Lamentations 3:40-66--Great Is Your Faithfulness (Part 3)

Lamentations 3:40-66
English Standard Version

40 Let us test and examine our ways,
    and return to the LORD!
41 Let us lift up our hearts and hands
    to God in heaven:
42 “We have transgressed and rebelled,
    and you have not forgiven.

43 “You have wrapped yourself with anger and pursued us,
    killing without pity;
44 you have wrapped yourself with a cloud
    so that no prayer can pass through.
45 You have made us scum and garbage
    among the peoples.

46 “All our enemies
    open their mouths against us;
47 panic and pitfall have come upon us,
    devastation and destruction;
48 my eyes flow with rivers of tears
    because of the destruction of the daughter of my people.

49 “My eyes will flow without ceasing,
    without respite,
50 until the LORD from heaven
    looks down and sees;
51 my eyes cause me grief
    at the fate of all the daughters of my city.

52 “I have been hunted like a bird
    by those who were my enemies without cause;
53 they flung me alive into the pit
    and cast stones on me;
54 water closed over my head;
    I said, ‘I am lost.’

55 “I called on your name, O LORD,
    from the depths of the pit;
56 you heard my plea, ‘Do not close
    your ear to my cry for help!’
57 You came near when I called on you;
    you said, ‘Do not fear!’

58 “You have taken up my cause, O Lord;
    you have redeemed my life.
59 You have seen the wrong done to me, O LORD;
    judge my cause.
60 You have seen all their vengeance,
    all their plots against me.

61 “You have heard their taunts, O LORD,
    all their plots against me.
62 The lips and thoughts of my assailants
    are against me all the day long.
63 Behold their sitting and their rising;
    I am the object of their taunts.

64 “You will repay them, O LORD,
    according to the work of their hands.
65 You will give them dullness of heart;
    your curse will be on them.
66 You will pursue them in anger and destroy them
    from under your heavens, O LORD.”

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Jeremiah finishes this chapter with a call repentance.  The people individually and as a whole should return to the LORD.  So far, they have cried out to Him to save them, but they had no intention of changing their hearts.  Normally we see the prophets say that the LORD is wrapped in light and is unapproachable because of His glory, but here Jeremiah says He is "wrapped" in His warriors garments of anger that has allowed Him to pursue His people without pity.  Here, he is wrapped in the clouds as the picture of Him coming on the storms to make judgment on the ungodly--the issue is that "His people" are the ungodly now.  He has let the world see Israel and Judah for what they really are and how weak and pitiful they are without His power and covenant backing them.  It is only because of His chosen favor that they prosper and are blessed because there was nothing good in them that made God love them (just like there is nothing good in any of us that makes good love us).  God pulled back the curtain for just a brief moment to show everyone what it would look like if Israel were treated just like every other nation on earth that was condemned, yet they were not every other nation and were not destroyed because He had eternal purposes in store for them (and I believe He still does as we read the writings of the Prophets and the Apostles).

As you read these words of Jeremiah about what Israel and Judah endured, I see the very things that Jesus had to endure as He went to the cross, but He deserved none of it.  Every spoke vile things about Him and assumed that God hated Him.  He was crying and sweating great drops of blood because of His anguish, even before His torture that made Him no longer recognizable as a man.

Jeremiah wishes the LORD's face which was a sign of His favor would turn back towards His people.  He knows the name of the LORD given to Him by Hagar, "The God Who Sees Me," and that is all Jeremiah is asking for here.  He wants the LORD to see His people and act compassionately towards them, not as their enemies, but as if He was their Father, and they were His wayward children that needed to come home.  Like the story of the Prodigal Son, Jeremiah desires for the picture of the Father standing, looking out into the far country for any sign of His wayward son so that He can run to Him and welcome Him back.  The older brother in that parable wanted the younger brother to be dead and get what he deserved (much like what is happening to Israel and Judah here), but the Father desired to restore the wayward son that He had always loved.  Nothing could change that.  The LORD desires to do what Jeremiah is praying for, but there was repentance in that parable before the wayward son left the pigpen and turned back to head home,  The Father did not come into the pigpen in the far country and let his son continue to live in sin there.  That has been the attitude of Israel and Judah to this point.  There is a need for them to repent.

The imagery of the Psalms returns with us falling into a pit that we cannot get out of.  Only the LORD can get us out.  All we can do is cry for help from Him, and He will respond with "Don't be afraid" and "Help is on the way."  Jeremiah knows from the Psalms that he's sung and lead others in singing that the LORD loved to deliver David when he was in similar situations.  He has apparently read the book of Job too and has entrusted His soul to the just judgment of God in the next life, even if he's not sure justice will come in this life.  He is certain of His salvation because it is based on the finished work of the Lord.  There are plenty of people that Jeremiah wishes that the LORD would take vengeance on because of how the people mistreated him, but he does not need to see that vengeance here and now because He knows the Just Judge will take care of everything one day.  We do not seek or pursue vengeance in this life for it is up to God to determine the proper means and proper time for His wrath to be satisfied.  Sometimes He wants to do something now to send a message to others of the judgment and wrath to come.  Other times, it may seem like the wicked prosper for a time, but they will be like the chaff that is burned up in the judgment never to be remembered again.  Only the good grain will remain.