When My Heart Is Overwhelmed

The Storm

David names both the honest condition and the honest cry together here, when my heart is overwhelmed, and, in the same breath, will I cry unto thee, worth noticing this is not sequential, first recovering, then praying, but overwhelm itself becoming the actual occasion for this cry, not requiring recovery first.

Notice lead me to the rock that is higher than I, a specific, humble request, not asking to somehow become taller than the wave himself, but asking to be led to something genuinely higher, an external rock, not internal, self-generated strength, worth holding as this whole book’s own honest picture of what genuine help actually requires.

This is worth examining against however much you have waited to pray until feeling less overwhelmed first, as if prayer required some minimum threshold of composure before it could genuinely begin, rather than this psalm’s own model, overwhelm itself becoming the actual, immediate occasion for crying out.

Whatever overwhelm currently describes your own heart, cry out today, in the middle of it, not waiting for calm to arrive first, and ask specifically, as David did, to be led to the rock that is higher than you, trusting genuine help to come from outside yourself, not merely from your own gathered composure.