Lamentations // #3 - “I am the man who has seen affliction”

I am the man who has seen affliction.

By the rod of the, of the Lord's Wrath.

He has driven me away and made me walk in darkness, rather than

light, indeed. He has turned his hand against

me again, and again, all day long.

He has made my skin and my flesh grow old in this broken, my

bones. He has besieged me and

surrounded me with bitterness and hardship.

He is made me dwell in darkness like those long dead.

He's warmed me in so I cannot Escape.

He has weighed me down with chains. even when I call out Cry

for Help, he shuts out my prayer, his Bard, my way with

blocks of stone and has made my past crooked Like a bear lying

in. Wait, like a like a lion in

hiding. He dragged me from the path and

mangled me and left me without help.

He drew his bow and made me the target for his arrows.

Who's my heart with arrows from his quiver?

I became a laughingstock of all my people, they mock me in song

all day long. He's filled me with bitter herbs

and giving me gold to drink. He's broken my teeth with gravel

and has trampled me in the dust. I have been deprived of Peace.

I've forgotten what Prosperity is so I say, My Splendor is gone

or I'd hoped for from the Lord. I remember my Affliction and my

wandering, the bitterness and the goal.

I will remember them. My soul is downcast within me.

This, I call to mind and therefore I have hope.

Because of the Lord's. Great love.

We are not consumed for his compassion's never fail.

They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.

I say to myself. The Lord is my portion.

Therefore, I will wait for him. The Lord is good to those whose

hope is in him. So the one who seeks him, it is

good to wait, quietly. For the Salvation of the Lord.

It is good for a man to Bear the Yoke while he is Young.

Let him sit alone in silence for the lord has laid it on him.

Let him bury his face in the dust and may yet be hope.

Let him offer his cheek to one who would strike him and let him

be filled with disgrace. For no one is cast off by the

Lord forever, though. He brings grief, he will show

compassion. So great is his unfailing love.

He does not willingly bring Affliction or grief to anyone to

crush Under Foot all the prisoners.

In the land, didn't either people their rights before the

most high to deprive them of justice but not the Lord's, see

such things. Who can speak and have it

happen. If the Lord is not degraded, it

is not from the mouth of the most.

Is it not from the mouth of the most high, the both calamities

and good things come? Why should the living complain

when punished for their sins? Let us examine our ways and test

them and let us return to the Lord.

They us lift up our hearts and our hands to God in heaven and

say we have sinned and rebelled and you have not forgiven.

You have covered yourself with anger and pursuit us.

You have slain, Without Pity. You have covered yourself with a

cloud student. No prayer can get through.

You have made us come and refuse among the nation's, all the

enemies have opened their mouths wide against his you've

suffered. We have suffered Terror and

pitfalls ruin, and destruction streams of Tears flow from my

eyes because of my people are destroyed, my eyes will flow and

see something without relief until the Lord looks down from

heaven and sees. What I see brings grief to my

soul because of all the women of my city.

Those who are my enemies without cause Hunted Me Like a Bird.

They try to end my life in a pit and first unto me the waters

close over my head. I thought I was about to perish.

I called, on your name, not from the depths of the pit.

You heard my play, close your eyes, your ears to My Cry for

Relief. You came near when I called you,

and you said do not fear. Helo took up my case.

You redeem my life? What do you have seen the wrong

done to me? Uphold.

My course, you seen the depth of the Vengeance, their plots

against me. Lord.

You seen the insult all their plots against me.

What my enemies Whispering muttering against me all day

long. Look at them sitting or standing

they mock me in their songs, hate them back for what they

deserve. Lord for, what their hands have

done. Put a veil over their hearts and

may your curse be on them. Pursue them in anger and Destroy

them from under the heavens of the Lord.

And this is the word of God. We have reached the Midway point

of this book of Lamentations, it's not a book for the

faint-hearted. And this is the third chapter of

five. And as Peter already said, we

actually come to the most famous and most quoted section of the

book here. Then we hear these words.

We don't often think they come from the book of Lamentations

Lamentations 3:22-23 for Say this because of the Lord's.

Lamentations 3:22–23

Great love. We are not consumed for his

compassion's. Never feel.

They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.

I say to myself, the Lord is my portion.

Therefore, I will wait for him. These are quite famous words.

Actually and Christians have written hymns.

About these words including the one we started with today.

Grit Is Thy Faithfulness, inspirational posters.

And art pieces of art have been produced with these verses on

them. And we imagine the setting for

these verses. We just look at them as they are

on the screen. There to be a time of real peace

and serenity. Maybe a beautiful summer's day

someone sitting by a stream under the shade of a tree.

A moment when everything is right with the world.

Everything is as it should be. That is when we imagine someone

would say words like this under cousin that we can assume he's

read that in in hard times. In dividend, we go well that all

sounds a bit trite. It's signs a bit simplistic, but

whoever wrote these words doesn't know much about the

harsh realities of life. And then we read these verses in

their original context. And the setting for these

statements couldn't be much more different than what we imagined

them to be. These are words spoken out of

the rubble of a devastated City, the rubble of a city destroyed

by War, whose inhabitants have been driven into Exile after

witnessing horrific scenes of suffering.

And as against the setting of the destruction of the city of

Jerusalem that the writer of lamentation says these things

about God. I just begs the question for us.

Hi. Can someone who lived through

the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BC ever dare to write these

words. How can someone who experienced

such brutality at the hands of the Babylonian Empire?

Say these things about God because of the Lord's.

Great love. We are not consumed.

His compassion's never feel. There are new every morning.

Great is your faithfulness. We might think yourselves.

Surely those words sound about Halo, don't they?

To this writer of Lamentations. But meaningless after all, we've

seen in the book so far about the suffering and sin of

Jerusalem at this point in its history.

The question is, what are these words are fear and hope and

prayer is doing in the middle of a book.

That is so dark and mournful as Lamentations.

Well, to begin to explore those questions to go.

Me to remind ourselves where we've got to in Lamentations so

far. What have we seen in this book

so far, I'd say we've seen a number of things the last few

weeks, but first of all, we've seen that Lamentations.

It's a memorial to the darkest moment.

In ancient Israel's history, a memorial to the destruction of

Jerusalem in that year 587 BC. So we read in the Bible that

after a Siege lasting three years, Jerusalem, also known as

Zion or the city of God was Conquered by the Babylonians,

the Temple of the Lord was destroyed.

That was the place where people met with God.

And most of the survivors were rounded up and carried off into

Exile, in Babylonia, the very poorest were left behind to work

the land. Is it a memorial so that God's

people do not forget this moment?

It's also a cry of pain. The Cry of pain from God's

suffering, sinful people. To bookmark by PN and grief,

shock and sorrow, anger, and questions.

As the writer records Frosty's cries of pain.

We've also seen that Lamentations, it's a picture of

God's devastating judgment on evil and sin.

And we've seen throughout this haven't we that this is not a

book about the suffering of the righteous or the innocent.

The Bible does speak about that for that we go to books like the

Book of Job in the Old Testament or the Psalms or the gospel

accounts of Jesus life and death.

No, this is a book about the suffering of the guilty.

And it's recorded for us by a loving God, for our Goods to act

as a warning sign for all of us that God's coming judgment is

real and we need to be ready for it.

Lamentations is a book of sorrowful, poetry full of pain,

full of anger, but we're going to see particularly in this

middle section full of Hope in the face of all that has

happened. So, what does this chapter

chapter 3? Add to the message of this book,

get you some things about structure.

Again, this is an acrostic poem which bases like a to zed and

Hebrew 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet.

So one section for each of the letters actually Lamentations

three slightly different it looks longer and our Bibles is

actually the same length in Hebrew, but there's like three

lines in each one that begin with the same letter.

So, it's a a,b BB CC. It's a really intense acrostic

structure here. It's like he's done these first

two. Chapters that he really goes to

time in chapter 3 on this structure.

And I'm going to say it's the Centerpoint of Lamentations that

also means it's like the heart or the summit of the book.

So, when Hebrew poetry, the middle point is often the bit

that is really Central. Doesn't build to the finale.

It kind of builds to the middle point, and it's in this chapter,

we hear the most words of Hope in the book.

I mean to be clear, this isn't the end of the book, we're not

out of the woods yet. We still got chapters 4 and 5 to

come still more descriptions of pain and suffering and

questions. And even as more credit to us,

we noticed that from that middle section.

Still comes with real raw suffering NS.

But there is something new going on.

In this chapter that affects the way.

We read the whole of the book. There's more I want to say that

Lamentations 3. It shows us that lament in the

Bible is not simply God's people expressing their Pian as

necessary as that is. Lament is also a way for God's

people to come back to God. As we recall who God is even in

the darkest of times, that is what the writer is doing in

chapter 3. In a sense, he's reconnecting

with God. He speaking to God out of

experience of suffering and sin, and, and by doing that, it's an

Act of Faith. He is daring to hope that God is

still good. That God is still near that.

God is not finished with his people yet, and he's not

finished with our world yet. Lamentations is about facing up

to the harsh realities that we live in a suffering World broken

by sin and we ourselves are a huge part of the problem, we

ourselves are sinners as well as sufferers but even as we face up

to that lament lift our eyes to the God, he is our only hope in

the face of suffering and in the face of sin, So let's look at

this. Middle section of limitations

together night. And the guide our way through, I

want to see asking a question throughout really, which is who

do we think is the speaker of this poem?

Who is able to speak these words to God's suffering sinful

people. And why should God's people

listen to? Why is this someone God's people

need to? Listen to his Lamentations

research, begins with a slight change in the speaker, but the

end of chapter 2. We've been listening to

daughter, Zion this to personification of Jerusalem as

a woman. She's she's been crying out but

not as she falls silent. She's almost worn out in her

despair. At the end of chapter 2, she

doesn't speak again in the rest of the book.

So suddenly God's suffering, sinful people, they need a new

spokesperson. The question is, who is

qualified and able to speak into the pin on Grief of this

suffering and sinful people who can speak for them as their

representative and who can speak to them as someone with words of

Hope. And the answer comes in verse 1.

But this speaker who describes himself, introduces himself, I

am the man who has seen Affliction by the rod of the

Lord's Wrath. Now, he's not named anywhere in

the book, so we don't know exactly who this man is.

He could be the Prophet Jeremiah who traditionally Associated as

as the author of this book or someone else who was there?

When Jerusalem fell, he could be like a job like figure crying I

in his suffering but actually think it's significant that he

isn't named because then forced to do some work that we listen

to him. Who is this man?

And is he worth listening to? And the first thing we learn

about this speaker, if he's a man who has suffered, As God's

people have suffered its first as 1218.

His suffered as God's people have suffered, let me read

verses 1 to 3 for us. I'm the man who's seen

Affliction by the rod of the Lord's wrath.

He has driven me away and made me walk in darkness, rather than

light. Indeed.

He has turned his hand against me again, and again, all day

long. Speaker, he is a fellow sufferer

with God's people, he's someone who's also experience the wrath

of God against sin. He's been struck by the rod of

the Lord's wrath. First one, That word for Rod is

the Hebrew word said that and it's the same word actually used

in that famous. Sam, Sam 23.

If you know the Lord is my shepherd and back in Psalm 23

The the fact that the Lord has a rod is really good news, David's

rights and that some even though I walk through the darkest

Valley, Your Rod and your staff they comfort me.

Davis, says actually cuz you've got a rod.

Lord, You're Going to protect me from my enemies.

And Lamentations. God uses his Rod to strike this

man. This is like an Auntie Psalm 23.

It's like he's a Shepherd punishing.

His sheep. You look forward to verse 10 to

12 instead of protecting them from bears and lions.

The Lord is like a bear or a lion attacking them instead of

using his bow to protect his sheep.

He's making them a target for his arrows.

It's really uncomfortable. Disturbing picture here.

And he goes on. Look at the references to

Darkness and these opening verses verse 2, he's driven

driven me away. Made me walk in darkness, rather

than light verse 6. He has made me dwell in darkness

like those long-dead darkness in the Bible.

It's a sign of God's anger against sin.

For example, see the plague of Darkness on the land of Egypt

and the Book of Exodus, it's a sign of being cut off and

separated from the God, who is light.

And then to add to the speaker talks about being under siege

from God, verse 5, he has besieged me and surrounded me

with bitterness and hardship, 47, he's walled me in so that I

cannot Escape verse 9. He's barred my way with blocks

of stone Basics, because if there is no escape from this,

God no escape from this punishment.

Verses 1318 make it clear, demand?

Speaking in this chapter, he has suffered like, the people of

Jerusalem. He's experience.

The wrath of God against his people's sin.

He is a fellow. Sufferer like them.

He's not speaking about suffering with.

That's an interesting idea. No, he doesn't stand aloof from

it. He says I have experienced this

I am a sufferer like you you can listen to me.

That's how the man introduces himself to us.

But the second thing we learned about this man, is the thing

that makes this chapter so different.

It's the ones that have gone before because the middle

section of this poem, we learned that this is a man who clings to

the God, who keeps his promises, he clings to the Lord, the god

of the Covenant. So versus one day at Team,

descends into deeper and deeper Darkness, as they go on to reach

their low point in verse 18. So I say my Splendor is gone.

He says and all that I had hoped for from the Lord.

But it's at this point where God seems most far-off and opposed

to the man that God suddenly becomes the main topic of the

poem. In the original Hebrew.

This is the first time, the name of the Lord is mentioned.

In chapter 3. The Lord that is Yahweh, the god

of the Covenant. With Abraham with Moses with

David, the god of relationship with his people, the God, who

saves his people from their sin, And it's almost at the mention

of his name, the Lord in verse 18.

Actually, the speaker begins to make his way back to him.

It's a turning point in the chapter, we shift from

descriptions of his suffering. To remind himself of the truth

of who the Lord really is. He starts clinging so the God

who keeps his promises. Now if you were here last week,

Dan, let us three chapter 2 and you'll remember actually hide

that idea. That God is the god, he keeps

his promises that actually haunted the people of Jerusalem.

Because with the destruction of Jerusalem, that's what God was

doing. He was keeping his promises.

He had worn them again and again, over centuries that if

they didn't put him first, didn't trust in him one day, he

would punish them for their sin and they didn't listen and

eventually he has done it. Your 587 BC God, kept his

promise. It's a haunting Truth for the

man. But in chapter 3, we get the

flip side of that truth. The good news of who, the Lord

is the god, who punishes evil and sin is the same God who

promises his people back. In Jitter on me. 31, never, will

I leave, you never will I forsake, you And so the speaker

here begins to take hold of truths about God which he knows

our true in spite of all the suffering and the Judgment he

sees around him. Verse 21.

Look at that for a second. He was yet this, I call to mind

and therefore I have hope. Now, the original Hebrew is

stronger than English. The monster it says this, I

caused to return to my heart. It's like he grabs hold of these

truths about God in the midst of his suffering.

He's grabbing them desperately The New Living Translation

transistor like this. He says, yet I still dare to

hope when I remember this. And that's what the man is

doing. He is daring to Hope in the love

and goodness of God. Even at this dark moment in

Israel's history. And at that point we come to the

famous verses we began with today and we learned these

truths aren't trite or shallow or blind to the harsh realities

of Life know, their tricks that God's people can cling to even

in the rubble. Even in the rubble of everything

having gone. Verse 22.

Because of the Lord's. Great love.

We are not consumed for his compassion's never fail.

They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.

Well, difference to these truths, make to God's suffering,

sinful people. Well, if the Lord really is the

Lord, if he is Yahweh, the god of relationship that God.

He Delights to save his people then maybe just maybe God of

Greece. Isn't finished with them yet.

May be in the midst of the Judgment that this man has a

actually. Maybe there's more to come.

Maybe this isn't the end of the story.

Look at verse 22 because of the Lord's.

Great love. We are not consumed.

He said, in spite of the Judgment that we've experienced

actually were still here. We haven't been consumed by

God's judgment in Jerusalem isn't final.

Maybe he still has purposes for us.

Maybe there is a way back to him.

As the called, as man is making in the middle of this chapter.

I'm just in passing history, proved the speaker right here.

Even though we see that the destruction of Jerusalem is a

picture of God's final judgment. It wasn't God's final judgment.

70 years later, a large number of the Exile has returned.

Jerusalem was rebuilt, the temple was rebuilt.

God's people return to the land, ready for the coming of Jesus a

few centuries later. Actually, the man is reminding

himself of God's character in the midst of the rubble and more

than that. He starts speaking to God.

You, look at that in verse 23. He says your compassion's.

Your mercies are new every morning and then suddenly he

addresses God directly for the first time.

Great is your faithfulness. He says, He's not just talking

about God, he starts talking to God.

And that's a necessary step for God's people to make as we

lament over our suffering, and our sin.

It's not enough to talk about God.

All your God is like this. He's like that.

It's not like to think truths about God, we need to talk to

him. That's what the man does, he

agree? It is, you're fearful as he

turns it into a prayer. Remember chance your friend a

few years ago. But another friend who'd given

up being a Christian, he'd given up following Jesus, and never

forget how my friend described him, he was a really bright guy,

this guy. And he said, I just think in the

end, he loved ideas about God more than he loved God.

He was very happy talking about God.

He was never lie talking to him, he's never really loving him.

The man who writes Lamentations to recess.

Come on, grit is your favorite. We're going to talk to this God

of compassion and mercy. We're going to say thank you.

We're going to say sorry. We're going to say please to

him. And it's not enough to talk

about God and a third person are we are we willing to Humble

ourselves and cry out to him? Great is your faithfulness,

you're our only hope cling to you.

Verse 24. I say to myself, the Lord is my

portion. Therefore I will wit for him.

With me to wait on the Lord. He's to place your hope in him

and him alone. Again a man could have said that

the Lord is my portion. Therefore let's get rebuilding.

Let's let's Shore up our defenses.

The problems might be back, but sitting in the rubble of

Jerusalem he says actually I'm powerless to fix this.

I'm powerless to see if myself or God's people and so he puts

his hope in the Lord, he asked God to be at work, he admits

openly, he cannot save himself, and therefore, he puts his hope

in the Lord And that's a big part of lament in the Bible.

It's acknowledging. We need God, we can't do

ourselves. We've got beyond the point where

able to fix things ourselves. So we cry out to God, help us

Lord, we wit for him. And the hope this man has is

remarkable because you think about verses 1318.

You think about chapters 1 and 2.

How can the Speaker of confidence that God's purposes

for as people are good when God actually has punished his

people? So severely Bronze that we come

to the middle section of the Pullman middle section of the

whole book, verses 31 to 33, an amazing statement of faith about

God. He says for no one is cast off

by the Lord forever, though. He brings grief, he will show

compassion. So great is his unfailing love

for doesn't willingly bring Affliction or grief to anyone.

An astonishing for a book that deals so much with God's

judgment against human evil and sin Lamentations.

Also adamant that God gets no pleasure from judging evil and

sin punishing human beings is something God does reluctantly.

And after numerous warnings judgment is not the way God

wants to relate to humanity. And that the speaker, he clings

on to the character of God, to his unfailing commitment, to

keep his promises and to love his people, He cries out to all

of us got he is a god of unfailing love.

He is always good and all the suffering we experience in this

world has limits and there is a purpose behind it.

Not. Now remember the speaker doesn't

claim to know exactly what that purpose is at this point.

But he does choose to wait for the Lord and to trust him in the

midst of the rubble. He does that.

He then wants to lead the people in Repentance and Faith, finally

versus 4266. again, we've seen as she wanted, most challenging

B of this book is, It describes the suffering of the guilty, not

the suffering of the innocent of God's people, rightly being

punished for their sin, the destruction of Jerusalem in 587

BC. It was it was not unjust.

Actually at the heart of this as well, this book has so much to

tell us about repentance and Faith, but what it means to

acknowledge our sin, to turn away from, and to turn to God

for his forgiveness. And his restoration, this is a

book all about, or the New Testament calls Godly sorrow.

That's a term. We get in 2 Corinthians, 7.

He had to 10. This is the Apostle Paul writing

to the Christians. In Corinth, he's writing about a

letter, he wrote to him that really convicted them of their

sin, that showed them what was wrong in their lives.

He says, even if I cause you Sorrow by a letter, I do not

regret it. Because your sorrow LED you to

repentance you became sorrowful as God intended.

And so we're not harmed in any way by us, Godly sorrow, brings

repentance, that leads to Salvation and leaves, no regret.

Worldly sorrow brings death. And we might read Lamentations

and I just think it's just so grin.

It's just so dark and mournful. It's just what point, what

purpose is there here. But the purpose for the speaker

here is Let Us return to the Lord.

Verse 40. Let us examine our ways and test

them, and let us return to the Lord.

Let us lift up our hearts and our hands to God and Heaven and

say we have sinned on rebelled. Actually what the writer is

trying to show us, his repentance is a gift from God.

I said a little while ago maybe that I've always struggled.

Repentance always feel so grim and so depressing.

Why would I want to think about my sin?

I just want to move on and forget about it.

But I see repentance is all about telling the truth about

ourselves. Not hiding anymore.

It's about taking the wit, off our shoulders on, just dropping

it at the foot of the cross. It's about letting go of that

hot cool of our guilt, just dropping it saying, Lord, please

take it. Please forgive me.

Please wash me clean. That's what the writer here is

urging God's people to do and it was his corporate repent.

This is we us I can so easily repentance very much, an

individual thing, the leases kind of introspection and

despair odds messed up again and we just turn more and more into

our cells. But actual repentance is some,

we can do together as Christians in a little minute.

We're gonna be taking the Lord's Supper Bread and Wine part of

what we do with that. Is we examine ourselves.

We say, sorry for our sin. We say thank you to Jesus for

his death and Resurrection are place.

It's a corporate thing. Depends is just something so

guilty, you do on your own, we do it together as God's people.

so, back to this chapters, we finish again, I think we heard

when Mark read it. I'd love to say that after this

middle section, the book. Everything looks up. but we saw

actually the paean of the Exile is still raw and the speaker and

the people he speaks to you are still hurting Verse 40 years, he

says streams of Tears flow from my eyes because my people are

destroyed. There's no a new to Victory or

peaceful restoration for God's people here.

They're still hurting on the speaker weeps with them. there's

a longing for God, to judge his enemies, rid the world of sin

and suffering once and for all I didn't that Lamentations 3 is

looking Beyond itself. It's looking Beyond itself for

hope. Because I hope isn't here and I

it's in the future. Lamentations 3 alongside the

rest of the book. For to find answers to its

questions. It needs more.

Because there's a tension at a wrestle at the heart of this

book. And it's between two truths

about God. He's a God of Justice, who must

punish human sin and Evil? And he's a god of unfeeling love

who promises to save a people for himself and hugging that

tension ever be revealed. Lamentations doesn't give us an

answer. For that.

We need, Jesus. We need to be prepared for Jesus

to enter the scene for Jesus to speak to us.

We began our time asking, who is the man speaking in Lamentations

3. Learned a lot about and he's a

man who suffered like them. Like God's people, a man who

clings to the God, he keeps his promises.

A man who leads the people in Repentance and faith.

I want to suggest is more. This is one of those bits in the

Old Testament. That is pointing us.

So powerfully to Jesus. The man who suffered like us

money, clings to the God, who keeps his promises in the midst

of his suffering and the money leads us in Repentance and

faith. In the Risen Jesus, speaking to

his disciples at the end of Luke's gospel, we hear, I'm

beginning with Moses and all the prophets.

Jesus explained to them what was said and all the scriptures

concerning himself. The every part of the Bible,

whether old or New Testament is written to lead us ultimately to

Jesus as the lit. Tim Keller used to say the

Bible's not about you, it's about Jesus and I want to

suggest we finish this morning that Jesus is the true and

better speaker of Lamentations 3, the one who alone can speak

words of Hope to suffering sinful people like those in

Jerusalem. Unlike us today Can we read that

this chapter again, with with Jesus as your focus and it just

resonates so much? Jesus has suffered like us just

think of how the Bible describes him.

A Man of Sorrows familiar with suffering, the book of Hebrews

because he himself suffered when he was tempted, what he's able

to help those who are being tempted.

Think if I jesus connect with the detail of Lamentations 3,

like the speaker, he took the full force of the rod of the

Lord's wrath for us and for our sin.

He dwelt in darkness went on the cross.

It was three hours of darkness in the hottest time of the day.

Like the speaker, here, streams of Tears flowed from Jesus eyes.

As he wept for his people. As he wept over the city of

Jerusalem. As he wept at the tomb of

Lazarus as he weeps. As he sees the damage that sin

and death has done, One to his world.

He is a man who suffered like us and therefore is able to speak

into our experiences of suffering.

He's a man who took that the full penalty for sin on himself.

Therefore, we can bring our sin to him and know that he is the

part of forgive us. Jesus, clung.

So the God who keeps his promises.

He trusted his father in the darkest of times, if ceremony,

not my will, but yours be done. Lord, on the cross.

My God. My God, why have you forsaken

me? And then father into your hands.

I commit my spirit. Jesus clung to the father in

suffering and he urges us to do the same.

And now risen from the dead Ascend into heaven, as our great

high priest, he leads us in Repentance and Faith.

He prays for us, he intercedes for us, he meets with us in our

weakness and he forgives us our sin.

When we take the Lord's supper and a few moments, we're

remembering Jesus victory over our sin.

That he's taken the full force of our punishment on himself.

I remember Jesus presence with us in a suffering world, as we

wait for him to return. none of us walked through this

suffering, sinful world alone, because of Jesus So, how do we

apply lamentation 3, what do we make of?

It was our takeaway from it. I'm very simply it's this, that

Jesus is the one who can speak into our suffering, our sin.

So let's listen to him. Listen to his words in

scripture, and then let's go to him from mercy and Grace, to

help us in our suffering, and our sin.

He knows what it's like to suffer to grieve in this world,

so go to him. We do have to hide our sin from

him because he's paid the price for it.

He's been struck by the rod of God's Wrath.

That's we remember when we took Bread and Wine.

Why did Jesus die? She was taking the punishment we

deserve on himself. So we don't have to