All my bones are out of joint

Psalm 21 and Psalm 22: So far I've been resonating with the psalms of lament more than the royal psalms or the psalms of victory (Ps. 21.) Psalm 22 goes through the cycle scholar John Hayes outlines: addressing the deity (v.1), complaint (v. 2) and feeling that God does not answer the cry for help, the motivation for divine intervention (v. 3-5), and the confession of sin (v. 6). That cycle is repeated several times in the 31 verses. What I like is the imagery in the second complaint cycle of the lament: "I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast." I've had my bones out of joint and it is a lamentable condition. I just returned from my 31st visit to the chiropractor since I was injured in a car accident in January, and sometimes I've felt exactly as the psalmist describes. I'm recovering well, but slowly, another lamentable fact. Today the chiropractor talked about living with a new reality -- after the early weeks of lamenting the fact of my injuries, I'm now ready to move on to what is, instead of what was before. Yesterday in class, we discussed Walter Brueggemann's article, "The Costly Loss of Lament" (JSOT 35 (1986):57-71) where he says that laments served a necessary and important function in Israelite worship, helping people move from pleas to praise. He says: "A community of faith which negates laments soon concludes that the hard issues of justice are improper questions to pose at the throne, because the throne seems to be only a place of praise." Brueggemann makes other good points, and I'll refer back to him in the days ahead.