Lamentations 1:16

The Bible says in Lamentations 1:16, “For these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water, because the comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me: my children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed.” Jeremiah is called the weeping prophet. He cried as he thought of the fate of his people and of his nation. Jeremiah wept. Notice what Jeremiah said at the end of this verse in describing his sorrow and pain: “my children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed.” In this case Jeremiah is thinking of his spiritual children. The same situation can happen with any parent’s child. When a child is born into the world to loving parents, the parents see the potential and they hope and pray and work toward to getting the child to adulthood unscathed, so that the child can achieve his or her potential. Christian parents know that an important part of that effort is for the child to hear the gospel of Christ and the Word of God during the formative years. How sad it is when a parent has prayed and worked and tried, and then the day comes when sadly the parent looks at what has happened and says with tears, “my children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed.” There are many enemies to keep the child from becoming what he or she could have been, and any parent can lose the battle to drugs, alcohol, violence, immorality, abuse, false religion, and the list goes on. There may be no greater suffering in life than when a loving parent loses a child. O what might have been! That is a sad song to sing for any child. God gave His Son willingly so that we could be saved forever.

The Bible says in Jeremiah 1:17-22, “Zion spreadeth forth her hands, and there is none to comfort her: the LORD hath commanded concerning Jacob, that his adversaries should be round about him: Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them.[18] The LORD is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment: hear, I pray you, all people, and behold my sorrow: my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.[19] I called for my lovers, but they deceived me: my priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city, while they sought their meat to relieve their souls.[20] Behold, O LORD; for I am in distress: my bowels are troubled; mine heart is turned within me; for I have grievously rebelled: abroad the sword bereaveth, at home there is as death.[21] They have heard that I sigh: there is none to comfort me: all mine enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that thou hast done it: thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called, and they shall be like unto me.[22] Let all their wickedness come before thee; and do unto them, as thou hast done unto me for all my transgressions: for my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.” In the midst of expressing his great sorrows about what has happened, Jeremiah also keeps his thoughts in line with the truth of Who God is. For example, Jeremiah says in verse 18, “The LORD is righteous.” Everything that the Lord does is the right thing: everything. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, and everything that He gives is good to give, and everything that He takes away is good to take away because He is righteous. It says in Psalms 100:5, “For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.” Many people forget this truth especially when they have suffered some great sorrow or disaster. Right after saying that the Lord is righteous, Jeremiah says about himself in the same verse: “I have rebelled against his commandment.” It helps to accept bad things happening to you if you believe a very important truth about yourself: you are a sinner. What do you or I really deserve anyway? We deserve hell, but if we believe in Jesus, we are on our way to heaven. Any sorrows that happen to us are far less than we deserve, and the sorrows are temporary because this life is passing away. The righteous Lord makes righteous decisions. There are good results in the wisdom of God for everything that He does and even for everything that He allows. Yes, people can suffer terribly, just like Jeremiah did. But it is a great blessing to know that soon we will be forever with the Lord enjoying the eternal happiness of heaven where there will be no sorrows.

In verse 21 of course Jeremiah was correct when he stated that his enemies would reap what they had sown. What goes around comes around. They were glad when they saw Jeremiah suffer, but by doing so, they were only going to ensure that they would suffer the same things. Jesus stated this truth in Mathew 7:1-2, “Judge not, that ye be not judged.[2] For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.” Be careful how you treat others, because you are thereby determining how others will treat you.

Jeremiah wrote in Lamentations 2:1-4, “How hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger, and cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel, and remembered not his footstool in the day of his anger![2] The Lord hath swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob, and hath not pitied: he hath thrown down in his wrath the strong holds of the daughter of Judah; he hath brought them down to the ground: he hath polluted the kingdom and the princes thereof.[3] He hath cut off in his fierce anger all the horn of Israel: he hath drawn back his right hand from before the enemy, and he burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, which devoureth round about.[4] He hath bent his bow like an enemy: he stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew all that were pleasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion: he poured out his fury like fire.” After reading this passage, there is one thing to say for sure you do not want to get on the side of God that would bring such things against you. That is one of the great things about having Jesus as Savior: something like this will never happen to a believer in Jesus. Jesus took the curse upon Himself when He was on the cross of Calvary. God’s anger against sin has been propitiated through Christ. Jesus suffered the wrath of God, and therefore all who will believe will be saved from the wrath. But pity those who do not believe in Jesus and do not get the benefits of the gospel. As Paul wrote in Romans 1:18, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;”

The Bible says in Lamentations 2:5-8, “The Lord was as an enemy: he hath swallowed up Israel, he hath swallowed up all her palaces: he hath destroyed his strong holds, and hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation.[6] And he hath violently taken away his tabernacle, as if it were of a garden: he hath destroyed his places of the assembly: the LORD hath caused the solemn feasts and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion, and hath despised in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest.[7] The Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his sanctuary, he hath given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have made a noise in the house of the LORD, as in the day of a solemn feast.[8] The LORD hath purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion: he hath stretched out a line, he hath not withdrawn his hand from destroying: therefore he made the rampart and the wall to lament; they languished together.” Once again we see that Jeremiah’s theology is right where it needs to be. He knows that God is in control of all things. From a human standpoint it was the Babylonians who came to Jerusalem and destroyed everything and killed one third of the people, and took another one third captive, and the other one third was dispersed to other places and other nations. Jeremiah could have written about how cruel the Babylonians were and how much he wanted to see the Babylonians punished for what they did. But Jeremiah did not look at things from that standpoint. Like every believer should do, Jeremiah looked at things from the standpoint of God working in his life. Whatever happened to Jeremiah, he knew that it was the hand of God. That is exactly why Jeremiah wrote that God did all things to the people of Israel and the city of Jerusalem. In verse 5 Jeremiah wrote: “The Lord was as an enemy: he hath swallowed up Israel, he hath swallowed up all her palaces: he hath destroyed his strong holds, and hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation.” The same is true for all of the verses in this last set of verses. Over and over again, Jeremiah states that God did it. Some examples of this follow. It says in verse 6, “the LORD hath caused the solemn feasts and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion.” It says in verse 7, “The Lord hath cast off his altar.” It says in verse 8, “The LORD hath purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion.” If you want to live by faith, then you must recognize the hand of God in what happens to you.

The Bible says in Lamentations 2:9-10, “Her gates are sunk into the ground; he hath destroyed and broken her bars: her king and her princes are among the Gentiles: the law is no more; her prophets also find no vision from the LORD.[10] The elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon the ground, and keep silence: they have cast up dust upon their heads; they have girded themselves with sackcloth: the virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground.” Verse 9 gives an interesting statement about the law. Jeremiah wrote, “The law is no more.” Certainly, it was the truth. The law could not be practiced without the temple. In order to even attempt to follow the law, there had to be the priesthood, and the daily animal sacrifices, and all the people visiting the temple and bringing their sacrifices there especially on the special feast days like the Passover. With the temple gone, it was over. The law was done. Jeremiah wept. But wait just one minute. Jeremiah had just accurately written that God brought all this destruction. Therefore, God ended the law. God kept the Jews from practicing the law. When God had Jerusalem destroyed by the Babylonians, God set the law aside. That was God’s plan. Once Jesus came, the age of the law was replaced by the age of grace. God what He does, and God allows what He allows, because it all fits into His great plan. The Jews did a good job of proving that man failed at keeping the perfect law. The law was perfect, but man is imperfect, and so the law just does not work for us except to be our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ. John 1:17, “The law came by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.”

As we go to the last part of verse 9 Jeremiah mentions another result of God’s chastisement coming against Israel: “her prophets also find no vision from the LORD.” Believers need to hear the Word of God taught from those who are called to teach it. That is God’s way of feeding His sheep. Jesus told Peter, “If you love me, feed my sheep.” If there was no one to teach the Word of God, it would be a terrible thing for a community or a nation. The people would perish. The vision of God’s will would fade away. It would be terrible. Of course, like any believer, a preacher must stay in fellowship with Jesus in order to have the Lord speak through the preacher. We can do nothing without Jesus, and that includes preaching God’s precious Word.

The Bible says in Lamentations 2:11-14, “Mine eyes do fail with tears, my bowels are troubled, my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of the daughter of my people; because the children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of the city.[12] They say to their mothers, Where is corn and wine? when they swooned as the wounded in the streets of the city, when their soul was poured out into their mothers' bosom.[13] What thing shall I take to witness for thee? what thing shall I liken to thee, O daughter of Jerusalem? what shall I equal to thee, that I may comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? for thy breach is great like the sea: who can heal thee?[14] Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for thee: and they have not discovered thine iniquity, to turn away thy captivity; but have seen for thee false burdens and causes of banishment.” In the midst of his sorrow for what happened to Jerusalem and to its citizens, Jeremiah mentions one of the reasons for its failure in verse 14. He mentions how the prophets had failed. They failed in two ways: they spoke “foolish things,” and they did not preach against sin which is what is meant when it says, “they have not discovered thine iniquity.” The problem was how much the people had sinned against God, and therefore the solution would have been to repent of their sins and turn back to God. That was the message of John the Baptist when he was given a message to Israel just before Christ started His ministry. John had the message of the symbolism of water baptism based upon anyone having received the forgiveness of sins. His message was, “Repent of your sins.” And then if you do repent, I will wash you in water in order to symbolize the forgiveness that you have already received. Of course, that was Jesus’ message too, only Jesus is the One who gives the forgiveness. Jesus said, “Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.”

___________________________________________________