Psalm 123

“show us favor, for we’ve had more than enough contempt”

Many scholars place the composition of Psalm 123 after Israel’s exile. During her exile Israel endured the humiliation of a subjugated people. Afterwards, Israel was politically weak, diminished in the eyes of the surrounding nations and facing their scorn. Consequently, the singer looks to God--”I lift my eyes to you”--seeking relief from the social contempt:

Show us favor, Lord, show us favor,
for we’ve had more than enough contempt.
We’ve had more than enough
scorn from the arrogant
and contempt from the proud.

In The Shape of Joy I have a chapter entitled “All the Way Home” where I explore the contrast between social mattering and existential mattering. Social mattering concerns how we matter to other people. And as you would expect, social mattering is a huge factor in mental health. Knowing that you matter to others, that others value and care for you, is life-giving. Existential mattering, also called cosmic significance, is more metaphysical and ontological in nature, hence the words “cosmic” and “existential.” Existential mattering is the durable conviction that your life has intrinsic value and worth no matter what. Biblically, when we describe human persons as being made in the image of God we’re pointing to their existential mattering. Our value is an ontic fact.

The point I make in The Shape of Joy is that, while both social and existential mattering are vital to well-being, existential mattering is the more robust predictor of health. In The Shape of Joy I illustrate this contrast by describing how our hearts can be broken. Our love stories can be sad and tragic. From lovers, to family, to friends. To say nothing of the epidemic of loneliness we are facing. From The Shape of Joy:

Hearts do. They crack. We are rejected, hurt, betrayed, and wounded. We can suffer abuse. We carry the scars. As I learned at an early age, falling in love is a risky and dangerous thing. The concerns here aren’t just romantic. Our families of origin are hazardous as well. The love we experience within our homes can be absent, inadequate, manipulative, or abusive. Family can mess us up in ways not easily fixed.

For my part, I’ve been lucky in love. But not everyone is. The problem with social mattering isn’t just that love is scarce, that loneliness has become an epidemic. Love itself can be the problem. The most important people in our lives can let us down, betray and hurt us. In light of this, our mattering has to dwell somewhere beyond our saddest and most tragic love stories.

We see this play out in Psalm 123. In the midst of a catastrophe of social mattering, facing contempt, scorn, and distain, the singer looks to God as their source of existential and cosmic mattering:

“Show us favor, O Lord, for we have seen more than enough contempt.”