lament

Restoration from a state of shame

Jeremiah’s numerous warnings about the destruction of Jerusalem were repeatedly ignored by the Jews and led to the prophet of God being tortured and imprisoned on multiple occasions. Jeremiah identified the problem as the Jews refusing to repent. Jeremiah asked, “O LORD, do your eyes look for truth? You have struck them down, but they felt no anguish; you have consumed them, but they refused to take correction. They have made their faces harder than rock; they have refused to repent” (Jeremiah 5:3).

Jeremiah grieved for his people and expressed his concern about the spiritual condition of their hearts. Jeremiah admitted, “’The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.’ For the wound of the daughter of my people is my heart wounded; I mourn and dismay has taken hold” (Jeremiah 8:20-21). The Hebrew word that is translated dismay, shammah (sham-mawˊ) was being used by Jeremiah to describe the extreme dismay he felt at seeing the destruction of Jerusalem, a horror that filled him with deep sorrow.

God’s intention was to consume the Jews completely using the military power of the Chaldean army (Jeremiah 9:16). God said, “I will scatter them among the nations whom neither they nor their fathers have known, and I will send the sword after them, until I have consumed them” (Jeremiah 9:16). The Hebrew verb that is translated consumed, kalah (kaw-lawˊ) describes the transitory reality of fallen human nature. God knew what it would take to awaken the Jews to their need for salvation and was committed to bringing them to that point.

The Jews preferred to worship the idols of the nations around them. They had forsaken the one true God, the living God “who made the earth by his power, who established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding stretched out the heavens” (Jeremiah 10:12). Jeremiah acknowledged his dependence on God and asked him to make things right. Jeremiah prayed, “I know, O LORD, that the way of man is not in himself, that it is not in man who walks to direct his steps. Correct me, O LORD, but in justice; not in your anger, lest you bring me to nothing. Pour out your wrath on the nations that know you not, and on the peoples that call not on your name, for they have devoured Jacob; they have devoured him and consumed him, and have laid waste his habitation” (Jeremiah 10:23-25).

God’s response to Jeremiah’s request was harsh, but it reflected God’s commitment to bring his chosen people to the point where their relationship with him could be restored. Jeremiah recorded, “The LORD said to me: ‘Do not pray for the welfare of this people. Though they fast, I will not hear their cry, and though they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence” (Jeremiah 14:11-12). The LORD was concerned because false prophets were prophesying lies to the people, making them think that they would not be overtaken by war and famine (Jeremiah 14:14). God told Jeremiah, “Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my heart would not turn toward this people. Send them out of my sight and let them go!” (Jeremiah 15:1).

God prepared Jeremiah for what was coming and warned him not to try to live a normal life because the devastation of war was going to permeate every aspect of the Jews’ lives. God specifically told Jeremiah “not to marry because of the horrors that families with children would endure during the siege of Jerusalem” (note on Jeremiah 16:2-5). Jeremiah recorded, “The word of the LORD came to me. ‘You shall not take a wife, nor shall you have sons or daughters in this place. For thus says the LORD concerning the sons and daughters who are born in this place, and concerning the mothers who bore them and the fathers who fathered them in this land: They shall die of deadly diseases. They shall not be lamented, nor shall they be buried. They shall be as dung on the surface of the ground. They shall perish by the sword and by famine, and their dead bodies shall be food for the birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth’” (Jeremiah 16:1-4).

Because he was a fallen human and had a sin nature like everyone else, “Jeremiah was subject to the wide range of emotions that are common to all men. He complained that God had deceived him (Jeremiah 20:7), sang praises to God (Jeremiah 20:13), then wished he had never been born (Jeremiah 20:14). Through it all, however, Jeremiah continued to preach God’s message (Jeremiah 20:8) because he was compelled by God’s call (Jeremiah 20:9; cf. 1 Corinthians 9:16)” (note on Jeremiah 20:7-18). At a point when he seemed to have lost all hope for the future, Jeremiah asked God, “Why did I come out from the womb to see toil and sorrow, and spend my days in shame?” (Jeremiah 20:18).

Near the end of his ministry, Jeremiah was threatened with death. The LORD told Jeremiah, “You shall say to them, ‘Thus says the LORD: If you will not listen to me, to walk in my law that I have set before you, and to listen to the words of my servants the prophets whom I send to you urgently, though you have not listened, then I will make this house like Shiloh, and I will make this city a curse for all the nations of the earth. The priests and the prophets and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of the LORD. And when Jeremiah had finished speaking all that the LORD had commanded him to speak to all the people, then the priests and the prophets and all the people laid hold of him, saying, ‘You shall die!’…Then the priests and the prophets said to the officials and to all the people, ‘This man deserves the sentence of death, because he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your own ears’” (Jeremiah 26:4-11).

Jeremiah was also accused of lying to the Jews. After he warned the people against going to Egypt (Jeremiah 42:1-22, it says in Jeremiah 43:1-3, “When Jeremiah finished speaking to all the people all the words of the LORD their God, with which the LORD their God had sent him to them, Azariah the son of Hoshaiah and Johanan the son of Kareah and all the insolent men said to Jeremiah, ‘You are telling a lie. The LORD our God did not send you to say, ‘Do not go to Egypt to live there,’ but Baruch the son of Neriah has set you against us, to deliver us into the hand of the Chaldeans, that they may kill us or take us into exile in Babylon.”

The LORD made it clear that the Jews were being punished because of their idolatry (Jeremiah 44:3). “The group of Jews who had fled to Egypt were still involved in idolatry. These people somehow thought their well-being depended upon their worship of the ‘queen of heaven’ (Jeremiah 44:17, 18). It took seventy years in exile to finally cure Israel of idolatry. The Jews had problems with legalism and Pharisaism after the exile, but never again did idolatry become prevalent” (note on Jeremiah 44:8). Jeremiah told the Jews who were dwelling in the land of Egypt, “Behold, I have sworn by my great name, says the LORD, that my name shall no more be invoked by the mouth of any man of Judah in the land of Egypt, saying, ‘As the Lord GOD lives.’ Behold I am watching over them for disaster and not for good. All the men of Judah who are in the land of Egypt shall be consumed by the sword and by famine, until there is an end of them” (Jeremiah 44:26-27).

Jeremiah wrote about the devastation that he witnessed in his book of Lamentations. Jeremiah said, “Those who once feasted on delicacies perish in the streets; those who were brought up in purple embrace the ash heaps” (Lamentations 4:5). Jeremiah went on to lament, “For the chastisement of the daughter of my people has been greater than the punishment of Sodom, which was overthrown in a moment, and no hands were wrung for her” (Lamentations 4:6).

Jeremiah also stated, “Happier were the victims of the sword than the victims of hunger, who wasted away, pierced by lack of the fruits of the field. The hands of compassionate women have boiled their own children; they became their food during the destruction of the daughter of my people” (Lamentations 4:9-10). “The famine in the land was so severe that the people resorted to eating their own children. A similar occurrence took place during the siege of Samaria by the Assyrians (2 Kings 6:25-29).

Jeremiah’s final plea to the LORD included an acknowledgment by him that God’s people were living in a state of shame. Jeremiah prayed, “Remember, O LORD, what has befallen us; look, and see our disgrace!” The Hebrew word that is translated disgrace, cherpah (kher-pawˊ) is “a feminine noun meaning reproach, scorn, taunt” (H2781). Despite the desperation of their situation, Jeremiah’s prayer reflected “the hope that the people of Jerusalem would return to a proper relationship with God” (note on Lamentation 5:21). Jeremiah said, “The joy of our hearts has ceased; our dancing has been turned to mourning. The crown has fallen from our head; woe to us, for we have sinned!” (Lamentation 5:15-16). Jeremiah then pleaded, “Restore us to yourself, O LORD, that we may be restored!” (Lamentations 5:21).

“The process called conversion or turning to God is in reality a re-turning or a turning back again to Him from whom sin has separated us, but whose we are by virtue of creation, preservation and redemption” (H7725). Jeremiah was referring to this process when he prayed, “Restore us to yourself, O LORD” (Lamentations 5:21) because regeneration is an act of God. Romans 3:23-25 tells us that “there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift. through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.”

God spoke of Jesus when he told Jeremiah, “Behold the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land” (Jeremiah 23:5). The LORD promised to turn the Jews mourning to joy and said, “With weeping they shall come, and with pleas for mercy I will lead them back…For the LORD has ransomed Jacob and has redeemed him from hands too strong for him” (Jeremiah 31:9, 11). God promised to “restore the fortunes of Judah and the fortunes of Israel, and rebuild them as they were at first” (Jeremiah 33:7). God compared the security of his promises with the constancy of day and night when he said, “If I have not established my covenant with day and night and the fixed order of heaven and earth, then I will reject the offspring of Jacob and David my servant and will not choose one of his offspring to rule over the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I will restore their fortunes and will have mercy on them” (Jeremiah 33:25-26).

Exile

The exile of the Jews was the result of their disobedience to the voice of the LORD their God. Moses told the people of Israel, “The LORD will bring you and your king whom you set over you to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known. And there you shall serve other gods of wood and stone. And you shall become a horror, a proverb, and a byword among all the peoples where the LORD will lead you away…You shall father sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours, for they shall go into captivity” (Deuteronomy 28:36-37, 41). The Hebrew word that is translated captivity, shᵉbîy (sheb-eeˊ) means “exiled, captured…and was normally used to describe those captured in war and taken back to the conquering country (Numbers 21:1; Ezra 3:8; Nehemiah 1:2)” (H7628). The prophet Jeremiah talked about the Jews being exiled to Babylon throughout his 50-year ministry. It says in Jeremiah 11:6-13:

And the Lord said to me, “Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem: Hear the words of this covenant and do them. For I solemnly warned your fathers when I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, warning them persistently, even to this day, saying, Obey my voice. Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but everyone walked in the stubbornness of his evil heart. Therefore I brought upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they did not.”

Again the Lord said to me, “A conspiracy exists among the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. They have turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers, who refused to hear my words. They have gone after other gods to serve them. The house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken my covenant that I made with their fathers. Therefore, thus says the Lord, Behold, I am bringing disaster upon them that they cannot escape. Though they cry to me, I will not listen to them. Then the cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will go and cry to the gods to whom they make offerings, but they cannot save them in the time of their trouble. For your gods have become as many as your cities, O Judah, and as many as the streets of Jerusalem are the altars you have set up to shame, altars to make offerings to Baal.”

Jeremiah complained to the LORD asking, “Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all who are treacherous thrive?” (Jeremiah 12:1), and the LORD answered him, “I have forsaken my house; I have abandoned my heritage; I have given the beloved of my soul into the hands of her enemies…Say to the king and the queen mother: ‘Take a lowly seat, for your beautiful crown has come down from your head.’ The cities of the Negeb are shut up, with none to open them; all Judah is taken into exile, wholly taken into exile” (Jeremiah 12:1, 7, 18-19).

Jeremiah recounted the fall of Jerusalem in the final chapter of his book. Jeremiah stated, “For because of the anger of the LORD it came to the point in Jerusalem and Judah that he cast them out from his presence” (Jeremiah 52:3). The Hebrew words that are translated came to the point, hâyâh (haw-yawˊ), which means “to exist” (H1961) and ʻad, which means “eternity” (H5703), suggest that the timing of the Jews’ exile was a part of God’s eternal plan of redemption and was being carried out according to the appointed time for Christ’s arrival on earth.

Nebuchadnezzar’s army attacked the city of Jerusalem for 539 days, but was unable to penetrate the walls surrounding it. It says in Jeremiah 52:5-8 that due to a famine, “a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled and went out from the city by night by the way of a gate between the two walls, by the king’s garden, and the Chaldeans were around the city. And they went in the direction of the Arabah. But the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho, and all his army was scattered from him.” Jeremiah had warned Zedekiah not to try to escape from the king of Babylon (Jeremiah 38:17), but Zedekiah refused to surrender. Zedekiah was captured and taken to Nebuchadnezzar at Riblah, in the land of Hamath (Jeremiah 39:5). “The king of Babylon slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah at Riblah before his eyes, and the king of Babylon slaughtered the nobles of Judah. He put out the eyes of Zedekiah and bound him in chains to take him to Babylon” (Jeremiah 39:6-7).

In his book of Lamentations, Jeremiah painted a sad picture of Jerusalem after the city was devastated by the Chaldeans. Jeremiah stated, “How lonely sits the city that was full of people! How like a widow she has become, she who was great among the nations! She who was a princess among the provinces has become a slave (Lamentations 1:1). Jeremiah lamented, “Judah has gone into exile because of affliction and hard servitude; she dwells now among the nations, but finds no resting place; her pursuers have all overtaken her in the midst of her distress” (Lamentations 1:3). The people of Judah going into exile was comparable to the experience of a woman being raped. Jeremiah said, “Jerusalem sinned grievously, therefore she became filthy; all who honored her despise her, for they have seen her nakedness; she herself groans and turns her face away” (Lamentations 1:8). The phrase seen her nakedness was a common euphemism for sexual relations (H6172). Jeremiah wanted his readers to understand that going into exile was an extremely devasting experience. The people of Judah would never completely recover from it.

No one is righteous

The Apostle Paul argued in his letter to the Romans that no one is righteous except God. Citing from Psalms 14:1-3 and 53:1-3, Paul said, “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one” (Romans 3:10-12). The Greek word that is translated turned aside, ekklino (ek-kleeˊ-no) means “to deviate” or “to decline (from piety)” (G1578). The Hebrew word that was used in Psalms 14 and 53, suwr (soor) “is used metaphorically to describe turning away from the Lord because of a rebellious heart (Jeremiah 5:23)…Its meaning extends further to indicate falling away, as when one is enticed to fall away from following the Lord to pursue other gods (Deuteronomy 11:16; 1 Samuel 12:20; Psalm 14:3)” (H5493). The author of Psalms 14 and 53, King David, understood the concept of turning aside because he had committed adultery and murder (2 Samuel 12:9) after God made an unconditional promise to him that he would make David the father of an everlasting kingdom (2 Samuel 7:16). After he had utterly scorned the LORD, the prophet Nathan confronted David and told him, “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ’”I anointed you king over Israel, and delivered you out of the hand of Saul. And I gave you your master’s house and your master’s wives into your arms and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah. And if this were too little, I would add to you as much more. Why have you despised the word of the LORD, to do what is evil in his sight? You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and have taken his wife to be your wife and killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. Now therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.” Thus says the LORD, “Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house. And I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun.”’ David said to Nathan, ‘I have sinned against the LORD.’ And Nathan said to David, ‘The LORD also has put away your sin; you shall not die’” (2 Samuel 12:7-13). In spite of his willful rebellion, the LORD put away David’s sin, meaning that David’s sin was forgiven, it did not have a negative impact on his relationship with the LORD.

David’s personal realization that he could not live up to God’s standard caused a great deal of pain and anguish in his soul and resulted in him writing several psalms that are referred to as laments. According to Mark Vroegop, author of the book, Dark Clouds Deep Mercy, a lament is a prayer in pain that leads to trust. Mark states, “You might think lament is the opposite of praise. It isn’t. Instead, lament is a path to praise as we are led through our brokenness and disappointment. The space between brokenness and God’s mercy is where the song is sung. Think of lament as the transition between pain and promise. It is a path from heartbreak to hope.” Psalm 53 is a perfect example of David’s journey from a painful realization of his failure to the hope that God’s unconditional promise to him was still in effect. David began this psalm by stating:

The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”
    They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity;
    there is none who does good. (Psalm 53:1)

David used the term fool to describe people who don’t believe in God. The Hebrew word that is translated fool, nabal (naw-bawlˊ) means “stupid; wicked (especially impious)” (H5036). David met someone named Nabal early in his life, when King Saul was trying to kill him. It says in 1 Samuel 25:2 that Nabal was very rich, “he had three thousand sheep and a thousand goats.” Nabal was a harsh man who behaved badly (1 Samuel 25:3) by refusing to reward David and his men for protecting his sheep (1 Samuel 25:10-11). David intended to kill Nabal (1 Samuel 25:13, 22), but Nabal’s wife Abigail intervened (1 Samuel 25:18, 23-31) and prevented David from responding inappropriately. Afterward, we are told in 1 Samuel 25:36-38, “And Abigail came to Nabal, and behold, he was holding a feast in his house, like the feast of a king. And Nabal’s heart was merry within him, for he was very drunk. So she told him nothing at all until the morning light. In the morning, when the wine had gone out of Nabal, his wife told him these things and his heart died within him, and he became as a stone. And about ten days later the LORD struck Nabal and he died.”

David’s memory of what had happened with Nabal likely prompted him to associate the behavior of those who do not acknowledge God with this man. David said, “They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity” (Psalm 53:1). But, David didn’t stop there. David went on to say that all have fallen away, and “together they have become corrupt” (Psalm 53:3). David stated:

God looks down from heaven
    on the children of man
to see if there are any who understand,
    who seek after God.

They have all fallen away;
    together they have become corrupt;
there is none who does good,
    not even one. (Psalm 53:2-3)

David’s conclusion that “there is none who does good, not even one” (Psalm 53:3) was based on his awareness of his own depravity. David loved God and was identified as a man after God’s own heart (1 Samuel 13:14), and yet, David broke two of God’s Ten Commandments without even giving any thought to the consequences for himself, his family, or the nation of Israel of which he was the appointed king.

David’s hopeful response to his realization that no one is righteous apart from God is reflected in the final verse of Psalm 53. David exclaimed:

Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion!
    When God restores the fortunes of his people,
    let Jacob rejoice, let Israel be glad. (Psalm 53:6)

The Hebrew word that is translated salvation in this verse, yᵉshuʿwah (yesh-ooˊ-aw) means “something saved” (H3444). Many personal names contain a form of the root including Jesus, a Greek form of jeshuʿah. Salvation or “’deliverance’ is generally used with God as the subject. He is known as the salvation of His people.” David was likely thinking of Israel’s Messiah when he said, “Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion” (Psalm 53:6). David’s second statement, “When God restores the fortunes of his people…” is a reference to Israel returning from exile, a period of time when the people of Israel were anticipating the arrival of their Messiah and eventually, the birth of Christ (Luke 2:26-32).

Paul explained the significance of Christ’s righteousness being transferred to us in his letter to the Romans. Paul said:

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction:for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:21-26)

Paul indicated that the reason why Christ’s righteousness was imputed to all believers through his death on the cross was to show God’s righteousness, “because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins” (Romans 3:25). In other words, God leveled the playing field so that both Old and New Testament believers could receive forgiveness of their sins. Paul said, “For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).