The Dark Devotion

The Dark Devotion

PSALM 23
The Lord, the Psalmist’s Shepherd.
A Psalm of David.

1 The Lord is my shepherd,
I shall not want.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside quiet waters.
3 He restores my soul;
He guides me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake.
4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I fear no evil, for You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You have anointed my head with oil;
My cup overflows.
6 Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life,
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

I envy and hate David at the same time for writing Psalm 23. He expresses a dark moment of despair with poetic and he is prosaic with his words. Even the economy of his words is near perfection. I have no pretty words to describe my moments of despair. In my despair, my very ideas are poisoned, my emotions are infected, my heart is darkened, and my life is emptied out.

The things I used to enjoy like green pastures and quiet waters have become condemnation for how far I've fallen away from joy. How can I enjoy anything when every restful position my soul tries to take, feels like laying in broken glass instead of grass?

I want to be on the paths of righteousness, but how can I handle the dark voices pulling me apart from the inside out. How can I speak against this growing evil presence in my chest who demands my destruction? Why can't I find comfort in the church or its people?

How can I be comforted by His Rod or His Staff when the terror inside me grows and gnaws and tears away any comfort I used to have? Reading His word leaves the skin of my soul raw and bleeding like someone filing against with a rasp.

And what table and anointing can I expect when I feel as if I have no future? As if I have no value to offer to anyone? What am I producing to care for myself? To earn a place at the table? How dare I even sit at a table I didn't even have the strength to place a single setting?

Who am I to deserve goodness and love when I don't want to be touched or cared for or looked after? Just the feeling of someone's eyes is crushing, as if their gaze can break my ribs and skull. I feel suffocated by people's well wishes.

Where is my Shepherd when I am lost in the night? Where is my God when I have lost my will to live? Where is my savior when I have nothing but the taste of despair in my mouth, sucking all moisture from my tongue and making it so useless and stiff, I can't even call out to be rescued.

As I try to find sleep, I keep repeating the verse, "Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death," hoping to drive away the dark spirits circling me in the night. And I'm stuck on that verse like it's a demented catechism that might save me from my own swirling madness. I can't move forward and I can't move backward. I'm trapped in despair like Hell itself was reaching up out of the void to grab hold of my very soul.

What platitude will save me now? What great Christian quotation should I get tattooed on my ribcage? What will get me out of the darkness of Hell itself when I feel so broken that pain seems to be the only real thing in this world?

I don't even know how to redeem this devotion so it gets its own salvation experience when I feel as if my own redemption has fled from me. Where can I find hope, when hope seems like a lie I have told myself my entire life. Was I really the foolish boy who read that Pandora opened the box one more time and hope came out like a butterfly? Only monsters came out of that box and they ate hope.

And my well-meaning Christian friend, can you step into my hell and brave the intense, suffocating furnace of despair? Can you promise me that I will be, "All okay," tomorrow? "Right as rain?" Why should I even listen to you, much else believe you, when my world has collapsed into a one hot-nerve-fiber-of-pain saying, "I'm not good enough and I deserve this pain."

"God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

Are you there God? I don't want to feel this despair anymore. I can't carry it. I can't control it. It has taken over my every thought and feeling and turned me into the shadow of death. I need to be free from this pain. I need you to break me free; I need you to send every angel of light in your army into my life. Please deliver me from my enemies. Please deliver me from this demon of hate that has claimed my soul as his own. Please hear my desperate prayer. I am not well and feel like I am fading and a new presence has taken over my mind and my heart and my soul. Do not hide from me God. Do not turn away from my face. Do not leave me in the darkness anymore. Save me.