Why, Lord? - Elizabeth Payson Prentiss

1818–78

“Wake up, O Lord! Why do you sleep? Get up! Do not reject us forever. Why do you look the other way? Why do you ignore our suffering and oppression?”

Those words of Psalm 44:23-24, probably written by King David, are angry words. The Israelites had been defeated in battle, and it looked as if God had abandoned them.

Elizabeth Payson Prentiss understood feelings like those. In 1852, within a span of four months, she lost two children—a young son and then an infant daughter. Elizabeth was so ill herself that she got to hold the baby only twice.

In a poem about her children, she included this verse:

One child and two green graves are mine;

This is God’s gift to me:

A bleeding, fainting, broken heart,—

This is my gift to Thee!

Elizabeth was, understandably, brokenhearted and angry at what God had allowed. Yet that anger didn’t change her deepest feelings for God. In her best-known novel, Stepping Heavenward, written in 1869, she wrote, “You cannot prove to yourself that you love God by examining your feelings towards Him. They are indefinite and they fluctuate. But just as far as you obey Him, just so far, depend upon it, you love Him.”

Broken hearts happen. Loved ones die. Jobs and security are lost. Dreams get shattered. Sometimes no matter how much you pray, no matter how much you get on your knees and beg, God seems to be asleep or looking the other way. Anger, bitterness, doubt, and confusion are natural reactions.

Those feelings, as Elizabeth said, are indefinite, and they fluctuate. At some point, her brokenheartedness lessened, and so did her anger toward God. She went on to write novels for children and adults, poems, and the hymn “More Love to Thee, O Christ.”

If you’re going through a tough time that has you angry or disappointed with God, it may help to know you’re not the first to feel that way, and you won’t be the last. Remember that while you’re sifting through your feelings, your love for God is still there, and his love for you will never change.

Give thanks to the God of heaven. His faithful love endures forever.

Psalm 136:26