.
I had been taught, both by my church experiences and my own personality (a firstborn, peacemaker, people-pleasing “good girl”), to minimize my pain. To suppress emotion. To keep things positive. But suppressing negative emotions didn’t make them disappear. Instead, it just made them fester under the surface, eventually affecting my body, brain, and soul.
So, when I started learning to lament … to name what hurt, to question, wrestle, and grieve before God … it felt unfamiliar. A little too raw. Almost disrespectful. It clashed with everything my people-pleasing instincts told me prayer was supposed to be.
But not everyone feels this same resistance. Some people find it more natural to speak their mind, even to God. If that’s you, maybe lament doesn’t feel so foreign. But for those of us who’ve been conditioned to be polite at all costs, to only offer prayers we’d want read aloud in Sunday school, lament takes practice.
And that’s okay.
The invitation of biblical lament isn’t about comfort zones; it’s about alignment with the truth. Scripture gives us language for anger, sorrow, doubt, and longing. The Psalms don’t censor the hard feelings, and neither did Jesus. So maybe the discomfort we feel is actually a sign that we’re stretching out of unhealthy patterns and into something more honest and whole.
Not only is this something we can practice in our own moments of discouragement, but it’s something the Body of Christ is called to do together. As wars rage, as injustice rises, as our world groans, lament gives us a way to acknowledge pain we don’t know how to fix. It teaches us to pray not only “God, help me,” but “God, have mercy on us.”
Lament might feel wrong at first. But in a world full of real pain, it might just be one of the most right and faithful things we can learn to do.
Resources I’ve Found Helpful
If you’re in a hard season and not sure how to talk to God about it, you’re not alone. The Bible is full of people who brought their grief, questions, and even anger to God, and He didn’t turn away.
If you need a place to start, these Psalms have walked with me through a lot: Psalm 13, Psalm 42, and Psalm 88. They remind me that God welcomes our honesty.
A few books I’ve loved:
- The Psalms: Language for All Seasons of the Soul by Andrew Schmutzer
- Pain and Grace: A Theology of Suffering by Gerald Peterman and Andrew Schmutzer
But to be honest? It took me years to learn how to lament. I grew up thinking I had to hold it all together for God. I didn’t know I could bring my raw emotions, my silence, and my confusion until I hit a breaking point and had to figure out how to cry out in a way that didn’t push me away from God but actually brought me closer to Him.
Since then, I’ve heard people say, “I wish I knew how to lament when I went through the hardest seasons of my life. That would have changed everything.”
So I created a resource to walk with you through it, step by step.
Inside, I’ll guide you through the components of a biblical lament, help you write your own, and offer spiritual practices that make space to meet with God right in the middle of your pain.
Because lament isn’t just venting. It’s communion. It’s how we stay connected to God when life doesn’t make sense. And it’s one of the most powerful gifts we’ve been given.
If your heart is craving that kind of connection right now, I’d love to walk with you.
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This is for the moments when you can’t fix it, but don’t want to shut down either. This is lament.
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If this resonates with you, I’ve been working on something special.
It’s a Scripture-rooted guide to help you meet with God in the moments when praise feels far away and pain feels overwhelming.
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