He Hears

“In my distress I cried unto the LORD, and he heard me.” (Ps 120:1 AV)

Just being heard is sometimes enough.  What is missing from this psalm is how God answered.  Or if He answered at all.  What follows the words above are the specifics of what the writer is seeking.  He is seeking relief from his persecutors.  There is no mention of what the LORD had done.  We don’t know who the writer is nor the circumstances of which he speaks.  All we know is the state of his heart and the comfort he received in simply knowing God heard him.  As stated before, sometimes that is all we need.  Sometimes all we need is to pour our hearts out to the LORD.  Sometimes, all we need to do is process the emotions bottled up from events too overwhelming to handle perfectly.  Sometimes, all we need is to know our God hears and cares.  What He chooses to do in response to our prayer doesn’t matter as much as knowing He hears.  That way, whatever He chooses to do or not to do is received and welcomed.  Even if the cause of distress is not immediately resolved, we are ok; because He hears.

One of the skills of a good hospital chaplain is learning how to listen.  There is little, if anything, I could do regarding a patient’s physical challenges.  I could not adjust medication, schedule rehab, or diagnose disease.  What I could do is to lend an ear.  Most of my visits were just that.  Pulling up a chair and holding a hand as they verbalized their struggle was about all I could do.  Offering a bit of scripture helped.  So did prayer.  But honestly, the biggest help to someone in distress is to be a sounding board for their troubles.  Over the few years I served as a chaplain, the LORD allowed me to see a few hundred patients.  There are a few I remember.  Each one taught me something different.  As the Holy Spirit led me to minister to unique needs, He taught me the best way to treat people as individuals and do the best I could do to help them.  My greatest fear was getting a call from someone who had passed unexpectedly or by tragedy.  One evening, late in the night, that call came.  A patient had been attacked and beaten.  He died while in the emergency room.  He was a young man in the wrong neighborhood at the wrong time of night and lost his life because of it.  I expected to find a family so distraught that there would be no comfort to be found.  At that moment, I learned a listening ear is often more help than a speaking tongue.  This family simply needed to process their shock and emotional distress.  No words were going to bring their loved one back.  No hatred was going to make it right.  An ear is what they needed.

We may not know how God will answer.  We may not even know if He will.  But knowing that He loves us with and everlasting love, that He has a purpose for all things, and that He will guide us to our heavenly home is sufficient.  Knowing that He hears might be all that we need.  It certainly was for our psalmist.  Even the LORD Jesus Christ starts out His prayer for Lazarus stating that the Father always hears Him.  I think that might be where faith starts.  We must believe that He is.  But we also must believe that He will reward those who diligently seek Him.  Maybe not with the answer we had hoped.  Maybe not with an answer at all.  Rather, He rewards us with the comfort in knowing that He always hears.  That is enough.  That is comforting.  That is assurance.  That is hope.  That is the greatest need of our hearts.  He hears us.