“It is Finished....”

~ Lamentations 4 ~

A Sacred Sorrow

Studies in the book of

Lamentations

~ The Season of Lent 2017 ~

Finding Your Voice When Life Doesn’t Make Sense

Flannery O’Connor (1925-1964)

“Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow…”

~ Lamentations 1:12

“It is Finished....”

~ Lamentations 4 ~

“And it came to pass after Israel had gone into captivity, and Jerusalem was laid waste, that Jeremiah sat

weeping and composed this lament over Jerusalem….”

Introduction to the Septuagint(the Greek Translation of the OT in 2BC)

01 How the gold has grown dim, how the pure gold is changed! The holy stones lie scattered

at the head of every street.

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02 The precious sons of Zion,worth their weight in gold,

how they are regarded as earthen pots,the work of a potter’s hands!

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“Then you shall break the flask in the sight of the men who go with you, and

shall say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts: So shall I break this people and

this city, as one breaks a potter’s vessel, so that it can never be mended.”

~ Jeremiah 19:10

05 Those who once feasted on delicacies perish in the streets; those who were brought up in purple

embrace the ash heaps.

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“They know no bounds in deeds of evil; they judge not with justice the cause of the

fatherless, to make it prosper, and they do not defend the rights of the needy. Shall not I

punish them for these things? declares the Lord…. This is the city that must be punished;

there is nothing but oppression within her.”

~ Jeremiah 5:28; 6:6

07 Her princes were purer than snow, whiter than milk; their bodies were more ruddy than coral,

the beauty of their form was likesapphire.

08 Now their face is blacker than soot; they are not recognized in the streets; their skin has shrivelled on their bones;

it has become as dry as wood.…

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03 Even jackals offer the breast; they nurse their young, but the daughter of my people has

become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.

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04 The tongue of the nursing infant sticks to the roof of its mouth for thirst; the children beg for food,

but no one gives it to them….09 Happier were the victims of the sword

than the victims of hunger, who wasted away, pierced by

lack of the fruits of the field.

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10 The hands of compassionate women have boiled their own children; they became their food, during the

destruction of the daughter of my people.

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10 The hands of compassionate women have boiled their own children; they became their food, during the

destruction of the daughter of my people.

Lamentations 4

Can a virgin forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? Has a nation changed its gods,

even though they are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that

which does not profit…. my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that

can hold no water….

~ Jeremiah 2:11-13

Can a virgin forget her ornaments,or a bride her attire?

Yet my people have forgotten medays without number.

~ Jeremiah 2:32

“…if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and

will forgive their sin and heal their land”

~ 2 Chronicles 7:14

God cannot look on the suffering of his own people, even under judgment, with- out the pangs of covenant memory: these wretched,

scavenging, starving, dehumanized living dead—

these are my people.

The Poet’s emotions are God’s too, just as

the prophet’s tears flow from God’s heart, just as the Messiah’s tears

would flow for the suffering of Jerusalem

in a later century….

06 …the chastisement of the daughter of my people has been greater than the punishment of Sodom,

which was overthrown in a moment, and no hands were wrung for her….

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11 The Lord gave full vent to his wrath; he poured out his hot anger; and he kindled a fire in Zion

that consumed its foundations.12 The kings of the earth did not believe,

nor any of the inhabitants of the world, that foe or enemy could enter

the gates of Jerusalem.

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13 This was for the sins of her prophets, who shed in the midst of her the blood of the righteous.

that consumed its foundations.14 They wandered, blind, through the streets,

they were so defiled with blood that no one was able to to touch their garments.

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“…in the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen a horrible thing: they commit

adultery and walk in lies; they strengthen the hands of the evildoers, so that no one

turns from his evil; all of them have become like Sodom to me, and it’s

inhabitants like Gomorrah…. for from the prophets of Jerusalem ungodliness has

gone out into the land.”

~ Jeremiah 23:14

..the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but

having itching ears they will accumulate for

themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth….

~ The Apostle Paul in 2 Timothy 4:3-4

17 Our eyes failed, ever watching vainly for help; in our watching we watched for a nation

which could not save.

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O Lord, the hope of Israel, all who forsake

you will be put to shame…~ Jeremiah 17:13

18 They dogged our steps so that we could not walk in our streets; our end drew near;

our days were numbered, for our end had come.

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For it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes the

judgment….

~ Hebrews 9;27

22 The punishment of your iniquity, O daughter of Zion, is accomplished….

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This is the most hopeful note in the entire book of

Lamentations.

”~ Adele Berlin, Commentator

qtd. in Christopher Wright’s The Message of Lamentations

“

Lament helps us find our voice to express the the reality of

pain, evil, and suffering in our world and in our lives.

“I’m right there in the room, and no one even acknowledges me.”

In a world filledwith evil, suffering,

& oppression,where is God?

He must not exist.

My argument against God was that the uni-

verse seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of ‘just’ and ‘unjust’...?

What was I comparing this universe with

when I called it unjust...

Of course, I could have given up my idea of

justice by saying it was nothing but a private

idea of my own. But if I did that, then my

argument against God collapsed too—

—for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not

simply that it did not happened to please my

private fancies…. Consequently, atheism

turns out to be too simple.

Then why doesn’t God do some-thing about it?

I could neverbelieve in a God

who would judge people.

The “Day of the Lord” is coming.

“You who think of sin but lightly,nor suppose the evil great,

here may view its nature rightly;here it’s guilt may estimate.”

“Stricken, Smitten, and Afflicted”by Thomas Kelly, 1769-1854

“It is finished.”

The Christian Gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to die for me,

yet I am so loved and valued that Jesus was

glad to die for me.~ Tim Keller,

The Reason for God

“He has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and

after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered to bear the sins of

many, will appear a second time to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.”

~ Hebrews 9:26-28

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