Lamentations 3:1-33

I am about to read a portion of Holy Scripture which may seem very strange to some of you, but it belongs to a part of the congregation, and I hope it may be the means of giving them comfort. I read it as a picture of the suffering of a soul under a sense of sin. I think it is a most graphic portrait of a heart that is aroused and made to feel its lost estate. If there are any such here, they will be sure to see themselves in the picture.

Lamentations 3:1. I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.

It is a mistake that most souls make when in trouble, to suppose that no others ever felt as they do. John Bunyan describes Christian as being very much comforted by hearing someone quoting Scripture as he went through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, for then he perceived that there were others in like case with his own. Do not think, poor troubled soul, that no one ever was so broken in pieces as you are; your path of sorrow is a well-trodden one.

Lamentations 3:2. He hath led me, and brought me into darkness, but not into light.

A Hebrew method of saying that it was a thick darkness without any light, either star-light or moon-light. You who have passed through this state of conviction know what it means;--no comfort from ordinances, no comfort from God's Word, no comfort from your daily mercies. Every stream of comfort seems dried up to you, and sin lies heavily upon you.

Lamentations 3:3. Surely against me is he turned; he turneth his hand against me all the day.

As if, when a man is about to strike, he smites not with his open hand but turns his hand, so the prophet says God did with him. He felt that he was being smitten with the heaviest blows that God seemed able to give.

Lamentations 3:4. My flesh and my skin hath he made old; he hath broken my bones.

As men through excessive grief sometimes appear to grow prematurely aged, so the prophet says he had done through grief. He felt as if his bones were broken. The sore vexations of his spirit had dashed the solid pillars of the house of Manhood from their place.

Lamentations 3:5. He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travail.

That is to say, as the besiegers erected a mound against a city, and threw up earthworks, so, the prophet says, God seemed to have thrown up earthworks from which he might fire off the great guns of the law against him.

Lamentations 3:6. He hath set me in dark places, as they that be dead of old.

As though he had to live in a tomb, where neither life nor light could come to him.

Lamentations 3:7. He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy.

«My way seems blocked up, nothing prospers with me.» As the convict sometimes drags about his chain, and has a ball at his foot, so the prophet felt as if God had clogged him with a heavy chain, so that he could not move because of its terrible weight.

Lamentations 3:8. Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer,

Which was the worst trial of all.

Lamentations 3:9. He hath enclosed my ways with hewn stone; he hath made my paths crooked.

It was believed that hewn stones made the strongest wall as the joints would the more closely fit into one another. Jeremiah seems to speak as if God had taken care and trouble to build, not as men do, roughly with common stones, but with polished and well-shapen troubles built like strong barriers in his way.

Lamentations 3:10. He was unto me as a bear lying in wait, and as a lion in secret places.

He felt as if the justice of God was about to spring upon him. He was afraid to move, lest the couchant lion should leap upon him, and tear him in pieces. John Bunyan, in his Grace abounding to the Chief of Sinners, describes in his own experience precisely what the prophet here speaks of.

Lamentations 3:11. He hath turned aside my ways, and pulled me in pieces: he hath made me desolate. He hath bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow. He hath caused the arrows of his quiver to enter into my reins.

And all this while, to aggravate his grief, he found no comfort anywhere.

Lamentations 3:14. I was a derision to all my people; and their song all the day.

It is just so with a man who is under a sense of sin. His companions ask him why he is so melancholy; he has an attack of the mopes, they say. They do not want his society, they will chase him from their midst. I marvel not that they want not his company, for well do I know that he wants not theirs, but this adds much to his grief, to find that they make derision and laughter of his woe.

Lamentations 3:15. He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with wormwood.

What a strong expression the prophet uses! As a drunken man hath lost his wits, and staggereth he knoweth not where, even as is a sinner when he really begins to taste the bitterness of sin. He does not act as if he were endowed with reason; despair and sorrow have driven his senses away.

Lamentations 3:16. He hath also broken my teeth with gravel stones, he hath covered me with ashes.

The Easterns usually baked their cakes on the hearth, and very frequently there would be in the cakes pieces of grit, perhaps large lumps of cinder, and sometimes small gravel stones, which would break the teeth. «So,» the prophet seems to say, « when I went to try to get some nourishment by the eating of bread, I was disappointed; my teeth were broken with gravel stones.» I remember when I used to go up to the house of God to try to get comfort; but, instead thereof, I came away more wretched than I went, for sin, that great devouring dragon, still followed me everywhere.

Lamentations 3:17. And thou hast removed my soul far off from peace: I forgot prosperity. And I said, My strength and my hope is perished from the LORD: remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me. This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope.

Notice the gracious change that has taken place, as if the sun had risen after the blackness and gloom of the night. Now the birds of joy begin to sing, and the flowers of hope begin to open their golden cups.

Lamentations 3:22. It is of the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassion fail not.

Bad as our state is, we are not yet in hell; we are not yet beyond the reach of hope.

Lamentations 3:23. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.

We had new mercies this morning, and we have had fresh mercies this evening. God has not forgotten us. The very breath in our nostrils is a proof of his goodness to us; let us, therefore, dear friends, still hope for yet further favors from him.

Lamentations 3:24. The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him. The LORD is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him.

Can you get a hold of this blessed truth, any of you troubled ones who are here? Broken-hearted sinner, can you get a grip of this comforting assurance? If so, there will soon be peace for you.

Lamentations 3:26. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the LORD. It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.

For this yoke, though it may seem to be very heavy for a time, when it has humbled us, and brought us to Christ, will bring us innumerable blessings.

Lamentations 3:28. He sitteth alone and keepeth silence, because he hath borne it upon him. He putteth his mouth in the dust if so be there may be hope. He giveth his cheek to him that smiteth him: he is filled full with reproach. For the LORD will not cast of for ever: but though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies. For he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men.

Unless he has some gracious motive for it, he never afflicts or grieves them, and when he doth act thus, it is as when a father smites his child. It is because it must be done and not because he loves to do it. See, then, the great mercy of God. May it lead the sinner to repentance, yea, and lead us all to put our trust in the Lord!

This exposition consisted of readings from Lamentations 3:1; and Jeremiah 31:22.