Breathing Room
Hear my prayer, Lord! And let my cry for help come to You. Psalm 102:1 NASB
Come to You – “‘There are three ways in which a man expresses deep sorrow: the man on the lowest level cries; the man on the second level is silent; the man on the highest level knows how to turn his sorrow into a song.’ True prayer is a song.”[1]
So we’re dealing with a man at the lowest level—crying.* Is there anything wrong with that? No, I don’t think so. Sometimes crying is all we can do. After all, the journey with God runs on emotional rails, not cognitive theory. If crying is all you can do, then cry—with spirit!
But there’s something else of interest here besides the first level of sorrow. The verb for “come to You” is bôʾ. It doesn’t mean “come” very often. “bôʾ, the fourth most frequently occurring verb in the ot, is used 2570 times, for the most part with everyday meanings of ‘go, arrive, enter a house,’ or, more idiomatically, ‘to die’ (go to the fathers) or for sexual relations (come in to her).”[2] The psalmist pushes it in another direction. Instead of “go,” he uses it as “come.” Well, maybe. Would it make any difference if the translation said, “And let my cry for help go to You”? We would still get the sense of it, but in English we don’t use “go” in that way. We think that this verse is about a personal appeal, and that appeal “comes” before God, as if it is presented before a King. But what if we said, “Go to You”? That has a different feel to it. It’s as if the crying is sent to God. And how is that possible? The imagery makes me think of packaging up my tears and FedEx’ing them to the heavenly throne. They are who I am at this moment, and rather than present myself disheveled, I send the equivalent, the representation of my condition. Perhaps I am overly aware of my unholiness. I don’t really have any status before the Throne. But I need Him to know what’s happening to me. So I send a “love” letter of tears. I send my crying to Him. The difference between “come” and “go” is not the message. It’s the perspective. “Come” feels like entering into God’s presence, like Esther before Ahasuerus. Bold timidity laced with potent fear. “Go” removes the trepidation. The crying is apart from the crier. God will do what He wishes with my offered message, but I am one step removed from His court when the crying arrives. Just enough psychological space so that I can survive no matter what happens next. Perhaps if I actually cried in His presence the outcome might be different. All I know is that sending the message of tears respects that fact that I am not on an equal plane with the recipient. That seems to be important.
Breathing room. That’s the difference between “come” and “go.” It’s a difference that matters, I think, because I know I don’t share the same space with the Lord of all. That holy air is toxic to my unholy life. If I breathed its purest form, I would die. So I send the slice of purity that I do have—my cry. That is unblemished, raw, real. It’s the actual me, reduced to nothing but need. It’s the only “holy” gift I have to give. And the psalmist seems to think it’s enough.
*Maybe not. After all, the psalmist does turn this distress into the lyrics of a song, so maybe he’s already at the third level but we, as readers, have to make our way there.
Topical Index: come, go, bôʾ, psychological space, holiness, Psalm 102:1
[1] Abraham Heschel, Between God and Man: An Interpretation of Judaism (Free Press Paperbacks, 1959), p. 208, citing Siaḥ Sarfe Kodesh, Vol. II, p. 92, paragraph 318.
[2] Martens, E. A. (1999). 212 בּוֹא. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., pp. 93–94). Chicago: Moody Press.
