Lamentations 3:55-66

V. HIS PRAYER FOR DELIVERANCE Lamentations 3:55-66

TRANSLATION

(55) I called on Your name, O LORD, from the depths of the pit. (56) You have heard my voice! Do not close Your ear to my sighing, to my cry for help! (57) You have drawn near in the day I called upon You. You said; Do not be afraid. (58) You have pleaded the causes of my soul, O Lord; You have redeemed my life. (59) You have seen, O LORD, the wrong done unto me. Judge my cause. (60) You have seen all of their vengeance, all of their plots against me, (62) the lips of those who rise up against me and their murmuring against me all the day. (63) Observe their sitting down and rising up. I am their song. (64) Repay them, O LORD, according to the deeds of their hands. (65) Give them blindness of heart! Let Your curse be on them! (66) Pursue them in anger and destroy them from under the heavens of the LORD.

COMMENTS

The closing section of chapter 3 is a prayer for deliverance which is filled with expressions of confidence that the prayer will be answered. As the prophet recalls the cistern experience and how God delivered him from that certain death his faith begins to grow. Just as God heard his cry from the dark dungeon of death (Lamentations 3:55) so he asks God not to ignore his present pleas for help (Lamentations 3:56). In the past God had answered his prayers by drawing near and whispering Be not afraid! (Lamentations 3:57). God had intervened on behalf of His servant, had taken up his cause, and had redeemed his very life (Lamentations 3:58). On the basis of God's past response to his petition Jeremiah again calls upon God to hear and answer his prayer.

In Lamentations 3:59-66 the actual petition is presented before the Lord. The prophet here prays in the first person singular. But the me of these verses is in reality us. Jeremiah is praying as an intercessor. He is praying for his nation and as part of his nation. The enemies for whose destruction he prays must then be the Chaldean conquerors of Jerusalem. The petitioner realizes that God already knows the desperate plight of Judah, the wrongs which have been suffered (Lamentations 3:59), the vicious and vengeful plots (Lamentations 3:60), the taunting and ridicule of the enemy (Lamentations 3:61-62). All day long the Jews are the subject of Chaldean taunt-songs (Lamentations 3:63), Therefore, Jeremiah calls upon the Lord to judge his cause i.e., judge those who have committed wrongs against the Jews (Lamentations 3:59). He asks God to repay these enemies in accordance with the deeds they have done (Lamentations 3:64). He prays that these opponents might experience blindness of heart i.e., intellectual confusion, and that God's curse might rest upon them (Lamentations 3:65). He asks God to destroy these enemies from off the face of the earth (Lamentations 3:66). Lamentations 3:64-66 reflect that imprecatory mood which is so difficult for Christians to comprehend. However, these verses are best regarded not as a prayer for vengeance, but as a plea for justice. If a holy and just God rules this world then wrong must be punished and inequities must be eliminated. The petitioner was confident that God was just and therefore did not hesitate to call for God to act in accordance with His justice. There is no personal animosity in these words. The prophet prays as a representative of his people. In praying for the destruction of the Babylonians he prays that God will fulfill the threats already made against the conquerors of Jerusalem (Jeremiah 25:12; Jeremiah 29:10; chaps. 50-51).