“When Crisis Hits”
Lamentations 3:7-9; 17-27
Once a month for the past 8 months I have met with a group of pastors in our area. We come together for three hours to learn from each other, to encourage each other and to pray for each other. We met this past Monday night and as we closed, my partner and prayer took me by the hand and he said, how can I pray for you? I didn’t ask him the same question and we prayed together. Such a simple thing but prayer makes such a big difference.
Many people are of the mistaken opinion that pastors are somehow immune to problems, hurts and that their families are as well. As pastors meeting together we share requests for our families, our wives, our children, our finances, our churches. And when we are done there is always plenty to pray about.
For some odd reason people expect the pastor and his wife and family to be problem free. There many expectations placed on the pastor and his family and at times it is hard. I say this to just remind you that at times family life can be difficult for all of us and pastor’s families are certainly not exempt. When crisis comes along, it shows no favoritism. In fact most of us would agree with this statement...
Many times we have just finished dealing with a crisis, or we are dealing with one right now or we are waiting for the next crisis to arrive.
In the Old Testament we meet a prophet named Jeremiah. We believe he wrote several books in the OT and including the book of Lamentations. And that’s a strange word—we don’t use the word lamentation usually unless we are referring to this book in the Bible. The word lament means to express sorrow, mourning, regret or grief and to do so out loud. It means to wail, to express sorrow in a powerful way.
Jeremiah, who wrote the book of Lamentations was nicknamed the weeping prophet. And when you read the text you can quickly see why. In fact Jeremiah said if only my head were a pool of water in my eyes a fountain of tears I would weep day and night. Jeremiah is telling us that he had wept so much over Israel that he had run out of tears. He goes on to say, my joy he has flown away, grief has settled on me and my heart is sick. His supply of tears was not big enough to handle the grief and despair he was facing. At one time or another we of all felt this way. And when it strikes, despair always affects the home.
This happens to Jeremiah and it leads him to make several statements regarding his despair. Lamentations 3:7.
(1) Verse 7. I feel trapped. He, speaking of God himself, He, has walled me in. Verses 7-9. For some reason, Jeremiah felt trapped. Walls all around him and no way to escape. As though he was way down, with heavy chains and he needed someone to break those chains. Let me ask you, have you been there before? Because if you have or that’s where you are now, you need to acknowledge it.
Jeremiah said the walls were all closing in around him and the burden was so heavy that he felt weighed down by heavy chains and on top of that everything was compounded by the fact Jeremiah felt that his prayers were not going any higher than the ceiling and he came to the conclusion that it was God that was causing all of it. .
(2) Verses 17-18. I am no longer happy and my future has been stolen from me. Here is Jeremiah living among many prophets of his day-and many were what we refer to as false prophets-he tells us back in chapter 2 that the false prophets were proclaiming a message that was false; it was full of empty promises and very deceptive! And Jeremiah is right about that for sure but again he comes to the mistaken conclusion that God is working against him; that God is supposed to him in his work. And as a result he feels there is nothing good he can say to anyone. One more.
(3) Verses 19-20. I can’t stop thinking about my past and I have now become depressed. We use the word depressed too loosely. For those among us who experience in dealing with depression you know exactly what I’m talking about. Too many people can have one thing goes wrong, they get down a bit in and say you know I feel depressed today. That could be but is not likely that his depression. Depression is not just being in a bad mood or feeling out of it for a few hours. Depression cuts deeper than that. It can rob us of our future and cause us to lose hope and we begin to feel like everything is wrong, always has been always will be. Fortunately there is a second part to this chapter. And I find here that Jeremiah reminds us that when we are in this Valley that he is describing, there are several facts we must remember.
(1) Always remember that regardless of your situation, there is always hope. V. 21. The word hope is found nearly 200 times in Scripture. It is mentioned in over one half of the books of the Bible. This is a book of hope. Is my favorite word in the NT and let me say again that it has a much deeper meaning than we realize. And our vocabulary when we use the word hope to express our desire for something we often use it in the same way we use the word to wish for something. Or to dream for something. We wish we could have it but we don’t really expect it. We don’t really know what the outcome will be. Hope comes from the Greek word elpiso (elpidso) and it carries this as its meaning… Certainty... Expectation... Trust.
In other words we don’t wish for peace, we don’t wish for a better life-a better future-we expect it. The Bible says Christ is our blessed hope and we can know we will live with him forever as believers.
Jeremiah felt as though all of his hope was gone. That his future was completely lost. Jeremiah had a very narrow view of who God was at this point—all he could focus on was the judgment of God in his own sin and he forgot about God’s mercy and forgiveness. And some of you have forgotten about it as well. You see Satan is the great deceiver—the Bible says he is a liar and he has been whispering lies into your years and you have made the mistake of listening to him and you have allowed his lies to control your daily thoughts. And that is a very dangerous place to live and be. And if you’re living there today you need to move out. You need to give Satan an eviction notice and tell him he is not welcome anymore.
(2) Another truth to remember…God’s faithfulness never ends. V. 22. It is constant. His faithfulness to us should never be questioned. Jeremiah, in the midst of his feeling trapped, with his piece gone, no happiness and his future lost, he says this is what I must remember—this is what I must call to mind. Because of God’s faithfulness - I will never perish-never. John 3:16. Because his mercies never end. You see we act as though God supply of mercy and love is going to run out. We act as though God is going to lose his patience with us and strike us down. His grace is a gift; it cannot be earned, nor can it be lost what you have it. And this is why. He is. Mercies. Never. .End.
(3) Remember that is hard as it may be, we must learn to wait on the Lord. Verses 25-26. Through all of this passage Jeremiah speaking to the people of Jerusalem and these people are tired, weary, they feel beat up at times. Jeremiah says he feels the rod of God’s wrath and he cries out because he has some sort of physical disease that he describes here and he is very sick and because he feels so beaten down he blames God all of it. He is in a very bad place—we get there too and all we can focus on is the judgment of God but somewhere in all of this the tide begins to turn for Jeremiah—the fog seems to lift and Jeremiah begins to see God is he truly is an begins to see his situation in a different light.
It reminds me of the 22nd psalmist David cries out, my God why have you forsaken me? He felt so all alone. And suddenly he says, but the Lord is my shepherd. Psalm 23. And now his conclusions are quite different. Now he sees hope. Now he gains confidence. Jeremiah realizes that not only is God faithful; God is always faithful. His faithfulness never ends. And as a result we must learn to wait on him. This is what Job had to do. Job learned to wait.
This is where all of us must get to in our walk with the Lord. God, everything is falling apart, I’m facing one difficulty after another but in spite of all of this, The Lord is my portion. That’s what Jeremiah says in verse 24.
Jeremiah lived in one of the most difficult times in history. Because it was great friction in that part of the world at this time. When Palestine was conquered the tribes were each given 80 particular territory—a portion and divided among the 12 tribes of Israel but the priests— you know what they got? Nothing. The OT says their portion was Yahweh. No land left. You just get Yahweh. The only thing that remained permanent for them was God. Jesus. He was enough. Is He enough for you?
