"Fresh Hope for Afflicted Souls" Lamentations 3:1-66 | Sunday, January 4, 2025

And I'll invite you to turn your Bibles

to Lamentations

Lamentations 3 · chapter mention

chapter 3. You can remain standing as we

read our text together. Lamentations

Lamentations 3 · chapter mention

chapter 3. If you're not sure where

Lamamentations is at, you'll find it

after the big book of Jeremiah and the

Old Testament prophets. But if you'd

like an easier path there, you could use

one of the Bibles in the chairs and find

it on page 674

if that helps you. Lamentations is not a

book that we often journey to and yet it

is one of the books that's needful for

believers.

The word lament

is a biblical genre

that expresses the depths of your

affliction

while also looking to the Lord, bringing

it to him, finding restored joy, hope,

and faith in him. It invites afflicted

people who identify with the writings of

the lament

to turn in faith to God, to trust in him

and cling to him.

Today is what we call fresh start

Sunday. First Sunday of the new year.

Every year we take some time to just

recognize and emphasize we're moving

into a new year.

And what we need is a fresh start. What

we need is fresh hope. Some of you 2025

was awesome. Some of you 2025 was not so

awesome.

But what I hope to show you today from

God's word is that regardless,

there is one place we must turn to find

the fresh hope that we're looking for.

And so the title of our message on this

fresh start Sunday is fresh hope for

afflicted souls. We're going to cover

the entire chapter of Lamentations 3,

but for now, I want to read the middle

portion, which will really give us the

heart of what this text is about, and

then we'll read through its parts in the

course of the message. Let's begin our

reading in verse 18. I want you to just

ask yourself, have you ever identified

with this thought? Verse 18,

Lamentations 3.

And I said, "My strength and my hope is

perished from the Lord. It's gone.

Remembering mine affliction and my

misery, the wormwood and the gall,

my soul hath them still in remembrance

and is humbled in me."

This I recall to my mind.

Therefore, I have hope. It is of the

Lord's mercies

that we are not consumed,

because his compassions fail not. They

are new every morning. Great is thy

faithfulness.

The Lord is my portion, saith my soul,

therefore will I hope in him.

The Lord is good unto them that wait for

him. The to the soul that seeketh him.

It is good that a man should both hope

and quietly wait for the salvation of

the Lord. Fresh hope for afflicted

souls. Let's pray. Our heavenly father,

we ask for your understanding from your

word today.

I pray it would speak deeply to our

hearts

that it would help us to identify

with the afflictions and sufferings

of our daily life.

That it would also renew and restore

hope to our souls as we enter into a new

year. We are trusting you to speak

plainly and clearly to us. And I pray

that your spirit would give us the heart

to understand and obey. I pray for the

lost that they might find their hope in

the salvation of Jesus Christ. In his

wonderful name I pray. Amen. Thank you

for standing in honor of God's word. You

may be seated.

>> [clears throat]

>> Many times a new year offers fresh hope.

It could be a hope for a financial

recovery.

Right now gas is down. Praise God.

Interest rates are falling. Inflation is

dropping, which is a blessing. It might

be that this year you hope for far less

car trouble than you had over the last

year. It might be that you are hoping

for a bigger pay raise this year or

perhaps for more work for your business.

You're hoping that this year offers a

better economic outlook.

It may be that you came under conviction

this year about taking better care of

your body. It may be that you feel over

the last year that you kind of let go

and you feel it and you see it. And

there are times when you might get a gym

membership because it's a new year and

you long for a new you. On New Year's

Day, instead of getting your traditional

McGriddle, you got a smoothie or

something at least a little bit

healthier.

That's often what we do in a new year.

A new year is a chance to start fresh in

your Bible reading. You may have not

made it very far last year. We've got

our Bible reading plans that you can

start at any time out there at the

welcome table. The key is that you just

read the Bible, but you may feel

somewhat defeated because you only made

it to March or April uh reading your

Bible and then you just kind of gave up.

And this year you long for a better

relationship with God, a better prayer

life, to be more committed to church.

There just some spiritual commitments

that a new year offers hope for.

For some of you, 2025 was very hard. You

went through some struggles you never

experienced before.

Perhaps it was a year of loss for you.

This year, mom and dad are gone.

Your fiance, your baby, a dear friend.

[snorts] You experience more death this

year than you ever have before in your

life.

2025 will always be marked in your mind

is the year that that

happened. [snorts]

Perhaps you were hurt by someone that

you opened your home to

or maybe family turned on you. [snorts]

2025 may have been a year of personal

struggle for you spiritually.

And maybe the anger, bitterness, or lust

got the best of you. That it was a year

where alcohol and drugs stunted your

spiritual growth, wrecked your life, or

perhaps the life of a family member you

love.

[snorts]

It was a year that reminded you that

you're fallen.

Today you're here on the first Sunday of

the year hoping to start fresh, hoping

to get off on the right foot with God,

hoping that you can become a new person

this year. Maybe you're here and you're

just wanting to connect with God. That

maybe events transpired over the last

year that have drawn your attention to

the Lord and there's there there's

something that you're looking for and

you just wonder if you'll give God a

try. Maybe that's what you're looking

for. That could be why you're here

today.

>> [snorts]

>> You faced your fair share of affliction

this year and what you need is fresh

hope.

But let me tell you believers, let me

tell you friends

that to experience the fresh hope that

your heart is longing for, it requires

something better and something greater

than the flip of a calendar page.

And that hope that you need to look for

is what Jeremiah seeks to provide here

in Lamentations 3.

The context of the book of Lamentations

is around the destruction of Jerusalem.

Babylon had besieged Jerusalem for three

years, starving the people out from food

and water.

When they finally broke through and

Israel surrendered, they slaughtered the

men, women, and children of the city. It

was brutal. They burned the temple, the

walls, and the whole city of Jerusalem

to the ground. It was left in ruins.

They killed thousands.

Others were carried away into captivity,

and some were left to rot in the ruins

of the city. Among those left behind was

the prophet Jeremiah.

Jeremiah was a good and faithful

prophet. And yet he found himself caught

up in the affliction that was brought

upon Jerusalem because of the sins of

unfaithful people,

the sins of the godless.

He was an eyewitness to it all. And if

you study what Jerusalem went through at

that time, it would cause you to cringe,

your stomach to churn.

Yet

their affliction came directly from God.

Israel rebelled against him.

They worshiped idols. They slaughtered

the innocent. Their leaders were

corrupt. And they had long forsaken the

temple and the covenants of their

redeemer.

In his mercy,

God sent prophet after prophet to them

to call them to repent and be pardoned.

That if they would simply acknowledge

they had sinned against God and turn

their hearts back to him, God would

pardon them and he would remove judgment

from coming to them. And yet they would

not hear.

Now they are left in the ruins facing

the terrible fallout [snorts]

of their sin.

Jer Jeremiah wrote Lamentations to

describe the depth of their affliction

in a way that would direct the hopeless

back to the one place where their hope

could be renewed, where everything could

change, where they could see light at

the end of the tunnel in their lives.

In this third lament of chapter 3,

if you look at verse one, Jeremiah

begins saying, "I am the man that hath

seen

affliction."

[snorts]

He had seen it. And in this lamentation,

he first expresses how affliction

completely removed his hope.

But then he goes to show what it was

that renewed his hope. And finally, he

invites the readers, which includes us

today, to partake with him in this

renewed hope. And as we study this text,

we learn how your afflicted soul can

find fresh hope

for this coming year.

But before we can get to hope, we must

begin, as Jeremiah does, with

affliction.

And we all know this to be true.

Affliction

can remove your hope.

[snorts] Jeremiah in the first 18 verses

retells how his experience of affliction

left him feeling hopeless.

The number one reason why he felt

hopeless was because his affliction came

directly from the hand of God. Look at

verse one. He says, "I am the man that

hath seen affliction by the rod of his

wrath."

The rod of his wrath.

He knew that it was God who sent Babylon

to destroy Jerusalem to carry many away

captive for 70 years because of their

sin against God.

But Jeremiah himself

was a faithful prophet.

While he recognizes that he too is a

sinner, Jeremiah was a prophet who was

faithful to God in Israel's worst

moments of apostasy.

He had been imprisoned, left in a

dungeon, and was constantly under threat

because he faithfully proclaimed God's

word. He told Israel they were in sin,

but if they would repent, God would be

merciful. He told them in Jeremiah 29

that they would find God if they sought

him with all their heart. But he was

rejected all his ministry. He suffered

all his ministry.

And now Jeremiah finds himself afflicted

in the ruins of Jerusalem, not for his

own sins, but for the sins of his

people.

[snorts]

In verse two,

Jeremiah says, "He hath led me." You

know what that means?

God's leading him by the hand.

That means that Jeremiah is following

God and he is faithfully following God.

And yet as he is faithfully following

God, he says, "He hath led me and

brought me into darkness and not into

light." It says in verse three, "Surely

against me his hand is he turned. He

turneth his hand against me all the

day." Hey, let me ask you. Have you ever

asked yourself, "Here I am following God

as best as I can, and yet he's turned

against me."

That's how Jeremiah feels.

[snorts]

Why does he feel that way? He goes on to

elaborate

his feelings in this affliction. And

you'll notice that the subject of every

single statement is God.

That this was God's doing. The first

thing that he says is that the Lord's

affliction left him feeling trapped. God

trapped me in. Look at verse four.

First, he speaks to his aged condition.

My flesh and my skin hath he made old.

He hath broken my bones. He hath built

it against me. The ideas building up

walls and compassed me or surrounded me

with gaul with bitterness and travail

groaning in my soul. Verse six says, "He

hath set me in dark places as they that

be dead of old." Do you get what he's

saying? I feel like a rotted corpse

lying in a grave. It's very descriptive.

It says in verse 7, he hath hedged me

about

that I cannot get out.

He hath made my chain heavy.

Also when I cry and shout, he shutth out

my prayers. He hath enclosed my ways

with hune stone. He hath made my paths

crooked. Do do you hear his voice? I

feel trapped.

And the one who has trapped me is God.

There's no way out.

Not even my prayers make it to the

ceiling of his enclosure.

Then he says this,

I feel haunted

by God.

Verse number 10. He was unto me as a

bear lying in weight and as a lion in

secret places. He hath turned aside my

ways and pulled me in pieces. He hath

made me desolate. He says this

affliction that God has brought into my

life, it's like he was a bear or a lion

hiding out just waiting to pounce. And

when he did, he pulled me apart.

Verse 12.

He [snorts] have bent his bow and set me

as a mark for the arrow.

God put a target on my back.

And the one pulling the string back is

God himself.

Do you hear the desperation of his cry?

Church,

God has turned on me. God has trapped me

in. God has hunted me down. And now God

has left me bitter. It says in verse 13,

he hath caused the arrows of his quiver

to enter into my reigns. The idea is

when he released that arrow, it shot me

right in the heart and it injected me

with something.

It says in verse 14, I was a derision to

all my people and their song all the

day. They wrote songs of mockery about

me because I trusted in you and now you

have turned on me.

What was on the tip of that arrow? Verse

15. He hath filled me with bitterness.

He hath made me drunken with wormwood.

Wormwood is the most bitter substance

they could possibly drink.

God has brought deep bitterness

into my life.

Therefore,

because God has turned against me,

because he has trapped me in, because he

has hunted me down, because he has shot

me with the poison of bitterness, I feel

hopeless.

Verse 16,

he hath also broken my teeth with gravel

stones.

He's made me chew on gravel and it

shattered my teeth. He's covered me with

ashes.

And now he turns his attention to God.

He says, "And thou hast removed my soul

far off from peace. I can't find it. I'm

so far away from it. I forget

prosperity.

My bitterness, my pain, my affliction is

so deep I can't even remember what it

was like to be prosperous.

Verse 18.

And I said, "My strength and my hope is

perished from the Lord

because of my affliction. Because of the

way God has turned against me, because

the way his hand is against me all day,

because of the way he's built up these

walls and given me no way escape, the

way that he doesn't hear my prayers

anymore, the way that he has hunted me

down and left me bitter. It's made me

instead of crying out in the Psalms,

"The Lord is my strength and my song."

That my strength is gone and my hope is

perished.

Here's really what it gets at.

[snorts]

I've lived under the expectation

all my life that God would protect me,

save me, and deliver me. But now he has

turned against me. And if I can't find

hope in him, then where is hope to be

found?

That's how he feels.

Sometimes affliction can leave you

feeling hopeless.

[snorts]

Probably the first reason for you is the

same reason for Jeremiah.

You know, your affliction ultimately

comes from God.

It could be that the affliction that you

have faced has been the fallout from

personal sin as it was for Israel.

It was the result of your time away from

the Lord when you wandered astray. When

you swed your wild oats, when you went

through your rebellious stage of life,

friends and family tried to warn you.

Your pastor, your youth pastor tried to

counsel you. The Holy Spirit was deeply

convicting you, but perhaps you ignored

them all.

Now the guilt is killing you. [snorts]

The consequences have come to a head.

And as you face the consequences for

your past sin and rebellion, you ask,

"How could I look to the Lord now?

How could he forgive me for what I've

done?"

Or if you're not careful,

[snorts]

you can forget that what you're going

through is because of your sin.

You can blame God for the decision that

you made

and you can begin to complain like

Jeremiah was. Where is God now? Why is

this still going on? And therefore you

say along with him, my strength and my

hope is perished from the Lord because

he is the one afflicting me.

>> [snorts]

>> It could be that your affliction has

been allowed not because of your sin,

but because of the permissible will of

God.

See, pain, suffering, and death are part

of the curse of sin. It's the fallout of

living in a sinful world. And so, in

some measure, all of us will face

suffering and affliction.

Whether it is the death of someone you

love or if it be a stock market crash or

a cancer diagnosis or inflation or a

housing crisis,

they are all the results of living in a

fallen world. And you may have been like

Jeremiah. You may have been absolutely

faithful to God and yet the bottom falls

out of everything. And you're left

wondering, where is God in all of this?

My hope was in him and yet it's like

he's turned against me. It's like he's

trapped me in. There's no way out of

this crisis. There's no way out of this

health problem. There's no way out of

this this enclosed wall. My prayers

don't seem to be getting past the

ceiling. Sometimes it can be simply

because God has allowed something in his

sovereignty to pass into your life that

is no fault of your own. It can leave

you hopeless.

Sometimes your affliction can be the

result of the sins of someone else.

Someone may have abused you,

abandoned you, or divorced you.

A person in a position of trust may have

assaulted you. And that's terrible. And

the very mention of it brings back very

painful wounds.

The question that we often ask in this

moment is why did God let this happen to

me?

Like Jeremiah, you feel like God has

trapped you in? Like God is hunting you

down. Like God has made you bitter. Like

he has turned his hand against you. And

when God has brought or allowed

suffering into your life, the affliction

can leave you feeling hopeless, just

like Jeremiah.

And it's in that moment, friend, you go

one of two ways.

You will either turn to the Lord or you

will turn away from the Lord. Whether

it's the consequences of your sin or if

it's because God permitted something in

your life or it's because somebody else

sinned against you. In that moment of

hopelessness, when you feel like God is

against you, you're going to either turn

back to him or turn away from him.

Which way will Jeremiah go in his moment

of affliction?

Well, although Jeremiah felt hopeless,

he came to realize he was not hopeless.

There was one thing that gave him hope.

And what restored his hope is the same

thing that can restore your hope. When

you are in that deepest, darkest moment

when as a lifelong faithful Christian,

the circumstances have so come to a head

where you have the thoughts in the back

of your mind of what it would look like

to walk away.

What's that hope?

While affliction

removes hope, it is the Lord's mercy

that renews hope.

What Jeremiah does here is he recalls

something to mind that renewed his hope.

If you look at verse 19,

he recaps everything he just said.

remembering, calling to mind mine

affliction and my misery, the wormwood

and the gall. My soul hath them still in

remembrance and is humbled in me. Do you

catch what he's saying? My affliction

brought me low,

but there's something that brought me

up. In verse 21, he says, "This I recall

to my mind, and therefore I have hope."

Verse 22, "It is of the Lord's mercies

that we are not consumed."

Notice the turn here. He's no longer

saying, "I and me." He steps back for a

moment and he looks at the whole

situation and he recalls the steadfast

faithful mercy of God to his people

Israel. It is of the Lord's mercies that

we are not consumed. See what Jeremiah

recognizes here is the reality is that

God as the judge and ruler of all the

earth because Israel had broken their

covenant relationship with him. God had

every right to disown and disband and

destroy completely the nation of Israel.

And Jeremiah recognizes in this moment

the very fact that God left behind a

remnant of us gives me hope that this

God is who he said he is. A God who is

gracious and merciful, forgiving

iniquity, abounding in mercy and

steadfast love. That is who God is. And

he has still proven himself to be just

that. Even in the depths of our

affliction, it is of the Lord's mercies

that we are not consumed. That word

mercies refers to the steadfast enduring

love and faithfulness of God. Even when

Israel had totally turned their backs on

him,

God remains faithful to his people. He

says his mercies are the only reason we

are not consumed. It says because his

compassions fail not. God pies us in our

misery.

He does not delight in it. He does not

take pleasure in it. He still even when

he must bring judgment, he still pies

the misery of our souls.

It says they are unending. They fail

not.

Verse 23, they are new every morning.

The word new is the idea of fresh. That

God's mercies and his compassions do not

spoil overnight like milk left out on

the counter, but rather they are new and

they are fresh every single morning when

you take a a a fresh sip of water. It's

refreshing your soul.

God's doesn't spoil. It's not like water

with floaties all in it sitting on the

counter overnight. It's fresh. It's new.

You know what that means? No matter what

you did the night before

that spoiled your relationship with God,

his mercy is fresh every morning.

[snorts] Forgiveness can always be

found. Restoration can always be seen.

He says, "Great is thy faithfulness.

Though I am unfaithful, he remains

faithful." Faithful for what? To show

mercy. faithful to show grace, faithful

to forgive, faithful to keep me as his

own. He says in verse number 24, "The

Lord is my portion, saith my soul."

Portion is a word that means an

inheritance that can never be taken

away.

God has given himself to me of his grace

and his mercy and his faithfulness.

Therefore, he says, "Will I hope in

him?"

He is my hope because [snorts] he

remains faithful.

God is so merciful and compassionate and

faithful that even when you rebel

against him, he does not utterly destroy

you. He does not disown you. He remains

faithful to you. And so Jeremiah finds a

glimmer of hope in the fact that the

Lord was still merciful and

compassionate and faithful to his people

even when they did not deserve it.

He recalled God's mercy and it renewed

his hope. And with renewed hope,

Jeremiah now calls others to find their

hope in him as well. They're in the same

situation as him, in the same ruins, in

the same poverty with their loved one

who's been carried away captive or

killed in front of them. They they've

experienced all the same desperation.

And yet this Jeremiah who said, "I God

turned against me. God hunted me down.

God trapped me in. God shot me with the

bitter poison of of evil and suffering.

I am hopeless before God." He has now

turned recalling the mercy of God and is

calling others to turn their attention

to the same mercy of God. It says in

verse uh 25,

the Lord is good to to them that wait

for him to the soul that seeketh for him

that even in your desperate situation

when instead of running away from God,

you look after him. You search him with

all your heart. Instead of trying to

understand why everything is happening,

you simply cling to the Lord with all

your heart. Says the Lord is good unto

them. Verse 26. It [snorts] is good that

a man should both hope and quietly wait

for the salvation of the Lord. That

rather than growing restless and

wandering, sit still, be silent, and

wait for him.

It says in verse 27, "It is good for a

man that he bear the yoke in his youth

that while you're young to bear up under

this suffering, knowing that the future

salvation is to come." That's what he's

getting at. It says in verse uh 28, "He

siteth alone and keepeth silence because

he hath borne it upon him. He putth his

mouth in the dust. If so be, there may

be hope. If he giveth his cheek to him

that smiteth him, he is filled with full

with reproach. You know what this means?

It's good when it's because of sin

to accept and take the punishment of God

with your face in the ground in

humility.

Rather than fighting God and resisting

God, you embrace what he's brought in

your life by his chastening hand. Why?

Because what you know is this. That the

day is coming when I submit myself under

the hand of God. That the same hand that

pushes me down will be the same hand

that lifts me up. That's who he is. And

so I'm not going to rebel against God.

I'm not going to turn against God.

Rather, I'm going to turn to God. That's

what I need to do.

There's a call to wait and hope in God's

salvation. There's a call to hope in

God's mercy. In verse 31 it says, "For

the Lord will not cast off forever.

The weight of this affliction is only

for a time. He does not disown us." Look

at verse 32. But though he cause grief,

yet will he have compassion according to

the multitude of his mercies.

God may bring grief and affliction into

your life,

but he shows mercy and pies you in those

moments when you turn to him.

It says in verse 33, "For he does not

afflict willingly, nor grieve the

children of men." He's saying, "God

takes no pleasure in your grief." You

know what that means in truth? God does

not bring affliction in your life

because he's turned against you. He's

not trapping you in. He's not hunting

you down. He's not shooting you with

bitterness. He's not leaving you

helpless. No. What God has brought into

your life is not to take pleasure in you

suffering. That's not the kind of God he

is. He's merciful. He's compassionate.

He's faithful. The question that they

would ask then is well then why are we

suffering in this? If God doesn't take

pleasure in us suffering then why is he

allowing this suffering?

And what Jeremiah shows them is that

they need to not only hope in God's

salvation and hope in God's mercy but

they need to hope in God's justice.

what he has brought has been the just

punishment for their sin. It says in

verse 34

[snorts] to crush under his feet all the

prisoners of the earth to turn aside the

right of a man before the face of the

most high to subvert a man in his cause.

That's speaking about injustice. What

what this is talking about is the

brutality and the violence and the

injustices that Jerusalem had been

committing against their own people.

What he's saying is this.

If you look at the end of verse 36,

those things the Lord approveth not.

You need to bear up under this

affliction

because it's come from God

because we have sinned.

>> [snorts]

>> That's what he's getting at. But what

he's calling Israel to do in this moment

is not to become embittered. He's

calling them to trust in God's salvation

and to trust in God's mercy and to trust

in God's justice. Why? Because of who

God has revealed himself to be.

Merciful, gracious, faithful, forgiving,

true. That is who God is. And therefore,

do not look for hope elsewhere. The very

one who has afflicted you is the very

one who can bring you out. The very one

who put you down is the very one who can

lift you up. You need to look to him.

How does this happen in Jeremiah's life

where he has

found no hope in God and yet now he has

found hope in God.

Well, it's because of who God revealed

himself to be.

Jeremiah found fresh hope for his

afflicted soul by recalling the faithful

mercy of God.

And I want to say to you today, friend,

believer

that there is one place that you will

find fresh hope for your afflicted soul

and that is by recalling to your mind

the faithful mercy of God.

It is remembering that he is not

afflicting you because he hates you,

because he's hunting you down, or

because he delights in your suffering.

No, that's not why. Sometimes it's the

punishment for our sin. Other times,

it's the fallout of of sin across the

world. And sometimes it's because others

have sinned against you. But for

whatever reason, God has permitted this

suffering into our life. It's not

because he wants to destroy you. And

it's not because God is a bad God.

Rather, what God wants you to understand

is that he is a merciful God. That his

mercies are still new every morning. We

must realize that if God was not

merciful, none of us would stand a

chance against him. See, we have all

sinned against God. And he is so holy

and perfect and pure that he as the

creator and judge of all the earth could

have condemned every one of us to hell

with no escape. but because he is

merciful. He sent his son Jesus to die

on the cross to pay for your sin to

appease his wrath. So that when God

looks at you and you trust in his son,

he sees nothing in you but the

righteousness of Jesus Christ. That is

what God has done in his mercy. You did

not deserve that. And yet he did it for

you because he's merciful. And now if

you will trust in the Lord Jesus Christ

as your savior, God will show you mercy.

He will forgive all of your sin and he

will give you eternal life if you'll

trust him today

when you believe and become his child.

It is only of his mercy that we are not

consumed when we sin. [snorts]

God's compassion never runs out. His

mercies are fresh every morning. His

faithfulness is forever. That is who God

is. [snorts]

Fresh hope can always be found cuz God's

mercy always abounds.

[snorts]

It can always be found. Why? Cuz God's

mercy is faithful.

His compassions are unending. His

faithfulness is great.

Because that is true.

How should you respond? And that's what

Jeremiah goes on to write about next. He

shows us how we should respond in light

of the truth that fresh hope can always

be found because God's mercy always

abounds. And that response is this. Turn

to the Lord. Turn to the Lord. Jeremiah

[snorts]

challenges Israel in the remainder of

this lamentation to turn back to the

Lord. first of all that they should turn

to him in repentance. It says in verse

37, "Who is he that saith and it cometh

to pass when the Lord commandeth it

not?" You know what that means? Who can

overthrow what God has said? What he's

pointing them to is the generations of

prophecies that warned them, "Judgment

will come if you do not repent." Who can

overturn what God has said? Look at

verse 38. Out of the mouth of the most

high proceedth not evil and good. Can

God not speak good into existence and

speak bad into existence? Of course he

can. So verse 39 says, "Wherefore doth a

living man complain, a man for the

punishment of his sins?" What Jeremiah

is recognizing here is because of sin,

we deserve to die.

And the fact that we have life still

begs the question, how could I complain

against God for the punishment he's

brought into my life when I don't

deserve to have life itself?

Wherefore should a man complain, a

living man complain? Rather, instead of

complaining against God, verse 40, he

says, "Let us search and try our ways,

instead of complaining about what God

has done, we need to consider what we

have done." And we need, he says, to

turn again to the Lord. He says, "Let us

lift up our heart with our hands unto

God in heaven. We have transgressed and

have rebelled. Thou hast not pardoned."

You know what he's saying here? We

accept the punishment of our sin. We

will not rebel against you. We recognize

this is because of what we have done.

That verse 43, thou has covered with

anger and has persecuted us. Thou has

slain and hast not pied. Thou has

covered thyself with a cloud and that

our prayer should not pass through. Thou

has made us as the offcowering and

refugees in the midst of the people. All

our enemies have opened their mouths

against us. Fear and a snare is come

upon us. desolation and destruction.

Mine eye runth down with rivers of water

for the destruction of my daughter and

of my people. We recognize that

everything that has come in our life has

come directly from you because we have

sinned

and we cry out to you. He's calling them

to repentance.

Notice secondly that he calls them to

turn to the Lord in the depths of their

distress.

Verse 49,

mine eye trickleth down and ceaseth not

without any intermission. I can't stop

crying.

You [snorts] ever been there

where months after everyone has

forgotten

in the depths of the night you're still

crying? You can't stop.

That's where they are.

Till verse 50, the Lord looked down.

[snorts] And behold, from heaven, mine

eye affectth mine heart because of the

daughters of my city. Mine enemies

chased me sore like a bird without

cause. They have cut off my life in a

dungeon and cast a stone upon me. Waters

flowed over my head. When I said, "I am

cut off." You get the picture that

[snorts] it's like I've been thrown down

into a dungeon and they have put a stone

over the top where I can't get out. And

yet through this hole they have poured a

water and it's like they're

waterboarding me. It's like they're

pouring water over my face. It's like

it's coming up over my head. It's like I

am drowning in the depths of my tears

and my despair and the attacks of my

enemies. I am in the dungeon and I am

dead meat.

When it says I'm cut off, that's what it

means.

And yet, it's in that moment in the

depths of that dungeon with the water

coming up to their throats that he says

this in verse 55. I called upon thy

name, O Lord, out of the low dungeon.

Thou hast heard my voice. Hide not thine

ear at my breathing, at my cry.

Thou drewest near. In the day that I

called upon thee, thou sayest, "Fear

not."

even in the depths of their affliction

that was the result of their sin. When

they cried out to God in their lowest

moment, God heard their cry and God drew

near and God said, "Don't fear.

Turn to the Lord in repentance. Turn to

the Lord in the depths of your distress.

And finally, turn to the Lord for

justice.

Verse 58.

Oh Lord, thou hast pleaded the causes of

my soul. Thou hast redeemed my life. You

know what he's saying here? You have

brought me out. This is the other side.

I've been brought out of this affliction

now. I've been brought out of this

distress. And now what my soul hungers

and craves for is your justice against

them. It says in verse uh 59, oh Lord,

thou hast seen my wrong. Judge thou my

cause. Thou has seen all their vengeance

and all their imaginations against me.

Thou hast heard their reproach, oh Lord,

and all their imaginations against me.

The lips of those that rose up against

me and their device against me all the

day. Behold, they're sitting down and

they're rising up. I am their music.

Render unto them a recompense, O Lord,

according to the work of their hands.

Give them sorrow of heart, thy curse

unto them. Persecute and destroy them in

anger from under the heavens of the

Lord.

What is this talking about?

Though God raised up Babylon to judge

Israel,

Babylon exceeded

in their brutality.

They went above and beyond in their

torture,

in the way that they abused their women,

in the way that they Here's what they

did to King Zedekiah. They they slit the

throats of his kids in his presence and

then plucked out his eyes to where the

last thing he ever saw was the brutal

slaughter of his own children. That is

what Babylon did to Israel. They took

pleasure in in judging and in torturing

Israel to where God I mentioned this

last week in the book of Zachchariah.

God tells Babylon, "You have touched the

apple of my eye."

God saw the injustice of Babylon

even when he raised them up to judge.

They were oppressed beyond measure. And

Jeremiah and the people of Israel are

calling out in this lament in their

distress. We trust in you, God. We have

turned to you in repentance. We have

turned to you in the depths of our

distress. And you have confirmed that

you heard us. You told us not to fear.

And now we're crying out for justice

against our enemies.

And that justice

God does bring. [snorts]

In one lament,

Jeremiah has gone from saying, "God has

left me hopeless," to calling Israel to

find hope in him.

How did he find this fresh hope? He

recalled God's faithful mercy.

>> [snorts]

>> And because God's faithful mercy still

provides fresh hope, I want to say to

you, friend, turn to him

in in your moment of consequence, in

your moment of affliction, rather than

saying, "God has turned against me,

therefore I'm turning away from him,"

rather direct your heart's attention

back to the Lord.

If your affliction is the result of sin,

instead of complaining against what God

has done, consider what you have done.

Search and try your own ways and turn

again to the Lord. Acknowledge that the

affliction that has come into your life

is the result of your sin and repent and

return to him. Why? Because he is

gracious. Because he is merciful.

Because the blood of Jesus Christ

cleanses us from all our sins. No matter

how many drugs you've done, no matter

how much alcohol you've drank, no matter

how much hurt you have caused, no matter

how much you rejected God or reviled God

or how long you've been turned against

God, he is still faithful to forgive. He

is still merciful to show you his grace.

God is that kind of God. He's

compassionate. He doesn't delight in

your grief even when it's the

consequences of your sin. nor does he

cast off forever.

He is still willing and capable to show

mercy in your life even in the midst of

your affliction. So friend, turn to him.

Turn to him. If your affliction is

simply the permitted circumstances of

life, I want to encourage you to turn to

the Lord in the depths of your distress.

>> [snorts]

>> There are afflictions you face that are

enough to bring you to your knees to

cause tears to stream down your face

uncontrollably

to where you feel like you're drowning

in a deep dark dungeon. You say, "God,

I've done my best. I'm not perfect, but

I've done my best to be faithful to you,

and yet I'm not sure why I'm facing

this." In those moments

when you want to turn away from him and

you want to feel embittered toward him,

instead of complaining to others about

what God is doing, cry out to him in the

depths of your distress from that low

dungeon. This faithful and merciful God

hears your cry and he sees your tears

and he whispers in your ear, "Fear not.

I am with you.

Be not afraid, neither be dismayed. I am

thy God.

Turn to him.

[snorts]

What will happen is even when it doesn't

make sense, if you'll recall the

faithfulness and the mercy and the grace

and the compassion of God, he can flood

your soul with mercy that doesn't make

sense. Comfort that wouldn't make sense

to anyone else but you who is

experiencing it. That's what he can do.

I want to say to you that if your

affliction stems from the sins of

others, turn to the Lord for justice.

Turn to the Lord for justice.

That person who hurt you, who betrayed

your trust, who violated you in your

times of suffering, affliction, and

PTSD. God has seen every tear.

He's heard every cry.

It wasn't something you earned. It was

something somebody took from you. He

knows what they did. He's well aware if

the justice system did nothing to help

you. [snorts]

And he is able to bring justice in ways

nobody else can. And so instead of being

bitter that God allowed it to happen and

trying to look for empty wells for hope,

turn it to the Lord.

Bring it to him. Trust his justice that

is perfect and complete and final.

Whatever affliction you're going

through,

don't turn away from the Lord. Turn to

the Lord because God's mercy always

abounds. Fresh hope can always be found

if you'll recall his mercy.

While a new year can bring a fresh

start, if you're like me, the freshness

wears off pretty quick.

[snorts] What you need is a fresh start

that will last.

And that can only come from God's mercy.

If 2025 left you hopeless in the

affliction of your sin. If you'll turn

to the Lord and repent, his mercy can

overwhelm your life and bring the

lasting change you're looking for.

[snorts] If 2025 left you hopeless,

wondering why all this happened. If

you'll cry to the Lord in your deep

distress, he'll hear you from that

dungeon and flood your soul with his

mercy, his compassion, and his

faithfulness and renew your hope.

And if in 2025 you were hurt by others,

trust his justice.

And even when it doesn't make sense,

God's mercy can cover you and renew the

hope that you thought was forever

removed.

Turn to the Lord and find fresh hope in

his faithful mercy.

[snorts]

You may be here today because something

has just felt off.

you felt a deep need to connect with

God.

Events that have transpired over the

last year have inspired you to at least

give God a try. I want you to know today

on the authority of God's word that he

is merciful.

He is compassionate

and he is faithful. [snorts]

So much so that he has worked mercifully

to bring your life here today so you

could hear about his son Jesus.

Jesus is the sinless son of God. He gave

his life on the cross to offer his blood

as a once-forall atonement for all of

the sins of all of the world in all of

time. That is how great the blood of

Jesus Christ was. That's why we sing

nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Only it can wash you clean. That atoning

blood appeased God's wrath against your

sin. And God raised Jesus from the dead

to prove his power to over life and

death. And he promises that if you trust

in Jesus Christ, his son, as your

savior, your every sin can be forgiven

and you can have eternal life. And then

you can experience God's new fresh

[snorts]

mercy

every morning, his unending compassions,

his great faithfulness.

There's an old song that says, "Come

every soul by sin oppressed." There's

mercy with the Lord, and he will surely

give you rest if you'll trust him at his

word. Only trust him. Only trust him.

Only trust him now. He will save you. He

will save you. He will save you now.

Will you trust in him today? Our

[snorts] heavenly father,

merciful,

compassionate, and faithful God,

our eyes are fixed on you. who alone

opens your hand and satisfies the desire

of every living thing.

We wait on your salvation.

As we come into a new year, we recognize

that the turn of a calendar cannot

provide nearly the hope that you can.

And I pray that these precious souls in

here this morning

would turn to you and find you to be

everything you said you are.

I pray for those who do not know Jesus

as their personal savior

that they would trust him now and be

saved.

Please work in our time of response. In

Jesus name I ask. Amen.