The first two chapters of the Lamentations of Jeremiah are primarily in the third person. Jeremiah is looking at the destruction of his beloved Judah and weeping for their suffering. His lamentation is over their destruction. The third chapter is a shift of gears. Here it becomes personal. Here Jeremiah talks about his own pain. And he isn't shy about naming the source. As a sample:
I am the man who has seen affliction under the rod of His wrath; He has driven and brought me into darkness without any light; surely against me He turns His hand again and again the whole day long (Lam 3:1-3).According to Jeremiah, God Himself has turned on him. According to this prophet of God, it is God's wrath that he is enduring. There is no hint of a sense of injustice. Still, Jeremiah thinks it's not only a judgment against his people, but against him.
As we read on, he fleshes out the pain he's in. He summarizes down around verse 17:
My soul is bereft of peace; I have forgotten what happiness is; so I say, "My endurance has perished; so has my hope from the LORD" (Lam 3:17-18).How many of us would want to correct Jeremiah? "Jerry, Jerry, come on. Surely God didn't do this to you. Surely you can't mean that God has removed your peace. Come on, Jeremiah. You can't mean that your hope is gone. Where else do we get hope but from the Lord?" That's what we'd like to say. We would, of course, be saying it in clear contradiction to his own words. And we would be premature. Jeremiah, you see, isn't finished.
But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness. "The LORD is my portion," says my soul, "therefore I will hope in Him." The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD (Lam 3:21-26).Ah! There, see? There is more to the story. I'm fascinated at the comfort Jeremiah finds in the midst of his very real suffering. It is not that there is hope that things will get better. He has already denied that. It is not that things aren't as bad as he thinks they are. Indeed, they are absolutely that bad. It's not that God will rescue him from his troubles. He has no reason to believe that. Jeremiah's hope doesn't come from the chance of something better. Jeremiah's hope comes purely and simply from God. "The Lord is my portion," he says. That's it. That's all.
We could learn from this. We could benefit from the recognition that "The Lord is my portion." When we face hardships and trials, we often look for the light at the end of the tunnel. Jeremiah found the light in the darkest moment simply in the presence of God. Paul put it this way: "I count everything as loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ" (Phil 3:8). That's Paul's secret. That's Jeremiah's secret. The real value in life is knowing Christ. All that other stuff -- comfort, wealth, health, family, friends, self-confidence, all that other stuff -- can go out the window. We can be without any hope of regaining any of it and still have hope, still have peace, as long as we realize, "The Lord is my portion." Nothing else matters.
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"3 I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. 4 And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God." 1Cor2
I don't know how it is with others, but for me the reference point was always the first touch by God. When in trouble, I always felt comfort in looking back to that moment and seek His presence. It is a comfort inside, not related to some gain in life. Just like in this case of Jeremiah. Timely topic indeed. : ))
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