Turn back

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 4-5; Psalm 30

TO CHEW ON: "Turn us back to You, O Lord, and we will be restored; Renew our days as of old." Lamentations 5:21

The bleak book of Lamentations ends on a bright note—the possibility of returning to God.

Stories of repentance (turning back to God) run through the Bible.

• David repented after committing adultery and murder (Psalm 51:1-19).

• Josiah repented when the priests found and read the books of the law (2 Kings 22:11,19).

• The pagan Ninevites repented at the preaching of Jonah (Jonah 3:6-9).

• Even evil King Ahab repented after hearing about God's coming judgment from Elijah (1 Kings 21:27).

I love the story of the Prodigal Son and the wording Luke uses to describe his return: "But when he came to himself he said...I will arise and go to my father and will say to him, 'Father, I have sinned...'" (Luke 15:17-18).

I'm sure you can remember your own coming to yourself, that moment when you 'repented' (turned, changed direction) from unbelief to faith, self-direction to God-direction. I know I can. I tell my story here (end of "My Rambling Story").

Of course following that one moment of big repentance when life takes a whole different direction, there are hundreds of smaller repentances. Each time we find ourselves again taking control of our lives and letting our old carnal self have the upper hand we can repent, turn back and be restored and renewed.

Jack Hayford says about repentance:

"The implications of biblical repentance are threefold:
1. Renunciation and reversal.
2. Submission and teachability.
3. Continued shapeability.


There is no birth into the kingdom without hearing the call to salvation, renouncing one's sin and turning from sin toward Christ the Saviour (Acts 3:19)" - Jack Hayford, "Repentance," New Spirit Filled Life Bible, p. 1293.

PRAYER: Dear God, thank You for drawing me back go Yourself. I pray for the prodigals in my life, that You will bring them home in the same way. Amen.

MORE: Praise is Rising by Brenton Brown and Paul Baloche

"Hear the sound of hearts returning to You
We turn to You
In Your kingdom broken lives are renewed;
You make us new..."

Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Intercession: patriotism at its highest

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 3; Psalm 29

TO CHEW ON: "My eyes overflow with rivers of water

For the destruction of the daughter of my people.

My eyes flow and do not cease

Without interruption

Till the Lord from heaven

Looks down and sees." Lamentations 3:48-50

Jeremiah* here shows himself a patriot whose heart breaks when God comes through with threatened judgments against Judah. What a picture of persevering intercession for his nation!

We are reminded of other leaders who prayed for their people.

• Moses interceded for Israel when God threatened to destroy them after the golden calf incident (Exodus 32:30-32), and again when God's anger was hot at their refusal to enter Canaan (Numbers 14:17-19).

• Samuel prayed for the people when they wanted to return to God after a time of backsliding (1 Samuel 7:2-6).

• David interceded for God's mercy on the people after they were inflicted by a plague following his sin of initiating a census (1 Chronicles 21:16-19).

We don't have to be leaders to intercede for our country. Dick Eastman says of the intercessor:

"An intercessor is a man or woman—or child—who fights on behalf of others. As such, intercession is the activity that identifies us most with Christ. To be an intercessor is to be like Jesus because that is what Jesus is like. He ever lives to intercede (Hebrews 7:25; Romans 8:34)!"

Eastman goes on to give four insights that help us understand the role of the intercessor and grasp its impact:

1. We must understand our "privilege" as intercessors. Christ is ever at God's right hand (Romans 8:34 linked above), and from this position He intercedes for the saints continuously. To be at God's right hand is spoken of in the Bible as being a great privilege and pleasure (Psalm 16:11).

2. We must understand our "position" as intercessors. We are energized (Ephesians 2:45), elevated (Ephesians 2:6: "raised... up together"), and enthroned with Christ in intercession (Mark 11:22-24).

3. We must understand our "promise" as intercessors. Our objective is to see God's Kingdom established (Isaiah 11:9).

4. We must understand our "power" as intercessors. See Luke 10:19... "Our Lord is saying that those who move in the direction of involvement and are willing to pay the price of intervention will have all the power necessary to confront demonic forces in their citadels."

— Dick Eastman, summary and quotes from Love on its Knees, pp. 21-25.

What a privilege to be able to serve one's country in this way!

PRAYER: Dear God, please give me the urgency and conviction of interceding for my nation that I see in Moses, Samuel, David and Jeremiah. Amen.

MORE: Intercession's impact

"I am convinced that when we stand before God with the record of spiritual successes and failures, we will learn that intercessory prayer had more to do with bringing about positive changes in our world than any other single spiritual activity." - Dick Eastman, Love On Its Knees, p. 17.


* "The author (of Lamentations) is not named, but traditions long before Christ claim that Jeremiah wrote it"  - Paul B. Watney,  "Introduction to Jeremiah," New Spirit-Filled Life Bible, p. 1036.


PSALM TO PRAY: Psalm 29

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Suffering and lament

"Jeremiah"  by Julius Schnorr Von Karolsfeld

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 1-2; Psalm 28

TO CHEW ON: "Judah has gone into captivity
Under affliction and hard servitude;
She dwells among the nations;
She finds no rest;
All her persecutors overtake her in dire straits." Lamentations 1:3

Lamentations is a book of laments. Four of its five poems are acrostics, perhaps the writer Jeremiah's poetic way of exploring his feelings of grief from Aleph to Tau (A to Z).

Jeremiah was mourning the fall of Jerusalem and with it the kingdom of Judah. Second Kings and Second Chronicles tell the story of her moral decline. Despite prophet warnings, the nation has continued downward, perhaps feeling too secure in God's promises of ultimate protection. Finally after a starving siege by the Babylonian army, Jerusalem fell, the city was destroyed, the temple burned, and all but her poorest  citizens marched into exile in Babylon. So Jeremiah weeps.

Some of Lamentation's themes help us understand and deal with our own griefs. (Themes are suggested by the "Introduction to Lamentations" in my Bible, by Roy Edmund Hayden, New Spirit-Filled Life Bible, pp. 1037-1038):

1. Their suffering was the result of their sin (Lamentations 1:5, 8, 18, 20).
2. Their suffering was seen as coming from God rather than from men (Lamentations 1:13,15).
3. Their suffering could direct them to God.
4. Suffering, tears, and prayers belong together (Lamentations 1:12, 16, 20).

The reasons we suffer may be different from the reasons Jeremiah and the Israelites suffered. We live under a different covenant where even blatant sinners may not experience punishment for sins until after death (2 Peter 2:4-10). But often we are forced to live the consequences of past actions. And suffering is also allowed to discipline us (Hebrews 12:3-17).

In a personal application part of Lamentation's introduction, R. E. Hayden shares some helpful thoughts about suffering with us:

"We need to submit to what God is doing and attempt to learn from the experience. If it is God's discipline, it will last as long as is necessary. There is no quick-fix solution to some of these problems and no easy way out. Discipline will direct us to God, drive us to prayer, and bring us into submission. We need it" - R. E. Hayden, "Introduction to Lamentations," New Spirit-Filled Life Bible, p. 1039 (emphasis added).

PRAYER: Dear God, I hate suffering as much as Jeremiah did. When trouble comes, may it drive me to You. Help me then to learn all the lessons I need to learn. When I am not suffering, help me to be sensitive and comforting to those around me who are. Amen.

PSALM TO PRAY:  Psalm 28

The Bible Project VIDEO: Lamentations (Read Scripture Series)

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Sin's misery

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 4:1-22

TO CHEW ON: "Now their appearance is blacker than soot;

They go unrecognized in the streets;

Their skin clings to their bones

It has become as dry as wood." Lamentations 4:8

What a catalogue of catastrophe is Lamentations 4.
1. The temple is desecrated (Lamentations 4:1).
2. Leaders and the nobility are no longer privileged or respected (Lamentations 4:2, 5, 7-8, 16).
3. People abandon their responsibilities (Lamentations 4:3).
4. Even the mothers' natural instincts disappear (Lamentations 4:3-4, 10).
5. People long for a quick death (versus this slow death by starvation) (Lamentations 4:9).
6. The nation is humiliated (Lamentations 4:12-15).
7. God no longer seems to be on their side (Lamentations 4:11, 16).
8. They feel besieged and pursued by neighbour nations (Lamentations 4:18-20).

Jeremiah sees all this, not as something that happened by chance but as a direct consequence of the peoples' sins (Jeremiah 32:22-23).

Though we, in our time, hesitate to make such direct connections between sin and calamity, Bible writers made it repeatedly (Romans 1:28-32; 2:2). Without Jesus' intervention on our behalf we would all be destined to drink the full cup to its bitter end (Romans 3:10-18). We know too, that sin is deceptive in its attractiveness. Being aware of its end helps us avoid getting snared by it.

"There is a way that seems right to a man,
       but in the end it leads to death." NIV - Proverbs 14:12.

PRAYER: Dear God, please grow in me an abhorrence of sin. Help me not to be deceived or taken in by its apparent harmlessness. Amen.

MORE: Judge yourself

"Keep yourself steadily faced by the judgment seat of Christ; walk now in the light of the holiest you know. A wrong temper of mind about another soul will end in the spirit of the devil, no matter how saintly you are. One carnal judgment and the end of it is hell in you. Drag it to the light at once and say — 'My God, I have been guilty there.' If you don't, hardness will come all through. The penalty of sin is confirmation in sin. It is not only God who punishes for sin; sin confirms itself in the sinner and gives back full pay.


"No struggling nor praying will enable you to stop doing some things, and the penalty of sin is that gradually you get used to it and do not know that it is sin. No power save the incoming of the Holy Ghost can alter the inherent consequences of sin." Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, March 16th reading (emphasis added).

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Hope food

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 3:22-45

TO CHEW ON: "'The Lord is my portion,' says my soul, 'Therefore I hope in Him!'" Lamentations 3:24

Writer, singer Carolyn Arends told this story on a 2010 Christianity Today webinar on worship:

"On July 12th my dad passed away and I was very, very sad and still am. My husband and I speak together at family camps and we were right in the middle of speaking at this camp. We went home for a day to see my Mom and cry together, and then she said, "I really think you need to go back and finish speaking at that camp."


At first I thought, How am I ever going to do that? I'm too sad. But it turned out to be such a gift because each day of that camp for about three hours I had this opportunity to formally affirm all the things that I know to be true about God's character — about His goodness, about His trustworthiness, about His provision for us. That was such a gift to me in my grief. It didn't take it away, but it reminded me that we do not grieve as those who have no hope and that we never mourn alone." (Webinar no longer available online.)

Focusing on God seems to be what Jeremiah is telling the beleaguered citizens of Judah to do here. In a turnaround so abrupt it practically gives us whiplash, he goes from dwelling on his desperate state, to reminding himself—and his hearers—of a vital fact: We have God, therefore we have hope.

He calls God his portion, a word commonly used to describe one's set-aside amount of food. How do we take God as our portion?

I think of it as meditating on and claiming for myself that aspect of God that relates to my specific problem. For example, if I'm experiencing injustice, I recall God's ability to see any situation realistically and to mete out justice for me in it. If it's illness or physical injury, I review the stories of healing in the Bible and meditate on God's ability to restore health—that sort of thing.

Jeremiah goes on to give other reasons it makes sense to trust in God—more flavours of that portion if you will:

1. It's good to experience God's "yoke" or constraint when we're young (it's implied that such experience matures and makes men and women out of us) (Jeremiah 3:25-27).

2. Problems don't last forever. God's merciful nature will eventually cause Him to show compassion (Jeremiah 3:31-33).

3. Nothing can come into our lives without God's knowledge or permission (Jeremiah 3:37-38).

Whatever you or I are facing today, let's claim God as our hope. Let's recall who He is. Let's remember His faithfulness to us. Let's make Him our portion.

PRAYER: "Dear God, thank You that You are big enough for every one of my problems. Help me to understand this at a heart / life level. Amen.

MORE: Store up for hope before trouble strikes

It's a good idea to prepare ahead for times of trouble. One of the ways we can do this is by familiarizing ourselves with God and  His attributes and ways in the good times, before tragedy strikes. Knowing God by J. I. Packer is an excellent book to read in this regard.

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Disaster

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 3:1-21

TO CHEW ON: "I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of His wrath." Lamentations 3:1

What a depressing succession of woes pours from Jeremiah's pen here. As a stand-in for Judah, Jeremiah sees himself as:
- sick and injured (vs. 4).
- dead and buried (vs. 6).
- a prisoner (vs. 7).
- tortured (vs. 8).
- a traveler on an obstacle-strewn road (vs. 9).
- attacked by wild animals (vs. 10-11).
- a target of arrows (vs. 12-13).
- the butt of ridicule (vs. 14).
- forced to swallow a bitter drink (vs. 15).
- the object of physical abuse (vs. 16).

With this graphic list that touches on what may have been Jeremiah's worst nightmares, he is depicting how terrible is God's wrath. There is no way man can out-maneuver such ferociousness; man is no match for God.

As we read, we may say, or think, whew, I'm glad that's not me! Yet each one of us is a mere breath away from our lives changing in unspeakable ways. View photos of any disaster, natural and man-made (the 2010 landslide in China for example, the floods in Pakistan, the  2013 flood in Alberta, and recent scenes from Aleppo, Syria.) Note the signs of normal, everyday life buried in mud, floating in water, crushed, broken, dirty, useless. Then imagine yourself in that situation. Seems hopeless, doesn't it?

Thus it's interesting that from under this figurative pile of rubble we hear a positive note: "This I recall to mind, Therefore I have hope" (vs. 21).

What gives Jeremiah hope? We'll talk about that tomorrow.

PRAYER: Dear God, You are fierce and powerful. I can never outwit You. I acknowledge Your omnipotence in the world and in my life. Amen.

MORE: "How Long O Lord" by Brian Doerksen



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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Trashed sanctuaries

Re-purposed church building (Photo: V. Nesdoly)

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 2:1-22

TO CHEW ON: "He has done violence to His tabernacle,
As if it were a garden;
He has destroyed His place of assembly:
The Lord has caused the appointed feasts and Sabbaths
to be forgotten in Zion.
In His burning indignation He has spurned the king and the priest.
The Lord has spurned His altar.
He has bandoned His sanctuary;
He has given up the walls of her palaces
Into the hands of the enemy.
They have made a noise in the house of the LORD
As on the day of a set feast." Lamentations 2:6,7

Seeing buildings that were once obviously houses of worship used for secular purposes always gives me a twinge. I wonder what happened? Did the congregation move to a different building? Are the people that formerly worshiped there still in existence as a body? Or did they fight, split, lose interest, die off, disburse?

Perhaps my feelings for church buildings are inappropriate. For in our focus verses today, it would seem that God Himself condoned not just the re-purposing but the very desecration of the temple, its celebrations, indeed all things to do with the outward show of worshiping God.

Why did He do this? One of the reasons was probably to drive home the fact that there is something even more important than outward forms of worship. That thing is obedience - 1 Samuel 15:22.

This brings me to the question, do I take comfort from the fact that I'm okay because I'm adhering to the expected forms and rituals of my time? Do I, for example, feel bad when I miss my daily devotions because of guilt over not having done a required thing? Or do I feel bad because I miss the closeness of being with Jesus?

The symbolism of a desecrated church is not lost on its members. But such an act can never harm the real church which is people, in-dwelt and living under the direction of the Holy Spirit in community with each other. In fact, each one of us is God's sanctuary -  1 Corinthians 6:19,20

And so any place can be sacred. Any room in your home, your garden, or your car can become a holy place because God meets you there.

PRAYER: Dear God, please show me where I am trusting in religious forms as a way of pleasing and getting points with You. Help me to understand, at a heart level, the difference between ritual and obedience. Amen.

MORE: Your church and its building

Most churches have dedication services when they begin meeting in a new building or move into an existing venue. These dedication services may include prayers that bind all evil spirits or influences which formerly operated in the physical space and invite the Holy Spirit to have free reign there.

In one church I attended, when we moved out of our old building we held a decommissioning service to lift the blessing we had invoked when we moved in. Such services are often a time of thanksgiving, sharing memories, and a declaration to the church and the secular community that the physical site and building is no longer a place of worship.

 Is there a biblical precedent for decommissioning services (one doesn't come to my mind)? What are your thoughts and experiences?

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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When God hurts us

"How deserted lies the city"

by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld

from "Bibel in Bildern"1851-1860

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations1:1-22

TO CHEW ON: "Her adversaries have become the master, Her enemies prosper; For the Lord has afflicted her Because of the multitude of her transgressions. Her children have gone into captivity before the enemy." Lamentations 1:5


In the next several weeks we'll be reading through all of Lamentations. It is a sad book originally titled "Ekah," the first word of the book. Ekah means how or alas. Some also called it Qinot or "Lamentations" and that name has stayed with the book.

Many scholars attribute its authorship to Jeremiah. He wrote it against the backdrop of tragic events in Judah.

The kingdom was in moral decline. At a time when they were subjects to the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar, King Zedekiah rebelled and Nebuchadnezzar came against Jerusalem (2 Kings 24:20).

Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem and many people starved. When Nebuchadnezzar finally broke down the wall, Nebuchadnezzar and his soldiers escaped. But the Babylonian army destroyed most of Jerusalem, burned the temple, and carried all but the poorest into exile (2 Kings 25:8-12).

As I read Jeremiah's poem of raw grief for his beloved land, I am touched by the images of Judah as a destitute woman. But I am also struck by the words "For the Lord has afflicted her."

Isn't life with God supposed to be good — better than life without Him? It seems that God has chosen to hurt His own people. Why?

A paragraph from the book's introduction in my Bible gives us something to think about in this regard:

"The Juhadites had been able to think of themselves only as God's chosen race. As such they felt that they would always experience good things. God had made covenants of blessing with them, but these were conditional. Blatant disobedience would mean that the pleasurable aspects of blessing would be replaced by punishment. The fulfillment of the promises of blessing could always skip a few generations of disobedient Israelites" - Paul B. Watney, New Spirit Filled Life Bible, p. 1036.

"Conditional (covenants of blessing), "blatant disobedience," "punishment." Could some of the troubles God allows us to experience be related to these things as well?

It is easy to promise would-be converts that life will be smooth sailing if they accept Jesus. But God, in His knowledge of everything about us, does allow trouble in our lives too. Could it be that sometimes God, in effect, hurts us because we have been disobedient and strayed from Him. We can be sure, though, that even such seemingly hurtful treatment is a sign of His love (Proverbs 3:11,12).


PRAYER: Dear God, please help me to have a realistic knowledge and view of my relationship with You. Help me to learn the lessons I need to from the difficulties you allow into my life. Amen.

MORE: Lamentations as poetry

Lamentations is a collection of five poems The first four, including poem 1 (our reading today), are acrostics. These are poems in which each stanza begins with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet (see also Psalms 25, 34, 37, 119).

Why the form? Writing acrostics may have been seen as a literary challenge in Jeremiah's day. Poems with predictable starting letters would be easier to memorize. We may also see such poems, in their going from Aleph to Tau (A to Z),  that the poet is  "...working through every grief, hurt, and fear, and opening up completely to both man and God" (from the introduction to Lamentations by Paul B. Watney, New Spirit Filled Life Bible, p. 1037).

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Weeping intercession

Jeremiah weeping (Lamentations 2-4) - Artist unknown

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Lamentations 2:1-22

TO CHEW ON: "'Arise, cry out in the night,
At the beginning of the watches;
Pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord.
Lift your hands toward Him
For the life of your young children,
Who faint from hunger at the head of every street.'" Lamentations 2:18,19

In this chapter Jeremiah (most likely the writer of Lamentations) bears witness to the unthinkable. God Himself has destroyed Jerusalem. He has withdrawn His protection so that enemies have devoured her like a "flaming fire" (Lamentations 2:1-3). Her palaces are toppled, her strongholds destroyed. God has even abandoned the temple so that the noise from it on feast days is the voice of the enemy (Lamentations 2:4-8).

Leaders sit in mourning and the surprising thing is that Jeremiah is with them, at least in spirit. Hasn't he warned them to repent or this would happen? Now it has so shouldn't he be gloating? But that's not Jeremiah. Instead he weeps with the most distraught.

It seems his emotions are aroused especially by the children—the poor starving children:

"My eyes fail with tears
My heart is troubled ….
Because the children and the infants
Faint in the streets of the city.
They say to their mothers
'Where is grain and wine?'
As they swoon like the wounded
In the streets of the city…" - Lamentations 2:11,12.

I see two lessons for us from Jeremiah's reaction here:

1. The true intercessor identifies with those he or she prays for. She lets her heart get moved to tears as she prays for things that weigh on her spirit. As Leslyn Musch says in her commentary on verse 18: "Do not hold back your tears as you pray and intercede …. Do not hold back in pouring out your heart before the Lord" - Leslyn Musch, Truth-In-Action Through Lamentations, New Spirit-Filled Life Bible, p. 1049.

2. We too should be moved by the plight of our children. No, most of our kids aren't starving in the street (in fact the opposite, as many are overweight from too much junk food and inactivity). But they need our intercession like never before.

• Too many are victims of broken homes and confusing relationships as they experience the consequences of our unfaithfulness.

• Educators are mandating that the youngest be exposed to sexually confusing and explicit information (StopCorruptingChildren.ca website has links to proposed and implemented curricula).

• Technology has opened doors to evil for our kids like never before. Research indicates that the average age of a child accessing pornography is 12 ("MP Joy Smith urges Canada to follow British approach to blocking pornography"- July 2013 Catholic Register article).

• Too many youth are in despair to the point of committing suicide because of bullying spread via social medial.

What is our response? Do we stand back with a smug "I told you so" attitude? Or do we allow our hearts to be moved by the plight of our society—especially the children?


PRAYER: Dear God, please touch and burden my heart with the things that move Yours, especially the plight of our children. Amen. 

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New King James Version (NKJV) Used with permission. The Holy Bible, New King James Version Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.