Soul Scientist

Psalm 137:1-4 CEB Alongside Babylon’s streams, there we sat down, crying because we remembered Zion. We hung our lyres up in the trees there because that’s where our captors asked us to sing; our tormentors requested songs of joy: “Sing us a song about Zion!” they said. But how could we possibly sing the Lord’s song on foreign soil?

Dearest Sarah,

While reading (and re-reading) Psalm 137 this morning, I saw a new application for my own life (and I think, yours, too) from these verses…

Chronic illness is our foreign soil, our Babylon where we are sitting and crying because we remember[ed] Jerusalem, i.e., our life before we became sick. Just as the Israelite captives mourned the loss of all they knew when they lived in Jerusalem, we are mourning the loss of our health.

We now hang our instruments of a familiar yet now gone life up in the trees. We now are sat down because we cannot stand or sing. Our tormentors [continue to] request[ed] songs of joy but all we can manage now are a few words with many tears.  

Neither of us would’ve chosen this life nor would we wish it for anyone else.

Neither of us can change nor escape the reality of our daily lives here in chronic illness.

Yet both of us have the constant choice to weep, to worry, or to worship.   

The Israelites didn’t wait for a return to Jerusalem to worship; they sang about Zion while captive in Babylon. They offered their tears, grief, and pain as acceptable sacrifices. They trusted that God would provide for this day and the next in their captivity.

The Israelites could worship because they knew their God was with them in all places for all times. They depended on God’s faithfulness in a place of fear. They relied on God’s love in a place of unfulfilled longings. They believed in God for deliverance in a place of desolation.

Whether we’re in Babylon or Jerusalem, we can do the same.

We can worship.

We can depend.

We can rely.

We can believe.  

We can do all that because we know God is always God. He is God over our Babylon, Jerusalem, and all places for all times in all circumstances.

He is God, whether or not we worship. But trust me, knowing God in worship with tears here in Babylon is far sweeter, stronger, and more sustaining than the worship ever was in Jerusalem. Because the pain, grief, and loss we offer in sacrifice with each moment of worship on our beds and in our burdens changes us and compels us to find the treasures hidden in darkness. For no matter how dark it gets, those treasures are kept for us in Christ (see Colossians 2:3).

The psalmist captured this idea with Let the godly exult in glory; let them sing for joy on their beds (Psalm 149:5 ESV). The joy found in triumphs is easier known than the joy found in tears. Yet I’m learning that the joy found in tears is what softens my heart and sharpens my faith. And there in the softening and sharpening, worship becomes the essential for all of my days, whether I live in Babylon or Jerusalem.

Take heart, dear Sarah, and praise our Good God with all of your soul, sorrow, and sacrifice. He is there with you. He is pouring out all of His lavish love, foundational faithfulness, and precious provision on you in exchange for your tears and worship.

Psalm 103:1-3 NIV Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all his benefits — who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases

Much love from your friend,

Beth

Written by and copyrighted to Beth Madison, Ph.D., 2024.

If you know someone living in Babylon, please consider sharing this post with them. More importantly, please keep praying for them to worship instead of worry or weeping. Worship is a tool our Good God uses to change us from the inside out and to change our world one person at a time.