Psalm 120:1 I call on the Lord in my distress, and he answers me.
For the first of these 100 Days of Ascent, it is perhaps fitting that the starting point is a place of certitude, a statement of fact: I call on the Lord and he answers me. No ifs, no buts, no maybes; just a clear statement of what is. The word translated call is the Old Hebrew qara, which carries the connotation of a loud, expressive sound, not a quiet muttering. The Lord is referred to by his name YHWH here, the independent, self existing proper name which I suppose speaks to his power, majesty and essence. This then is an interesting juxtaposition, a cry in a season of distress to the all powerful God, who in His answering deigns to respond to the cry of one puny human.
These last few months have felt like ones in which I have hovered around rock bottom, not least because my struggles with cognitive dissonance are worse not better; not helped by an increasingly present sense of drifting away. Perhaps I haven’t called out enough?
\\\* I call on the Lord in my distress, in this season of looming darkness.
Stuck between a hard place, and rock bottom I cry out for redemption.
Hear my cry oh Lord and be near, in this season of despair I pray.