Lament

Lamentations 3: (for full text see here)

1 I am the man who has seen affliction  under the rod of his wrath;

And us? Cancer, shootings, national chaos, death, loss, finances, marriages, health. We are sojourners who have seen affliction.

And Jesus to Jeremiah, to us? “I drank the cup of my Father’s wrath. Father, let this cup pass from me. But not my will, your will.”  

2 he has driven and brought me into darkness without any light;

We? When the depression sinks in. The trials continue. No light at the end of the tunnel.

Jesus: And on that dark day of crucifixion, the day became night, and darkness swallowed the earth.

3 surely against me he turns his hand again and again the whole day long.

Our cries. God, where are you? Why don’t you take it away? Why don’t you heal? Why don’t you fix it? Why don’t you come through? Why didn’t you stop it?

And Jesus turned his hands, God’s hands, toward us, outstretched on the cross. Touching the leper. These are the hands of God.

4 He has made my flesh and my skin waste away;  he has broken my bones;

5 he has besieged and enveloped me with bitterness and tribulation;

6 he has made me dwell in darkness like the dead of long ago.

Our corporate voice, individuals: Death eats away at my body. Death takes a loved one. Depression like death. Love and life involve loss, big and small.

And Jesus met death, laying in that tomb. Jesus knew death.

7 He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;

It wasn’t my fault. Victim. Circumstances. Pawns in the forces of fate.

Jesus could have called legions of angels to his protection. He could have bowed before Satan and been a king without the cross. But Jesus willingly said no to escape, and took on our pain, the full ravages of suffering and death from ages past and ages to come on his own body. Willing.

    he has made my chains heavy;

8 though I call and cry for help, he shuts out my prayer;

God, I have been praying for thirteen years! Where is the answer? Are the heavens brass? Do you hear? Do you care?

And in Gethsemane, the Father said “No” to the Son to say “yes” to us. The Father’s heart torn, “No.” Agony. Sweating blood. The only true “No” in prayer said, the ultimate, the final “No” so that we can have confidence that if we ask in his name according to his will, “Yes” (1 Jn. 5:14). So that all the promises are “yes” to us in Christ (1 Cor. 1:21)

9 he has blocked my ways with blocks of stones; he has made my paths crooked.

10 He is a bear lying in wait for me, a lion in hiding;

God, a trap. God, what do you demand? What do you want from me? You hunt me like a lion.

The Lion of Judah, the victorious King through the sacrifice of the Lamb. The blood in the serpent’s mouth who prowls around like a lion. Satan’s roar vanquished by the Lion of Judah.  

11 he turned aside my steps and tore me to pieces; he has made me desolate;

12 he bent his bow and set me as a target for his arrow.

Life doesn’t stop. Fiery darts. Stabbed in the back. Pricked again. Jab after jab. Loss after loss. Desolate.

But in Genesis 9, God set his rainbow in the sky. A covenant to never again destroy completely. A covenant of peace. Rainbow—a bow. Instrument of war. And where was it pointed? At God himself. God, the God who swore to throw his wrath against his own Son, who would love rebellious enemies unto the death. Jesus took the bow.

13 He drove into my kidneys the arrows of his quiver;

14 I have become the laughingstock of all peoples, the object of their taunts all day long.

Shame. No good news. Abandoned in the long haul. Grief, pain, health wears on and the cards stop coming.

Mocked. Crown of thorns. Naked. At his most vulnerable, the insults still pierced like the flogging. Jesus, taunted, bore our shame.

15 He has filled me with bitterness; he has sated me with wormwood.

16 He has made my teeth grind on gravel, and made me cower in ashes;

17 my soul is bereft of peace;

Worries. Anxieties. No peace. No sleep.

But Christ forfeited peace to become our peace (Eph. 2:14). Do not let your hearts be troubled he whispers to our soul, and the cross thunders the reason why.

    I have forgotten what happiness is;

18 so I say, “My endurance has perished; so has my hope from the Lord.”

19 Remember my affliction and my wanderings, the wormwood and the gall!

20 My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me.

Jesus is the lament. Jesus is the one who lived this out.

Jeremiah, prophet of God’s Word to the people and the people’s words of grief to God. Jeremiah pointed to only the greater prophet.

And from Jeremiah’s grief-stricken mouth comes those immortal words of hope in the darkest of dark:

21 But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope:

22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end;

23 they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

24 “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.”

25 The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.

26 It is good that one should wait quietly  for the salvation of the Lord.

We wonder how. How can Jeremiah speak those words? Those seem far from my heart in such pain. 

If Jesus is the exact image of God (Heb. 1:3), perhaps Jeremiah had a glimpse of that kind of God. The God who would be with him in suffering. The God who would withhold nothing. The God who would give all, give everything he had:

God the Father—giving Son to death, giving Spirit to dwell.

God the Son—giving life, breath, his glory, a place to lay his head.

God the Spirt—giving himself as wisdom, guide, teacher, seal.

Jesus is the lament. Jesus is the prophet speaking here. Jesus is our words. Jesus is God’s Word to us. Jeremiah was just a foreshadow of the God who cried “Why?”, the God who gave all, withheld nothing from his Father or us.

Him we call to mind, therefore we have hope.