I am weary with my moaning; every night I flood my bed with tears; I drench my couch with my weeping.
Psalm 6:6
There is such a thing as a “dark night of the soul” as described in this psalm. Likely each of us will experience at least one of these periods in our lives. The onset of a dark night may come from tragedy in your life. Perhaps you have lost one precious to you—a child, parent, or spouse. Certainly the grief towers down on you; every thought seems to circle like a vulture upon your loss, hunting you, preying you down. Memories are shadowy ghosts reminding you of a face, a laugh, a touch, a voice, you will never experience again. The question in these dark nights will often be: “why were they taken from me?”
Or perhaps your dark night is the result of the loss of position, material possession, or general purpose in life. You were let go from your job. You do not know when or if the money will come in. What is the measure of your life? Heaping our identity and worth in these things can crumple us when, due to the uncertainties of life, our buildings come crashing down. The question in these dark nights will attack our reason for living: “what is my life worth anymore?”
Perhaps for some of you, relational distress and dysfunction have caused you to flood your bed with tears. Your spouse has left you for another, or simply traded in years of marriage for a “pursuit of happiness.” Or your parents have forsaken you, leaving you bitter and confused. Or a child has rebelled and wandered away, piercing you with pangs of paternal grief. The seepage of open wounds make you flinch in pain whenever that person is mentioned. Though the fault may be on the other person, the lingering question will always be, “did I do something wrong?”
Finally, for some of us, a dark night will seem to have no source at all, coming only from a deep depression of our minds and souls. The mental anguish blasts us down on our face. The weight of despair chokes us, leaving us wheezing for breath. The sinister thoughts sneak in like unwelcome house guests. And the worst part: we do not know why we are feeling this way. The expression of our sorrow is a bed full of tears. The haunting question will echo David’s cry: “But you, O Lord—how long?” (v.3)
Why do we mention all of these fountains of sorrow? Because no one’s experience in a dark night is completely the same. Though we all will travail through them, our divots and valleys are contoured differently. But the one similarity that should comfort us all is that we have all been through them, and even greater, there is One who is able to walk with each of us particularly through our “valley of the shadow of death” (Ps 23:4).
Secondly, we mention all of these because we each need a particular word of sustaining grace through them. You need to have your dark night named and addressed before you can receive the consoling touch of Jesus in your life. Jesus was no stranger to loss of life (Jn 11). He was no stranger to inner anguish and sorrow (Mt 26:38). He was not immune to betrayal and desertion. The very hands that made the world are willing to lift your head and wipe away your tears.
Lastly, sometimes you just need to hear that it is okay to grieve and weep. Jesus does not expect you to bind it all up and “get it together” before you come to Him. If all you have are tears for the moment, for the day, for the month, or for the year—then bring them. Gospel grace reassures you today that “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit” (Ps. 34:18). The Light of the world is no stranger to your darkness. In truth, He has drawn very near.
