I Am Afflicted, But The Lord

When you need to remember — that You're still my Shepherd.

You can carry the cumulative weight of being afflicted from a long way back. Not one event — patterns. Hurts that started in your youth, words that left grooves, treatments that have been long enough that they feel like part of who you are. You manage. But the accumulated furrows have been deep. The back is marked — and the Lord is righteous. He has cut asunder the cords of the wicked before, and "many a time afflicted" can still end with "yet they have not prevailed."

This passage opens with a corporate testimony from the long-afflicted: "Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say. Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, yet they have not prevailed against me." The repetition is the point. Two times he says "many a time." Long affliction, long not-prevailing. Then the imagery that names the cumulative damage: "The plowers plowed upon my back; they made long their furrows." The picture is brutal. His back has been used like a field, with deep grooves cut into him by people who treated his body as soil for their plows. He does not soften it. Then the line that turns everything: "The Lord is righteous; He has cut asunder the cords of the wicked." The Lord cut the ropes. The plowmen had cords binding their oxen to the plow. The Lord cut those cords. The close is hard for modern readers — a prayer that the haters of Zion will be like grass on a housetop that withers before it grows. But the framing is important: "Neither do they which go by say, 'The blessing of the Lord be upon you; we bless you in the name of the Lord.'" The hatred for God's people is finally exposed for what it is — refusal to bless. Their fate is silence where blessing should have been.

• Right now, name one affliction from your youth that has left long furrows — and whisper: "Yet they have not prevailed against me." • Write this down: "What plowers' cords have I been carrying that the Lord has actually already cut?" • Repeat this line when old wounds reopen: "The Lord is righteous; He has cut asunder the cords of the wicked."

Stop. Breathe. Let the truth that affliction has not prevailed quiet the furrows, then tell Him exactly where you need to see those cords cut — out loud if you can.

God, many a time have they afflicted me from my youth — and I do not want to keep pretending the furrows are not there. But they have not prevailed against me, because You did not let them. You are righteous, and You have cut asunder the cords of the wicked over my life. Where old plowing has left deep grooves, plant something new. Keep my heart from rotting into bitterness; keep me waiting for what only Your hand can grow back. You're still my Shepherd.

The Lord is righteous — He has cut asunder the cords of the wicked.