Lamentations 5:19-21

It is interesting, and I think important, to see what a Godly man thinks and feels in a situation that is brought about by the sin of a group that he is a part of. I think it draws parallels with the repentant heart – the heart that has turned back to God from evil – because both show what thought processes occur in a (now) God-centred mind in an ‘ungodly’ situation (or one brought about by ungodly behaviour). This is the case for Jeremiah, who as a prophet of the LORD, is still a part of the sinful Israelites who have brought about cataclysmic destruction upon themselves. And in the midst of this punishment, we see Jeremiah’s thoughts and feelings, as a Godly man’s response.

‘You, O LORD, remain forever;
Your throne from generation to generation.
Why do You forget us forever,
And forsake us for so long a time?
Turn us back to You, O LORD, and we will be restored;
Renew our days as of old...’ (Lamentations 5:19-21)

Jeremiah is extremely distressed. This is obvious from the rest of the chapter, and other parts of Lamentations. That’s the first thing we notice (or rather, already have in our minds). The Christian response to suffering resulting from sin is not indifference. It is not to ignore it.

Next we see that Jeremiah makes an observation: the LORD remains forever, and rules forever. He doesn’t change. He is in complete control. Nothing happens without His knowledge and consent. This sets the tone for the rest of the small passage we consider.

Next Jeremiah asks a question, a perfectly ‘human’ question, based on his previous observation: If God is forever, and is in complete control, then why is Israel still in so much suffering? Why has it taken so long for God to act in favour of them? This, rather than a question of God, is merely a rhetoric used by Jeremiah to show that he was wearying from the suffering. He ‘answers’ his own rhetorical question next:

Jeremiah realises that it is the sin of the people that has led them to this place, and it is the continuing sin of the people that keeps them there. He realises that only by turning back to the LORD will they be restored. However, it is interesting to note that he specifically asks God to turn them back to Himself. That is, he admits that of their own hearts, the Israelites will never turn back to God, but only by the grace of God initiating repentance. He admits that it all comes back to God. And thus, his strong faith that ‘we will be restored’ is justified, given that all the conditions are based on God, and we remember his previous statement ‘You, O LORD, remain forever...’.

What does this say for us? Well, as Christians, we all know we sin. Sometimes that sin leads to suffering in this world. Our response to this suffering should be as Jeremiah responded. We are not to be indifferent, but instead to have Godly sorrow over our sin, but our thoughts should always lead back to the sovereignty and unchangeability of our God, at which point we should sincerely ask God to change our hearts, to point us back in the right direction, which we can have complete faith that He is able to do!

*As a side note, again we see the practicality of a seemingly ‘academic’ view of the characteristics of God. If we continually come back to who God is, then I believe many practical problems become no problems!

Lamentations 4:17

‘Still our eyes failed us,
Watching vainly for our help;
In our watching we watched
For a nation that could not save us.’ (Lamentations 4:17)

Who’s ever been in a situation where they needed help but it never came? Some of us might have been in that physical situation, at least for a while. More frequently I think we go through it spiritually. This is what Jeremiah is saying here: ‘Our nation needed help, but although we watched out for help from a nation (namely Egypt I believe), they could not save us.’

Here, he place emphasis not on the fact that there was no-one to help them, but that they were looking to the wrong place – they were looking to a nation that couldn’t save them anyway.

How often do we look to the wrong place for help? It is an epidemic of humanity. People that are depressed or sad turn to drink or drugs to help them out...but that can’t save them. People that are struggling internally look to themselves for strength, but they can’t help themselves. As Christians, we are sometimes in dire straits spiritually, but who do we turn to? Ourselves? Our friends? The five-step guidebook to a better spiritual life? None of these can save us. None. And we look in vain to them to do so. We must look to God. It is the knowledge of and relationship with God that will save us.

Lamentations 3:20-24

‘Through the LORD’s mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
“The LORD is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I hope in Him!”’ (Lamentations 3:22-24)

This sounds like a lovely inspirational verse, and it is. But when the context is realised, it takes on so much more meaning than a simple ‘God is good!’

The chapter thus far (up to verse 18) describes the personal affliction and tribulation of Jeremiah which he attributes directly to the LORD, referred to as ‘He’. It is a list of trials and sufferings that the LORD has brought about on Jeremiah – and finally in verse 20 he says:

‘My soul still remembers
And sinks within me.
This I recall to my mind
Therefore I have no hope.’ (Lamentations 3:20-21)

It is all too much for him as he brings the pain into memory, and it leaves him without a sense of hope. This is a fairly important concept I think, in that sometimes it is memory of suffering that leaves us feeling without hope. It is the mind-games after the event. And this can be more distressing than the actual initial suffering. A feeling of hopelessness is the pathway to depression. We do well to put past things behind us. To focus on the future. And that is what Jeremiah does now: for the next verse is the verse at the top, the lovely words about God’s goodness!

The first line is a statement both of our position and God’s character. Jeremiah is saying that by rights, God’s wrath should consume us (or more specifically, the Jews – but of course, the specifics do not matter in this case, Romans makes it quite clear that we are implicated as well), because we are evil. But it is also saying that because of the fact that we are not consumed, that this must be some act of great grace on God’s part. Thus he turns the tables on those who would say that God is being too harsh in His judgment by saying that this judgment they are facing is actually mercy.

‘Great is Your faithfulness’ – the Israelites weren’t the most faithful people. The number of times that they departed from the LORD then realised their error and returned, repeating the process, is staggering. And yet, against this bleak scene of disloyalty is contrasted the faithfulness of God, who, even in the time of His wrath against the ugly sin of Judah, had mercy and compassion upon them, remembering His covenant with them. What an encouragement to us! For what is His covenant with us? It is sealed with the blood of Jesus Christ, and shows us to be righteous in His sight. And this covenant cannot be broken! We can anger God enough for Him to send us as ‘captives’ to a foreign land, and yet His mercy and grace will not be broken. What a God!

The last two lines sum up Jeremiah’s apparent sudden change of heart. In verse 21 he says he has no hope. But in verse 24 he says that he hopes in the LORD! Why the sudden change of heart? Remember that in verse 21 he was bombarded with these images and memories of his pain and suffering, his humiliation at the hands of the people. This blocks out any hope, if your hope is in this life. For if your hope is in this life, then your hope rests in personal happiness, dignity and honour, power, health and self-esteem. But Jeremiah had been stripped of all these things by God. In verse 24 he realises that it is God that is his portion – it is not things in this life that he needs, but only God! Take everything else away and leave God, and he would still have his hope! Only when we can truly say this from the heart will we know pure joy in suffering and dismay. And if we do not hope in the LORD, if our portion is not Him but this world, then inevitably our hope will fail us eventually, for all earthly things come to an end, and all human emotion is fickle. Thus I think it is imperative (if almost impossible), that we continue to realise that God is our portion. He is all we need.

Lamentations 2:6-7a,10a,11,19-20

Lamentations is a series of poems, apparently. Hebrew poems are a bit different to English poems, in that usual structure is based on what we would call ‘acrostic’. Typical poetry might have 22 stanzas, each beginning with the next letter in the Hebrew alphabet. Chapter 2 of Lamentations is like this.

The content is very similar to chapter 1, in that it deals with the humiliation of Judah and Israel. My mind structured it as follows:

V. 1-9: The LORD’s part in the destruction of Judah

1-5: Generally
6-9: Specifically against the ‘Holy’ things

V.10-16: People’s response to the calamity

10: The elder’s response
11-14: Jeremiah’s response
15-16: The surrounding nation’s response

V.17-19: Summary and Lament

17-18: Summary
19: Lament and commands

V.20-22: Prayer to the LORD

20: Request for the LORD to ‘reconsider’ due to the severity
21-22: Further description of the severity of the punishment

As I read the chapter, my mind kept flicking to thinking – how similar is Judah to the church today? Last chapter, I focussed on the internal struggle with sorrow, resulting from external hardship. I had a reply which was particularly true and helpful, because there are two types of sorrow: there is sorrow over sin committed, which is essential to the Christian life, and is one of the causes of a broken-heart, which leads to God being able to use you. The other type of sorrow is more of a selfish sorrow, resulting from being disappointed in life (about physical or external things). This sorrow is necessary or inevitable, but unless we see God through it, will not be beneficial.

Nevertheless, last chapter I focussed on internal sorrow, but this chapter my mind was thinking about the state of the church, and our response to that. It is an over-dramatic caricature in some respects, and I do not believe at all that there was meant to be some type of link between Judah and the Church in this respect. But I do see elements, especially in Jeremiah’s response to the situation, that might challenge us in our response to situations around us.

Challenge 1:

‘He has done violence to His tabernacle,
As if it were a garden;
He has destroyed His place of assembly;
The LORD has caused
The appointed feasts and Sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion
In His burning indignation He has spurned the king and the priest.
The Lord has spurned His altar,
He has abandoned His sanctuary;
He has given up the walls of her palaces
Into the hand of the enemy...’ (Lamentations 2:6-7a)

One may think that even though God has punished His people for their transgressions, that the ‘Holy things’ that He has ordained, He would keep in place. The Temple, the feasts and Sabbaths, the altar...all were symbols of the purity that the people lacked. Humanly speaking, wouldn’t it be wise to keep those things undefiled as a sign that the people had failed, but God’s purity would never be marred? So that the standard to which they must live has not changed?

I think this view underestimates God’s plan. For even in the Old Testament, God’s heart was not in the ritual obedience of His people, nor the sacrifices they burnt, but in their heart and attitude towards Him, in their willing and joyful obedience of His instruction. Thus His reprisal of the people also engenders a reprisal of the ritualistic traps they had fallen into, convincing themselves that they were pleasing God. You see, as Jesus says, Man was not made for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath for man – and His altars and the Temple are the same. They are for men, a gracious gift of God to men, for their benefit. But when they are misused and profaned, God shows that it is not them that He wishes Israel to keep and ritually attend to. Rather, He wants their hearts and souls and their very lives. And thus, by letting the feasts be forgotten and the Temple destroyed He causes grief on the part of Israel, but shows them mercy – for He is showing them again the way to Him.

Are we similar to Israel? Personally? Collectively? Is our ‘Christianity’ merely a ritual played out day-by-day? Are the prayers from the heart or the head? Does God own our lives and hearts and souls, or just our name and our Sundays? What is Christendom like as a whole? How much of what we do is merely ritual or tradition? I am not saying that tradition or ‘ritual-style’ practices are bad – but it is doing these things for the sake of ritual or tradition that is utterly worthless. We must challenge ourselves on this daily, because as humans we have a natural tendency towards ritual. It is less effort. Remember, God would tear down all our rituals and traditions if it would help us.

Challenge 2:

What is our response to sin in the church? (or likewise, sin in our own life?) There are two responses given here, both extreme, and both from different perspectives.

‘The elders of the daughter of Zion
Sit on the ground and keep silence;
They throw dust on their heads
And gird themselves with sackcloth.’ (Lamentations 2:10a)

The wearing of sackcloth is often an image of repentance in the Bible (for example the Ninevites in Jonah). Obviously, an extreme sorrow is being conveyed here by the elders of Judah, the ‘wise ones’ of the nation. But it is a contained sorrow, almost a quiet mourning. The feeling that comes across to me is that of deep regret and determination to change. Is this our response to sin in our own lives? Are we hit by the ugliness of our sin, and sit silent, repenting in the dust? Or do we carry on as if it hadn’t happened? In a way, both must be true. For if we are living in the light of past sin all the time, we will never have victory, whereas we know that Jesus has already paid for all of our sins, and thus we need no longer be subject to them. But this sorrow and regret is a precursor to the repentance, which for us immediately brings us this sense of freedom and victory, and thus the sorrow and regret is still necessary and important (as was stated above). To what extent do we regret our own sins? As we grow closer and closer to Christ, we should bemoan our sin more and more, as we begin to see the contrast of its true ugliness against the beauty of Christ.

Likewise, what is the state of the church? What response do those ‘elders’ of the church have towards sin in the church? Is it passed off or even encouraged? Or is it condemned and mourned?

The next response is that of Jeremiah himself (or the author of this book)

‘My eyes fail with tears,
My heart is troubled;
My bile is poured on the ground
Because the children and the infants
Faint in the streets of the city.’ (Lamentations 2:11)

Well that’s pretty intense! This is a more personal response, directed towards the results of the sin. That is, Jeremiah is aghast at the horrors of the destruction around him. What are our responses to the consequences of sin around us? Do we ignore it? Dismiss it? Are we so used to death and suffering and evil that we are unfeeling towards it? Well, Jeremiah was in an extreme situation of course (which will become even more evident later on), but I really think that we can all be challenged by his response to the disaster around him. Jeremiah was so overcome with emotion that he not only cried until he couldn’t see anymore, but he vomited and was made physically sick. This reminds us not to become complacent and uncaring towards suffering in the world.

Challenge 3:

‘Arise, cry out in the night,
At the beginning of the watches;
Pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord.
Lift your hands toward Him
For the life of your young children
Who faint from hunger at the head of every street.’ (Lamentations 2:19)

How passionate are we in our requests of the Lord? How honest and open are we in bringing our lives to Him? How reliable are we in turning our problems over to Him? Just the other night I was thinking quite fervently about something I had to do the next morning, and planning and debating in my mind what exactly to do, and worrying about if it would be alright, as I was going to bed. Then all of a sudden a thought popped into my head: ‘Just ask God to take care of it and leave it to Him, silly!’ I did, and automatically it was off my shoulders. I couldn’t help but think how much time and effort and energy we waste worrying about things ourselves instead of being reliable and consistent in turning them over to God.

This verse goes much further than that. It tells us to pour out our heart like water before the face of the Lord! Once you pour water out of a cup – unless you pour it into another non-porous vessel, you will never get the water back in the cup. It is a non-reversible process. And we are asked to pour out our hearts to God in the same way! We should never expect them to come back. Just pour them out, give them to Him once and for all! The sheer urgency of the words that Jeremiah says to the people is astounding – but they are in a time where the utmost urgency in prayer is needed. How much less is needed today? Is the world better off now? Are there no children fainting from hunger? Worse, are there no children of God, starving for God’s word, but with no means of getting it? Are there no children, lost and blind, without the light of the gospel? No, I think now is as good a time as any to be pouring our hearts out like water before the face of the Lord.

Challenge 4:

‘See, O LORD, and consider!
To whom have You done this?
Should the women eat their offspring,
The children they have cuddled?
Should the priest and the prophet be slain
In the sanctuary of the Lord?’ (Lamentations 2:20)

This verse gives us a glimpse of the magnitude of the horror that Judah was undergoing: mothers were so starved of food that they were eating their own children, whom they had been nursing. (This during the siege of Jerusalem). Moreover, it presents us with a challenge: are we interceding in prayer for those around us? Are we consistent in coming to the Lord for our friends and relatives and those we know in order to seek His grace?

They are all simple challenges, and yet in no wise simple to fulfil. Let us, by God’s grace and the Holy Spirit, strive daily to see these things fulfilled in our own lives.

Lamentations 1:16

Lamentations is a book not often read, I believe. Supposedly written by Jeremiah, it is a book of ‘laments’, or sorrowful poems concerning the destruction and captivity of Judah. Jeremiah was indeed very sorrowful, as seen right from the first chapter. We look today at one of his internal struggles, caused by the external.

‘For these things I weep;
My eye, my eye overflows with water;
Because the comforter, who should restore my life,
Is far from me.
My children are desolate
Because the enemy prevailed.’ (Lamentations 1:16)

For ‘these things’ he weeps; that is, the captivity of his people, and the desolation of the ‘Holy City’, of Zion, and of the desecration of the temple. These things were so immensely important to the Jews that anything against them was taken as a personal hurt. In fact, Jeremiah (we will assume he wrote the book) hurt so much that he considered himself dead. He thought that God, the comforter, should restore his life. But for all his need, he felt that instead, God was far from him.

I am going to have a guess and say that all of you have been in that type of position before. Not that a foreign nation has come and destroyed your precious temple or taken your family captive, but that you felt so sorrowful because of external things, that you were ‘dying’ internally. And then when you found that this was happening, you look around for God to restore you, and suddenly find that He is ‘far from you’. It is the worst feeling I have ever experienced, I think.

We ask the question, ‘where are You?’ ‘How do I find You?’ We know we need Him.

Well, we need to go back to the cause of the external sorrow. Obviously, there are many ways that sorrow can be caused – loved ones dying, personal failure, financial concern, angry bosses, long absence of loved ones, the list goes on. But if we go to the root of some of these sorrows, we see that some are caused by completely innocent things (for instance, someone’s untimely death by cancer), while some are induced by a pattern of sin, or a sinful attitude (eg. Failing an exam or two because you have neglected study in favour of immediate pleasure). We see in Jeremiah’s case, that the sorrow caused (on the whole nation) is because of the whole nation’s sin. Now, when your sorrow arises from this root, it is not surprising that God is far away when you look for Him to comfort you.

This does not mean, however, that He has abandoned you. Only that you have abandoned Him. He is still there. Right where He always was. And it doesn’t matter how sorrowful you are. Doesn’t matter how painful the situation is, or how inwardly dead you are, God is the comforter, and He will take hold of you, if you will return to Him.

Sorrow is not something we seek, but when found it is a catalyst for the good. Persevere.

I believe we shall find more answers in this book as we go through, and I’m looking forward to seeing the beauty and helpfulness of a sorrowful heart.