Tradition says that Jesus prayed this prayer the night he spent, imprisoned in the custody of Caiaphas the high priest, abandoned by his followers, alone.
As we prepare for the suffering of Good Friday to come, may we also prepare, as Jesus did, not to turn away from suffering, but to abandon ourselves to the mercy of God, who hears the cry of his people.
Psalm 88
Prayer for Help in Despondency
A Song. A Psalm of the Korahites. To the leader: according to Mahalath Leannoth. A Maskil of Heman the Ezrahite.
1 O Lord, God of my salvation,
when, at night, I cry out in your presence,
2 let my prayer come before you;
incline your ear to my cry.
3 For my soul is full of troubles,
and my life draws near to Sheol.
4 I am counted among those who go down to the Pit;
I am like those who have no help,
5 like those forsaken among the dead,
like the slain that lie in the grave,
like those whom you remember no more,
for they are cut off from your hand.
6 You have put me in the depths of the Pit,
in the regions dark and deep.
7 Your wrath lies heavy upon me,
and you overwhelm me with all your waves.Selah
8 You have caused my companions to shun me;
you have made me a thing of horror to them.
I am shut in so that I cannot escape;
9 my eye grows dim through sorrow.
Every day I call on you, O Lord;
I spread out my hands to you.
10 Do you work wonders for the dead?
Do the shades rise up to praise you?Selah
11 Is your steadfast love declared in the grave,
or your faithfulness in Abaddon?
12 Are your wonders known in the darkness,
or your saving help in the land of forgetfulness?
13 But I, O Lord, cry out to you;
in the morning my prayer comes before you.
14 O Lord, why do you cast me off?
Why do you hide your face from me?
15 Wretched and close to death from my youth up,
I suffer your terrors; I am desperate.[a]
16 Your wrath has swept over me;
your dread assaults destroy me.
17 They surround me like a flood all day long;
from all sides they close in on me.
18 You have caused friend and neighbor to shun me;
my companions are in darkness.
Amen
Very much appreciated.
Maundy Thursday is what we Presbyterians call today. Our church is about to start an evening service to commemorate Christ’s crucifixion.
Maundy Thursday also commemorates Christ’s washing the feet of His apostles and the institu- tion of the Lord’s Supper; the new Passover.
Just like in Exodus, the blood of an unblemished lamb was used to put paint over the doors of the Jews to ward off the Angel of Death coming for the firstborn. Jesus was the unblemished lanb.
It celebrates the origin of The Preists.
THANK YOU! These words are very meaningful at this time of my life…at every stage of my life. AMEN!
The flesh was tugging at our Lord, still knowing it all must happen as the Savior of all mankind.
Beautiful but still so sad.
Hosanna! to the cross.
There are many who I know will take great comfort in this Psalm, Menagerie.
I am one.
Thank you.
O Lord, remember me 🙏🏻
To accompany this Psalm, something I’ve kept which I pray will reach the hearts of any who need to feel nearer to Christ at his Crucifixion.
https://opusdei.org/en-us/dailytext/i-am-with-him-in-the-time-of-trial/
Thank you. Scriptures keep me grounded. I wish other websites would offer them among the news.
Just beautiful. Thank you.
At the end of the Maundy Thursday service, after the sacrament of communion, we perform the stripping of the altar. The black paraments are placed on the altar in preparation for the services of Good Friday.
There’s a lot of pain, anguish & anxiety in this Psalm, & understandably so.
Time to reflect, remember & give thanks for this sacrifice.
O Sacred Head, Now Wounded………
Amen.
Thank you
Amen
Jesus’ victory over Death was won in Gethsamane with his total surrender to God’s will….
Viva Cristo Rey!
Que viva!
The sweat on His brow turned to blood…Our precious Savior.
Just returned from Communion and this article is a good finishing touch for this day. Thank you for this post!
Amen.
This is a quick study guide for Ps. 88, as Menagerie has attributed this to Heman the Ezrahite.
1. Psalm 88 & Psalm 89 are written by two Ezrahite brothers—Heman and Ethan. Their wisdom was proverbial, although not to the level of Solomon’s (1st Kgs. 4:31).
2. Heman endured a personal testing of suffering similar to that of Job.
3. Heman engaged in an unceasing prayer ministry, as a result of his life-long physical afflictions.
4. As Heman anticipates his arrival in Sheol, he ponders whether the Rephaim (shades, departed spirits, giants) will rise up and praise the LORD, and whether Abaddon would declare His grace and truth (Ps. 88:10-12).
5. Like Job (Job 13:15), Heman avows his faithfulness until death (Ps. 88:13-18; Rev. 2:10).
In His suffering the night before His cruel execution, Jesus likely experienced every terror and fear and sense of human loneliness that Heman expressed in this prayer.
Ref. https://ttb2022.com/through-the-bible-2022/140/
In the video attached to the outline, Psalm 88 is reviewed starting at about 36:00
Thank you. Amen.
(Thank you, Menagerie. The Lord is teaching me to not turn away from suffering, but to embrace it.)
Suffering is hard — yet the Lord Jesus endured the greatest, agonizing suffering ever known – for us.
God is sovereign over our suffering; He uses it to make us more like Christ – if we will submit.
God also graciously provides His grace to sustain us, until the time He says: “No more.”
I pray that as believers, we will surrender our suffering to God for His holy purposes, and for our good. He loves us and knows what He is doing.
Suffering changes you — it makes you humble.
And we need to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God.
Jesus left us an example of how to suffer well — patiently and humbly.
As we share in the fellowship of suffering with Christ – and for Christ –
a watching world will notice that believers endure hardship differently.
Then, hopefully, they see the beauty of the gospel of Jesus.
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“I want to know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to Him in His death …”
Philippians 3:10 (Berean)
Thank You, Lord Jesus, for suffering according to the good and faithful words of the Father.
I worship You, my God, for shedding Your perfect humanity as it was broken and poured out, revealing the Holy God for all to see, “Surely You have taken upon Yourself the brokenness of us all…”
I will love You forever; You have utterly captured my heart.
Thank you. Very meaningful this year, more than usual
Such incredible despair in this psalm. If this is the prayer that Christ prayed on this day, it should give us hope knowing that the son of God once felt like we sometimes do. Our problems not near as grave as saving mankind.
Makes one reflect on what has taken place before us, very humbling.
Thank you. Blessings to all who come to this site.🙏
We read the words, but can hardly take them in: we try to imagine the meaning His Spirit tries to convey to us: and we come to the place where we know, that Jesus’ manhood was perfect innocence; and there was no buffering of what He endured, by means or conditions, the rest of us might use to alleviate the suffering. God became flesh and blood for this very thing, to give His life a ransom for us!
Many years ago, when we had the privilege to visit Israel; when we were in Jerusalem, they showed us what was traditionally believed to be the house of the high priest, Joseph Caiaphas; and within it, a deep pit dug out, where they would have held the Lord until they drug Him before Pilate early the next day.
Remembering these things, along with this very sad Psalm, sure makes you think and search your heart; gives a look into the Lord’s heart, what He was willing to endure to save us.
Thank you for posting this very important and very deep Psalm.
May the Lord bring us all into knowing Him in the way He so loved us.
Wow… that is wonderful that you got to go to Jerusalem.
Thank you for posting this Menagerie and for all you do
“My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: Nevertheless, not as I will but as thou wilt.”
~Matthew 26:39
🙏🏻🕊️🎚️
Reading this Psalm, I think of those J6 prisoners, their families, their friends, and those who have rejected them without stepping back to look at the big picture. There is a reason behind it all, to remind us that knowing how GOD works with us is what gives us the strength to endure, to see all of it thru without giving up. That is how we become like Christ Jesus, and why we share in HIS body and HIS blood, and knowing that HE is there, beside us, through it all. And I think of DJT, and all that he is enduring to see this through, never giving up, and never forgetting that God is at his side!
Robert, I too, was thinking of j6 tonight in Mass, and prayed for Jesus to give them strength.
I went to a different chuch tonight for Holy Thursday Mass. Close to home, but not the one I normally go to.
What a wonderful experience.
Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
Amen!
Psalm 88 was read at tonight’s Mass. It’s the only Psalm that doesn’t end on a high note. The Tridium is an emotional time as we meditate on the Lord’s Passion.
CS Lewis’ thoughts on the Last Supper…
“I don’t know and can’t imagine what the disciples understood our Lord to mean when, His body still unbroken and His blood unshed, He handed them the bread and wine, saying they were His body and blood…I find ‘substance’ (in Aristotle’s sense), when stripped of its own accidents and endowed with the accidents of some other substance, an object I cannot think…On the other hand, I get no better with those who tell me that the elements are mere bread and mere wine, used symbolically to remind me of the death of Christ. They are, on the natural level, such a very odd symbol of that…and I cannot see why this particular reminder – a hundred other things may, psychologically, remind me of Christ’s death, equally, or perhaps more – should be so uniquely important as all Christendom (and my own heart) unhesitatingly declare…Yet I find no difficulty in believing that the veil between the worlds, nowhere else (for me) so opaque to the intellect, is nowhere else so thin and permeable to divine operation. Here a hand from the hidden country touches not only my soul but my body. Here the prig, the don, the modern , in me have no privilege over the savage or the child. Here is big medicine and strong magic…the command, after all, was Take, eat: not Take, understand.”
O God, who have called us to participate in this most sacred Supper, in which your Only Begotten Son, when about to hand himself over to death, entrusted to the Church a sacrifice new for all eternity, the banquet of his love, grant, we pray, that we may draw from so great a mystery, the fullness of charity and of life. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.
Thank you for the meditation. Allow me a respectful correction: it’s not “tradition” which informs us about the night of prayer and anguish in Gethsemane, but God’s Word–the Bible.
Tradition says that Jesus prayed this prayer the night he spent, imprisoned in the custody of Caiaphas the high priest-
He spent the night in a pit, held prisoner, in Caiphas’ house after being taken from the Garden of Gethsemane.
God has us in the palm of His hand always. Thank you Lord for everything. Let he without sin cast the first stone. & in these Holy days please bring back the lost sheep of our flock. For me my nephew whom I love like the Godson he is! Come back W. Love your uncle!
Humble thanksgiving for putting the Word of the Lord out where all can read, that eyes be opened & ears attuned to the Word; that souls come to the Light & embrace mankind’s only hope: the Saving Grace of Our Lord & Savior, Jesus Christ.
it’s an honor to be able to call the sovereign and holy god of the universe, my Father.
But it wasn’t on Thursday. Please read https://www.thepathoftruth.com/teachings/three-days-and-three-nights.htm
Matthew 12:40 King James Version 40 For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
That would mean Christ was crucified and buried on Wednesday. The annual “High Sabbath” was to begin on Thursday thru Friday, conventional Sabbath on Saturday. Christ would then rise between dusk on sat & dawn on Sunday. Thus fulfilling the prophecy of “3 days & nights in the heart of the earth” from Matt 12:40