Quick Summary:

Two themes encompass our readings this morning: LAMENT and HEALING. David laments over the deaths of King Saul and Saul’s son Jonathan. Jairus laments for his dying daughter. A woman laments over a chronic illness that has left her life in shambles. But though the song, though the story, begins with lament, lament is not the end of the story.

This sermon explores the role of David's lament as a national experience, and also how God's compassion in Jesus reaches through the laments of our lives. In Hebrew the word for "compassion" comes from the word for "womb." Fred Niedner points out that when we read in the Scriptures: “God will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love,” the writer is suggesting that when we suffer, God looks upon each one of us as though God were our mother. We are invited to be God's wombing presence in the world.