Lamentations 1 Devotional
by Pastor Mark Hudson
We live in a relatively happy-clappy church age so I love the fact that the Bible has an entire book called Lamenting. Okay, Lamentations. But this is a book set aside for reflecting on life in the minor key. If you read the entire Bible, and especially the Psalms, you will find people that are grieving, mourning, and experiencing sadness and loss. North American Christians don’t know much about grief. We tend to talk about overcoming and rejoicing. Yet, it was the Apostle Paul who wrote, “as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing (2Co 6:10 ESV)”
Jeremiah experienced rejecting, hard hearts, and sorrow. This short book of laments is full of anguish, affliction, sorrow, grief. Here are some tough words Jeremiah uses: lonely, widow, slave v.1; weeps bitterly, tears, none to comfort, friends have dealt treacherously, enemies v 2; exile, affliction, hard servitude, no resting place, distress v. 3 and we could go on and on for the entire book.
But don’t lose sight of God in this book or in any grieving as a believer. I believe God wants us to grieve and mourn our losses. When a man or woman loses a husband, they can and must take a long time in unhurried grief. Mourning takes energy, reflection and should be done with God’s Word and in God’s presence. You should feel the loss. That is how God made us; like it or not. Those of you who have experienced a loss, dig deep into this spiritual book. This book is not a downer but a spiritual masterpiece. Jeremiah points us to God. “Oh Lord, behold my affliction” v 9. See also, just in the chapter one, Jeremiah’s references to God, v. 5; v. 11; 12-15; 17-18, 20-22.
Both joy and grief are in the Bible. We experience this same unlikely combination in our lives as well. Hopefully the grieving, mourning, and loss part comes later in your life but you will experience deep loss sometime in your life. When you do experience a loss, not if but when , seek God. Go deep and keep striving to know Him in and through that loss.
God loves us deeply. His greatest gift to us is Himself. He uses tragedy, deep sorrow, painful affliction, and staggering disappointments to open us up to new vistas with God. What we need is God. When we lose someone or something dear to us, we don’t need that person or that thing back. We need God.
Loss, disappointment, and rejection open us up to other areas that we need to develop. One time when I was going through a difficult time, a person asked me, “Why don’t you ever use the words sad or sadness. Do you feel sad?” I realized I never used that word. I really had no idea how to grieve. I thought grieving was only for people mourning a death of someone they loved. I’m not much more mature in my understanding of grief but I have improved a little since then.
Do you allow mourning in your faith? Do you have a vocabulary that expresses a range of experiences and feelings? Just like every profession or interest has their own vocabulary do does loss, affliction, and grief. As you read Jeremiah in Lamentations, notice, “Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow, which was brought upon me, which the Lord inflicted on the day of his fierce anger” v 12. Too pious to say that? Maybe you are not pious enough. Or “Look, O Lord, and see, for I am despised.” V. 11. And just wait until you come to chapter 3 which contain some of my favorite verses in the Old Testament.
But no one’s sorrow was as great as Christ who took our sorrows. He bore God’s wrath. And He bore the full brunt of his fierce anger against sin. God the Father held nothing back. Even with that you will still experience sorrow in this life. But it will be “as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.”