Lamentations 2:11-22. In the first part of this poem yester day we were confronted with the anger and wrath of God. Jeremiah repeatedly told us that it was the LORD (Yahweh) who had brought all of this destruction on Jerusalem. We also saw that the destruction wasn’t undeserved. The people had broken God’s Law repeatedly and had ignored the warnings by Jeremiah and other prophets. The consequences of sin had been obvious from the very beginning. Adam, and all his offspring, was eventually going to die, he was banished from the garden and would have to pull weeds forever more, and of course there was that shocking slaughter of an animal make clothes for him and Eve. There had been punishment (wandering in the wilderness for forty years) when the Israelites refused to invade the land God had promised to them, during the period of the Judges they repeatedly disobeyed and suffered for it, and 136 years before their own destruction they got to see their sister kingdom, Israel, destroyed and scattered by the Assyrian Empire. There was plenty of warning. As we saw God is serious about sin (disobedience and rebellion) because sin separates us from Him.
Today’s part of the poem starts out with the author personally grieving because of the destruction of Jerusalem and the suffering of the people in it during the siege. In verses 11-12 he uses the very real picture of the children starving to death in their mother’s arms. In verse 13 Jeremiah, the messenger of God whose words are supposed to help the people see and understand and return to God, is speechless. His desire is to comfort and heal but the problem is too big, it’s an ocean, and it’s beyond him. Part of the problem is that there were false prophet giving them bad information and false hope. Don’t worry, be happy was their message; God will never destroy His city and His Temple. We like it when people give us a way out so we can keep living the way we want and that is what the false prophets did. Jeremiah’s was almost the only voice pushing the people to turn back to God and it was drowned out by that of the false prophets.
In verse 15 we see this “Jerusalem is too important to God” attitude. Evidently the people of Jerusalem had been quoting Psalm 48:2 and Psalm 50:2 as they thought about how important Jerusalem is to God. In Psalm 48 we see Jerusalem as a lighthouse to a world in danger of being shipwrecked by sin. The whole world saw the city as a place of refuge (stronghold, v.3) for those within. They also saw God’s great power. The ships of Tarshish (v. 7) were the best of the time yet God could command the wind to break them easily. With his power he would properly (righteously) judge (vv. 10-11) the enemies of Jerusalem. Those enemies were aware of the power of the God of Israel, Yahweh, and were amazed and terrified (vv. 4-5). By quoting verse 2 the people showed they thought Jerusalem was too important to destroy.
It is ironic that the people would have quoted Psalm 50 to defend their “we’re too important attitude”. Psalm 50 was a warning to the people about their insincere offerings to God. In Hebrew (the language the Old Testament was written in) beauty is not so much about the way things look as it is about how useful a thing is; its about purpose and appropriateness. In Psalm 50:2 Zion (remember this is another name for Jerusalem, the mountain it was on, and the location of the Temple) is called the “perfection of beauty”. That is almost like saying “perfectly perfect” or “the ultimate in usefulness”. The reason is not because “Zion” was so impressive but because that is where God would “shine” from. Unfortunately the people of Jerusalem had lived in a way that made it hard for the nations to see God’s light; there were so many “gods” in Judah the world didn’t know which one was the true one. Jerusalem was “un-useful” or unbeautiful and Yahweh needed to clear things up with those watching and those living inside Jerusalem, so the judgment in the time of Jeremiah.
In verses 15 and 16 we see those who had passed by afraid to touch Jerusalem in Psalm 48 now completely mocking both the city and the attitude of the inhabitants. They were even taking credit for the destruction of the city (“swallowed her up”). But in verse 17 we are reminded that it is Yahweh who had made sure this happened. We are also told that this situation had been promised by God in his word. In Leviticus 26:14-39 we see God’s promise about what will happen if the Israelite’s turn their back on him and disobey his rules. There are several layers to the punishment. God will punish and then see if the people have chosen to obey. If the disobedience continues the more and harsher punishment will come. Of particular interest is that eventually God promises to destroy their cities and sanctuaries (holy places; notice it is plural probably indicating that there were many “gods” being honored), that they would be so hungry in the middle of the punishment that they would eat their own children, that they would be scattered among the nations/their enemies, and that the new inhabitants of the land would be horrified by the destruction left behind. Leviticus was written over 850 years before the destruction of Jerusalem, before the Israelites took over the land, while they were still in the wilderness living in tents, before they had cities. It should have been of no surprise to them when Jerusalem was destroyed.
Verse 18 starts out by telling us that the “heart of the people are crying out to Yahweh (LORD). The rest of what follows could be that “cry”. Some translations put the rest of verse 18 and all of 19 in quotes. The beginning of verse 18 could also be a statement by Jeremiah of the people’s reaction to the destruction. Just because they are crying to Yahweh though doesn’t mean that they have turned back to him. In the Law of Moses the very first rule the Israelites were given was to have no other “gods”. It’s not enough to turn to God you need to turn away from other “gods”.
It is interesting that verses 18 is talking to the “wall of the daughter of Jerusalem”. Walls represent protection and usually you would talk about how the wall of a city protects the city. In yesterday’s reading we saw that by using the term “daughter of Zion” that Jeremiah was focusing on the people rather that the physical city. I think that is the case here too. Whoever is talking they are talking to the wall that was supposed to protect the people, but the wall had been broken down and the people had been taken; the wall had failed and should feel bad about that. At night, when the city was locked up and basically everyone was asleep, guards were stationed around the city on the top of the wall to keep watch in case an enemy attacked at night. Since the wall was destroyed there was not a way to keep watch, the city was vulnerable. At the end of verse 19 we see that children in the city are in danger but the danger isn’t from the swords of an invading army but from lack of food (Keep in mind that Jeremiah is writing theses poems after Jerusalem has been destroyed, but here he is looking back to when the destruction wasn’t finished yet). That sort of tells us that the invaders haven’t invaded yet and that the wall really isn’t broken down. These word are probably the words of Jeremiah and not a quote of the people at the beginning of verse 18. Clearly the average Jew didn’t really trust Yahweh as the one true God. In verse 18 Jeremiah is using the picture of a wall surrounding the people to describe God, Yahweh. But Yahweh was no longer protecting the people from physical harm, the inhabitants of the city were under siege and starving to death, for that he wanted God (the wall) to cry.
In verse 19 the people of Jerusalem are told to cry to Yahweh (LORD) at the beginning of the night watch (the time the wall really begins its job) and beg for the lives of their children (“your little ones”). God had removed his protection from the people of Jerusalem but remember it was a punishment that he had warned them about. In that warning in Leviticus (and other places too) there was always a solution, turn back to God, and Jeremiah is still encouraging the people to do that.
In verse 20 Jeremiah again talks to Yahweh, the one true God; his personal God. He challenges God about the horror of what is going on, mothers are eating their children, priests and prophets are dying in the place where the one true God is supposed to be honored, and now their city has been invaded and young and old, civilian and soldier are lying dead in the streets. Jeremiah admits that Yahweh has done this because of his anger and has not spared anyone. Again this may seem brutal, but you need to remember the even greater cost of not turning back to God; eternity where there is no good (see yesterday’s post and check out the description in Revelation 21 of eternity for those not part of God’s forever kingdom).
Verse 22 is a little difficult. Some people thing that the people of Jerusalem have been talking all this time but I really do think that this is all Jeremiah. Verse 22 continues his words to Yahweh. In the beginning of the verse he tells us that God called someone or something like he was inviting to a religious festival. In many religions festivals were times to try to get the gods to do something for you, in Israel the festival were there to remember what God had already done of promised to do for the people. In this case Jeremiah is telling us that the horrible events he has seen (“terrors all around me”) are like one of these festivals; the punishment of God is a reminder of his faithfulness, he had warned them of the consequence of constant rebellion and now he was following through. God doesn’t change, he will do what he has said, both blessings (promises of good) and curses (promises of punishment). Verse 22 ends with a cry of sorrow from Jeremiah. He looks on the people of Jerusalem like his own children, he had tried to raise them right but they defected. Because of God’s (right and fair) anger the people had been destroyed by Jeremiah’s enemy. There are three possibilities for the enemy. Since God is pictured as the one who destroyed Jerusalem it could be God, but it is unlikely that Jeremiah would see God as his enemy. Second since Jerusalem was destroyed by the human hand of the Babylonian Army Jeremiah might be referring to Babylon or Nebuchadnezzar, but in the book of Jeremiah he consistently told the people to submit to the Babylonian invasion, it was a punishment from God. The Babylonians did overstep what God sent them to do and acted in ways that God did not intend and for that we were told in the book of Jeremiah that they would be punished. So Jeremiah might see them as his enemy but maybe not. The real enemy here was the sin and rebellion of the people, I think that sin is the enemy Jeremiah is talking about.
We need to remember that sin is our real enemy too. Paul told us that sin really doesn’t have much power anymore because Jesus has conquered it (I Corinthians 15). But as we have seen sin does have a real “sting” (1 Corinthians 15:54-55) for those who reject Jesus, just as it had a very real sting for those inhabitants of Jerusalem and Judah who continually rejected God call to turn back to him. God has and wants a good future for all of us but unfortunately those who reject his offer only darkness and suffering await. That reality is why God gets angry and uses extreme measures to help us understand here and now while we still have a chance to turn back. Turn to God today, you may avoid some pain and suffering now, and you will certainly avoid an eternity of it in God’s loving protective presence.
God thank you for the promise and reality of Heaven. Thank you for consequences for sin now so we can learn before it is too late. Thank you for “knocking me up along side of the head” a number of times so that I would get serious about you. Help me listen better each day so I can avoid more of those “hard” lessons. Help me learn to love and honor you more each day so I will be better prepared for eternity with you. Thank you for your faithfulness. Help many turn to you and miss out on that other eternal reality, Hell. Thank you for Jesus.