Lament is how you live between the poles of a hard life and trusting God's goodness. Lament is how we bring our sorrow to God—but it is a neglected dimension of the Christian life for many Christians today. We need to recover the practice of honest spiritual struggle that gives us permission to vocalize our pain and wrestle with our sorrow. Lament avoids trite answers and quick solutions, progressively moving us toward deeper worship and trust. Exploring how the Bible—through the psalms of lament and the book of Lamentations—gives voice to our pain, this book invites us to grieve, struggle, and tap into the rich reservoir of grace and mercy God offers in the darkest moments of our lives.

Today, racial wounds from three hundred years of slavery and a history of Jim Crow laws continue to impact the church in America. Martin Luther King Jr. captured this reality when he said: “The most segregated hour of Christian America is eleven o’clock on Sunday.” Equipped with the gospel, the evangelical church should be the catalyst for reconciliation, yet it continues to cultivate immense pain and division. Weep with Me by Mark Vroegop is a timely resource that presents lament as a bridge to racial reconciliation in the world today. In the Bible, lament is a prayer that leads to trust, which can be a starting point for the church to “weep with those who weep” (Rom. 12:15). As Vroegop writes: “Reconciliation in the church starts with tears and ends in trust.”

In Waiting Isn't a Waste, author Mark Vroegop explores 6 characteristics of waiting, calling believers to lean on Christ for comfort while they wait for the uncertainties of life to unfold.

"Scripture is the only document our church needs!" Have you ever thought that?Okay, fine. But I have a few questions for you. First, who exactly would you say Jesus is, and can I get baptized in your church if I, like, totally disagree with you on his divinity?Also, is it okay for me to call myself a member of your church and-you know-never, ever attend?And-last question-who in your church, generally speaking, decides who the pastors are? I mean, does the church just kinda know? The Spirit tells them? Or, maybe, you personally speak for the Spirit!Yes, Scripture should be a church's sole authority. But the confessions, covenants, and constitutions of a church articulate what the members agree the Scripture teaches on what they should believe, how they should live, and how they should be governed.Church documents are a prosaic topic, to be sure. But they facilitate unity. They protect a church from being governed by the passions of the moment. And they force a congregation and its leaders to be careful, deliberate, reflective, and, hopefully, biblical. Not bad, for a boring old administrator's job.To put it another way, church documents are kind. It is kind to tell people what you think up front. It is kind say what you will expect from them or how disagreements will be resolved.Imagine a husband and wife, a year into marriage, realizing they have dramatically different views about commitment and faithfulness because they never bothered with vows. "Ah, that's just paperwork!" Or, imagine your boss asking you to do one thing when you thought your job was something else because you never had a job description.This is what church documents are for-letting everyone know what their job is, and what covenant faithfulness looks like.Believe it or not, we at 9Marks get questions about church documents perhaps as much as any other topic. And my guess is that a lot of our pastor-readers are not surprised. They know how crucial good documents are.For reasons like these, we offer this edition of the 9Marks Journal to help you think through different aspects of confessions, covenants, and constitutions, as well as a couple of other documents. If you have follow up questions, try the 9Marks Mailbag, or just ask an older, wiser pastor! We pray this is useful.

Lamento es cómo se vive entre los extremos de una vida difícil y la confianza en la bondad de Dios. Expresamos nuestra tristeza a Dios por medio del lamento, pero para muchos cristianos hoy es una dimensión olvidada de la vida cristiana. Debemos recuperar la práctica de esa expresión espiritual sincera que nos da permiso para vocalizar nuestro dolor y luchar contra el abatimiento. El lamento evita las respuestas fáciles y las soluciones rápidas, y nos ayuda a avanzar progresivamente hacia una adoración y una confianza más profundas. Este libro analiza cómo la Biblia da voz a nuestro sufrimiento por medio de los salmos de lamento y el libro de Lamentaciones. Nos invita a dolernos, luchar y aprovechar la rica reserva de gracia y misericordia que Dios ofrece en los momentos más oscuros de nuestra vida. Lament is how you live between the poles of a hard life and trusting God’s goodness. Lament is how we bring our sorrow to God―but it is a neglected dimension of the Christian life for many Christians today. We need to recover the practice of honest spiritual struggle that gives us permission to vocalize our pain and wrestle with our sorrow. Lament avoids trite answers and quick solutions, progressively moving us toward deeper worship and trust. Exploring how the Bible―through the psalms of lament and the book of Lamentations―gives voice to our pain, this book invites us to grieve, struggle, and tap into the rich reservoir of grace and mercy God offers in the darkest moments of our lives.

This devotional journal is an ideal companion for anyone wanting to apply the knowledge they learned about lament from Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy and practice it in their own life.