Ps. 77.2 (the vain land)

 In the day of my distress / I have sought the Lord
at night / my hands have been extended / without respite;
but my soul / has not been comforted. 

We should note here—and this was present in the first verse as well—the sense of outward striving toward God. It is more pronounced in this verse because of the physicality of the movement: “I have sought the Lord…at night my hands have been extended without respite”. The first verse indicated the same by way of the “crying voice”. From his voice, to his soul to his hands—the psalmist has become an agent of striving petition, of movement toward God. Further, this sense of total bodily movement-striving toward God is complimented by a total temporal movement as well. During the day he seeks, and at night his hands extend. All of this is “without respite”. Not only is his being a petition, but he fills out time as well. For him, time has become, to its last corner, but an extension of his striving petition to God. In other words, he consumes time and is consumed by it as he looks to God for “comfort”. All of this finds its most poignant expression in a manner very similar to the opening verse. There, we saw how the psalmist’s “voice” is intended to refer to the fact that God’s “voice” is only in the past, that in some deeply troubling fashion the psalmist has been left with an ability to speak to a god that is silent (perhaps permanently). Here, that image is found in the “hands”. The concluding line of the psalm reads, “You led your people like a flock, by the hand of Moses and Aaron”. It is the only other time “hand” is mentioned. Like the voice, it seems to be highlighting the apparent absence of God to the psalmist—while he raises his hands to God, God’s hands have withdrawn (there is no Moses or Aaron in the present). The effect is devastating. The psalmist’s strength comes from (flows out of) his covenant with God. Without his answering covenant partner, he is left in a realm not simply of silence, but of abandonment and utter vulnerability. (Had he known, perhaps he would have covenanted with another more constant partner—this reality will come to for later in the psalm when the psalmist essentially says, “To whom else could we have gone?” (vs 13)). This is summarized in the concluding phrase, “but my soul has not been comforted.” He has “sought the Lord”, but the Lord has withdrawn and made himself inaccessible. Although his hands are extended, God’s hands seem resolutely in the past. He is now dwelling in the land of vanity.