How to pray when everyone else has someone

This one is about a feeling that's hard to admit to.

It shows up at weddings. It shows up when someone at work says what they did at the weekend and it's obvious there were four of them there. It shows up on a phone at night, scrolling, looking at people who clearly have somebody, and it turns out you've been doing it for twenty minutes.

Nothing bad has happened. Nobody has wronged you. You're just looking at other people's lives and something goes sour, and then you feel bad about the sourness on top of the original thing.

And there's usually a second thought underneath it, quieter and worse. Which is: I've done nothing to deserve this. I've been decent. I've turned up. And they've got a full house and I've got an evening.

Most people don't pray that one.

You can pray about being lonely. That feels allowed. Envy doesn't. Envy feels like something to sort out before you come, because it's not sad, it's ugly — it's wanting what someone else has and being annoyed that they have it.

So it stays out of the prayer.

And then the prayer is about a version of your life you've edited. You bring the loneliness, cleaned up, with the resentment taken out. Which means the thing you're actually carrying that night never gets said to anyone at all.

There's a psalm that starts exactly there.

It's Psalm 73, written by a man called Asaph, who led worship — so this is a religious professional, someone whose job was God. I'm going to read part of it, not all of it, because it runs long. It opens with him nearly walking away.

Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart. But as for me, my feet were almost gone. My steps had nearly slipped. For I was envious of the arrogant, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no struggles in their death, but their strength is firm. They are free from burdens of men, neither are they plagued like other men. Surely in vain I have cleansed my heart, and washed my hands in innocence. For all day long have I been plagued, and punished every morning. When I tried to understand this, it was too painful for me, until I entered God's sanctuary, and considered their latter end. For my soul was grieved. I was embittered in my heart. I was so senseless and ignorant. I was a brute beast before you. Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You have held my right hand. Whom do I have in heaven? There is no one on earth whom I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart fails, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

Look at where he begins.

He says God is good — and then immediately, but as for me, my feet nearly went. He's admitting he almost lost it. And he says what nearly took him out. Not suffering. Not doubt about whether God exists. Envy. He was looking at people who had it easier and it nearly finished him.

He tells God that. He uses the word. Envious.

Then he says the second thing, the one underneath. In vain I have cleansed my heart. That's the sentence about deserving. That's a man saying, I did all this for nothing, look what it got me. He says that out loud, to God, about God.

And here's what he doesn't do. He doesn't work it out. He tries to — he says he tried to understand it and it was too painful for him. The thinking failed. He couldn't reason his way to feeling better about it, and he says so.

So what changes it?

Two things, and neither of them is what you'd expect.

The first is that he went somewhere. He says, until I entered God's sanctuary. He didn't have a realisation on his own. He got up and went to where God was, and something shifted there that hadn't shifted at home. His situation was the same coming out as going in. The place he stood was different.

The second is what he says on the other side of it. My soul was grieved, I was embittered, I was a brute beast before you. That's him looking back at the envy and calling it what it was, and he leaves it in the psalm. He doesn't delete the ugly part now that it's passed. It's still there, written down, because it happened.

Then the turn. Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You have held my right hand.

Not: I stopped envying them. Not: I got what they had. Just — I'm still here with you, and you didn't let go of my hand while I was in it.

Now, the line at the end needs saying carefully, because it's easy to hear wrong.

Whom do I have in heaven? There is no one on earth whom I desire besides you.

That is not Asaph saying he doesn't want people. It's not a man announcing he's fine on his own. The Bible never says being alone is fine — the first thing God calls not good, before anything has gone wrong in the world, is a man being by himself.

What Asaph is saying is narrower than that, and heavier. He's talking about a portion. That's an old word for the share you get, the piece of land that's yours. He looked at people with a full share and he had none, and what he ends up saying is: you are my portion. Not instead of a life. As the thing underneath it that doesn't run out when everything else does.

He says my flesh and my heart fails, and then, but God is the strength of my heart. He's not pretending he isn't failing. He's naming what holds when he does.

So here's the one thing to do.

Tonight, say the envy to him. Out loud, with the name on it. Not the sanitised version — not I've been feeling a bit low lately. The real one. I saw them and I wanted what they have and I resented them for having it.

And then say the second part, the one about deserving, if it's in you. That you've done what you were meant to do and it doesn't look like it got you anything. Asaph said that. It's in the book. Nothing was struck out.

You may not feel differently afterwards. Asaph didn't stop being the one without, and the psalm never says the people he envied lost anything. What changed was that the ugly thing was out of him and in front of God, instead of sitting in him being carried alone.

Surely in vain I have cleansed my heart, and washed my hands in innocence.

That's the prayer of a man who led worship for a living, and it's on the page as he said it.

Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You have held my right hand.