A Heart that Laments

If I may, I’d like to marry Keith Green’s “My Eyes Are Dry” to One of Jeremiah’s laments.

Jeremiah 9:1

Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!

The depth of Jeremiah’s lament continues into chapter 9 revealing the backslidden state of God’s people.

Likewise, Keith Green’s song also prays for tears. Jeremiah was willing to lament, to weep. Much like Jeremiah, Green was volunteering to be a weeper. He prayed for a heart that would be transfixed by God’s remarkable sweetness. Consider these lyrics:

My eyes are dry

My faith is old

My heart is hard

My prayers are cold

And I know how I ought to be

Alive to You and dead to me

But what can be done

For an old heart like mine

Soften it up

With oil and wine

The oil is You, Your Spirit of love

Please wash me anew

With the wine of Your Blood

Now, if you feel an agreement with Jeremiah and Green, let’s use Jere 9:1 and “My Eyes Are Dry” as a prayer. Here are 11 prayer points taken straight from Jeremiah 9:1 and Green’s song:

1. Lord of all Creation, create in me the ability to weep in prayer. Teach me to lament. Let me not approach this task out of intellect, but rather, out of brokenness. Let me see the need. Let me feel the necessity of this ultra important endeavor. Impart to me the language of crying.

2. Again… God, heal me of dry eye syndrome. Give me tears

3. Lord, will you increase my faith? And forgive me for any and all unbelief.

Mark 9:24 And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine aunbelief.

4. Dearest Jesus, help me to not to be hard and callous on the inside. Forgive me for not being moved with compassion, for being low in empathy, for being uncaring with my prayers

5. Holy Spirit fire, rest on me. Forgive me for praying habitual, rudimentary, tame, mundane, dead, lukewarm prayers. Warm my soul with your blaze.

6. God, help me to be spiritually alive. Breathe afresh on me. Quicken me, Holy Spirit.

7. Spirit of God, help me die. Show me my cross. Give me strength and grace to pick up my pledge to living as a dead man. Let me live on the altar of Rom 12:1 (present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service). Let me be a laid-down sacrifice. May sin, flesh, temptation, compromise, worldliness die in my life as You continue to wholly sanctify me.

8. Father, let me not have an old, aged, dull heart. Make me new. Give me new prayers, cares, songs, feelings. Forgive me for settling into ruts, and for losing spiritual gusto.

9. Almighty God, I sincerely ask that you soften my insides. Let me feel. Remove the scaly flesh that I’ve armored my soul with. Heal me from this hardened survival mode I’ve adopted and operated in for far too long. Let me be sensitive, touchable, and led by your gentle impressions. I know I probably miss your nudges way too often, and I want to repent of that. I want to be different. I want to embrace a soft heart, even if it regularly leads to a broken heart. I volunteer for the broken heart. Let me become a person who prays from the posture of a soft heart.

10. Jesus, I want to be more like you. You were a manifestation of love. Help me to love the world, love my neighbors, love my brothers and sisters. Help me to pray and minister with and because of that love. Put your heart in me.

11. Lord, I’m praying for me. I need prayer. I need your attention, your help. I need to be fixed. So I call on the transformative power of your blood to work on me. Redeem me. Correct and Forgive me. Use me. Pray through me. The power of your blood…let it be at work in me.

Chapters of lament that I believe will be useful for us in this pursuit of becoming a weeping, loving, caring intercessor:

• Jeremiah 9

• Jeremiah 13

• Jeremiah 14

• Lamentations 2

• Psalm 39

Key Verses we can use for reference:

Psalm 56:8

You have taken account of my miseries; Put my tears in Your bottle. Are they not in Your book?

Psalm 126:5

Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy!

Luke 7:38

and standing behind Him at His feet, weeping, she began to wet His feet with her tears, and she wiped them with the hair of her head, and began kissing His feet and anointing them with the perfume

> and lest anyone thinks this is only an Old Testament attribute, Paul was no stranger to the ministry of tears:

Acts 20:19 I served the Lord with great humility and with tears and in the midst of severe testing by the plots of my Jewish opponents

Acts 20:31 Therefore watch, and remember, that by the space of three years I ceased not to warn every one night and day with tears.

Corinthians 2:4a

For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote unto you with many tears

Dear brother or sister, if you have read this far I believe it’s because you already have a heart for this kind of ministry, this kind of intercession. I bless you for that and I pray that you continue in letting Holy Spirit mold the heart of Christ in you.