Tears

I will not say do not weep, for not all tears are evil –

Gandalf, at the end of Lord of the Rings as Sam and Frodo part.

“All our enemies have opened their mouths
    wide against us.
47 We have suffered terror and pitfalls,
    ruin and destruction.”
48 Streams of tears flow from my eyes
    because my people are destroyed.

49 My eyes will flow unceasingly,
    without relief,
50 until the Lord looks down
    from heaven and sees.
51 What I see brings grief to my soul
    because of all the women of my city.

It is again a long time since I’ve posted on the Lamentations series – we’ve moved house across the length of England in the meantime, so my mind and time has been elsewhere. But I want to finish it in a series of shorter focused posts.

Remember that we sit with the Lamenter in the midst of the ruins of Jerusalem after the Babylonian invasion. Ruin and destruction are all around. And so streams of tears flow from his eyes. They will continue to flow until Yahweh looks down from heaven and sees.

Not of course that Yahweh doesn’t see, but the Lamenter means see in the sense of take action – like at the start of Exodus when Yahweh sees the suffering of his people. For the Lamenter, and for the OT believers they use language that describes what they see and feel – not a theoretical reality they have constructed to guard their concept of God from the difficulties of the world.

The response here to suffering is to weep. There is no nonsense here about a stiff upper lip. There is no sense that weeping is inappropriate in a believer, or in a person, or (worst of all) in a man. No this man (3:1) is the man who has seen sorrow. And his sorrow and weeping over the state of Jerusalem he prefigures the man of sorrows who will walk through the streets of the same city and weep.

It makes me think. How much do I weep over the pain and trauma of a broken world, and in particular of a broken church. 5 years ago, depressed at the state of politics here, and across the Atlantic, and in particular at the comments about women that the man who would go on to lead the US had made I wrote these words: https://rozandmark.wordpress.com/2016/10/08/who-can-sound-the-depths-of-sorrow/

The memory of those comments, and in particular the indefensible way in which certain evangelical leaders supported the man who made them, brings me to the final line of the lament in the section I consider here:

What I see brings grief to my soul
    because of all the women of my city.

While there are various ways this could be taken it seems most likely that the Lamenter is weeping over the condition of the women in the city – the verse seems parallel to the end of the previous stanza:

Streams of tears flow from my eyes
    because my people are destroyed.

I think the Lamenter is grieved because of the impact that the destruction of Jerusalem has had on women. Here again there are lessons for us today. 5 years ago I was appalled at the comments that a candidate for US president could make about women, and then horrified at the defence of those comments by so called evangelical leaders.

In the intervening years we have discovered that similar attitudes, and actions matching the attitude to women were held by a world leading apologist/evangelist. In the intervening years we have had revealed what many already knew – that part of a leading figure in the conservative UK evangelical scene’s bullying behaviour was his treatment of women in his congregation. And we have also had it made clear that in that particular case it was women who saw the issues first.

That should cause us grief – and grief that leads us to repentance. Especially those of us who have ever been in a conversation where women have been belittled, where their testimony has been explicitly – or implicitly – said to have been of less value than a man. Where they have been written off as ’emotional’ (as if that were somehow a problem in any case) or excluded from the discussion with an innocent sounding phrase or word that cuts them out.

I have seen those discussions. More terribly I have been in those discussions and not found the words to make it clear that what is really going on is wrong. Sometimes I have found the words – but too often silence and retreat has been my response.

In both 6th century BC Jerusalem and our 21st century world women are very often the first to feel the pain and brokenness of world and church. Often the first to see what is really going on. Often the first to be mocked and bullied.

Will those of us who see this weep and let those tears drive us to a repentance that changes our hearts and lives? That leads us to new ways of working and new ways of living. Ways that follow the man of sorrows who wept over Jerusalem, and who never belittled or took advantage or bullied anyone – who related to women with perfect humanity, in perfect love.

Lamentations 3: dissonance

I wanted this series to be one that I wrote during March, during the latter half of Lent, and maybe finished off during April. But three things happened that slowed down that process.

One was good news – I got a new job, and so lots of energy has gone into working out learning of new processes and people.

The second was that I had minor surgery – and recovering from that took longer than I anticipated, in particular recovering mobility and physical energy took longer than I would have liked – maybe not really any longer than average, but it would have been nice to be quicker 🙂 

The third thing that happened was the awareness of the weight of abuse stories in the church. In particular observations about a culture of fear in the evangelical world, and observations about the tendency of the evangelical world to operate on the basis of inner rings resonated with me. I understand something of that. I know what is to have played my part in being afraid, and in participating in ways of doing things that would have created/sustained a climate of fear. 

As I have pondered that I have wanted to come back to Lamentations. I have recently participated in a conference in person (much of it was via zoom, but I was part of an in person section) – which happened to take place at one of the venues I associate with that culture of fear, mostly because of the time of my life that I had most to do with it. Driving to that venue down a familiar road made me think of some of those times in my life that I have both been afraid and helped to maintain ways of doing things that help to create fear. 

As I’ve done that I’ve been at a conference centred around hope for the world in the Old Testament – and as such it has been massively encouraging to hear more of reasons to hope from God’s word. Indeed one paper pointed out how much in the latter half of the Psalms the place of hope is God’s word. 

That encourages me to come back to Lamentations – to see in this book of disorientation the way to live with that disorientation, and to help others in the midst of that disorientation. And I think a major part of it is listening. And so I want to try and listen to the next 10 verses or so from Lamentations. First in Lamentations 3:34-36:

“When all the prisoners of the land are crushed under foot

When human rights are perverted in the presence of the Most High 

When one’s case is subverted – does not the LORD see it”

Yahweh sees. It is not easy to see if these words are a cry of anguish from someone who sees their rights being violated right now, or if they are actually the words of the suffer realising why Yahweh is acting in this way.  If Jerusalem is being punished for their sin, then maybe the exile is actually part of Yahweh’s demonstration of his goodness in bringing about justice for his chosen ones. Israel’s sins of oppressing the poor and needy in their land have gone on for so long – but no more. Because Yahweh sees. God sees our sin. God sees the way we cheat. God sees the way we oppress the poor – and God will judge. Sin will come to light.

I think this is a more likely way of reading this text because of the next verses. These are strong words, hard to take at the best of times, but even harder when we see people who should know better destroying the faith of the weak and vulnerable:

Who can command and have it done?
If Yahweh has not ordained it?

Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come?

Why should any who draw breath complain about the punishment of their sin?

As I read Lamentations and consider what has gone before, and what comes after I wonder about how far we should push this voice. I am not completely comfortable with that – but I suspect that is beside the point. My comfort or otherwise with a God who is sovereign is not the point here. The point is that God is in charge and we need to know that. 

We need to hear that God is in charge, and that when disasters strike it is not because he has stepped off the throne to avoid responsibility, still less that he has been taken unawares. The bible will not let us get away with that sort of a God. No, the voice of the poet here is backed up by many others – Amos and Isaiah spring to mind – it is from God that both “bad” and good come. We cannot complain about our sins being punished – if we have, like Judah’s leaders, been complicit in treating others as less than human we stand to be punished by Yahweh one way or another.

The only response is self examination and returning to Yahweh.  The poet appeals to the people he is with:

Let us test and examine our ways and return to Yahweh

Let us lift up our hearts as well as our hands to God in heaven

This is the response we need to have to trouble. That trouble may or may not be the direct consequence of our sin or folly – but it is trouble that God has in some sense brought on us, or allowed to come into our lives, it is trouble that should cause us to look back to Yahweh. To test. To examine. To return. To lift up our whole lives, not just outward piety, but all we have is to be God’s. 

And yet, while the poet knows this is true at a deep level, it is also something that isn’t the whole story for him in his present lived reality. He lives in a world where he sees this:

We have transgressed and rebelled – and you have not forgiven

You have wrapped yourself with anger – and you have pursued us – killing without pity

You have wrapped yourself with a cloud so that no prayer can pass through

You have made us filth and rubbish among the peoples

Their state seems to be disproportionate to their sins. The God who is defined by grace and compassion is killing without pity. The God who promises to forgive sins, is the God who holds back his forgiveness. The God who listens to prayer has blocked prayer from getting through. The God who creates people in his image has made his people like rubbish on the streets.

This is dark and gloomy and sounds like there is no hope, and furthermore sounds different to the poet of a few verses before. V34-41 seem to express a degree of confidence in understanding God’s ways that comes crashing to the ground in v42-45. Affirmations of God’s sovereignty collide with an angry God who shows no mercy and refuses to listen to prayer. 

What can be said when we find such dissonance in the text. How do we listen to the different voices. Perhaps we need to remember that this is one man struggling to come to terms with the overthrow of his city and his home. The darkness has closed in on him. He has suffered in ways we cannot imagine – at least how I, in a comfortable western home, cannot imagine. And he pours out his heart. As he does that he expresses his deepest fears, the hopes he longs for, the truth he knows and the darkness he feels. All of that is shaped and formed into a creative and intensely structured work of poetry. 

We need to listen to each part of his speech. To hear the truths he affirms, and to hear the reality of the feelings he expresses – which for him are felt and experienced as deeply as the truth he knows. There is an objective reality to truth – and yet there is also a personal dimension in which we all in a very real sense have our own truth that we need to speak, and that we need to listen to in others.

Before experience can be weighed and judged by an individual, and before others can speak into that experience the experience must be heard. We who listen to others must not jump in before they have finished. And that means that we who think we know what the truth is in a given situation need to learn to be patient and be ready to persist with the voices of others for much longer than we might feel is necessary. Even if we think we know what they are saying and agree, we still need to listen and hear their voice spoken.

I think this does apply in situations where Christians have been hurt by others. We can hear their stories, we can sympathise with their cries, but most of all we need to be ready to listen, and to listen again. We need to be ready to hear the whole picture, and not jump into correcting the details we might feel are lacking, or provide the justification for the actions of others that they are not considering. 

Fundamentally we need to listen well, and let our desires to be right, our desires to heal, and our desires to comfort be subsumed to utter attention to the presence of the other, and to hearing their story. And as we do that we can invite them to join us in listening to the bigger story that puts the pieces back together – but we need to first acknowledge those pieces.

(Footnote: As I reread that I know that I’m hearing echoes of Larry Crabb’s final chapter in “Finding God” – but I don’t have the time now to go and type  up the entire quote – but I definitely recommend the book to you.)

100 Years: Humble Listening

Today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of John Stott. I am not simply blogging about that because I happen to work for one of the organisations which he founded. Rather I thought it was worth paying a personal tribute to someone whose writings have been a formative influence on my own theology and spirituality.

In a blog intended to help those in ministry I think it is good to be reminded of those who have gone before us and whose example can spur us on, and who we can learn from. In a world of so much bad news it is good to be reminded of good and positive examples in Christian leadership. There are so many figures in Christian History who have so much to teach us, and of those in recent years John Stott’s life has much we can learn from.

I grew up in house with John Stott’s books on the bookshelf. I can remember making use of the Ephesians commentary when I took some time to study that book for myself after my GSCE exams. I read and appreciated Issues Facing Christians Today, and especially the sense that with some hard work it was possible to apply the Bible to our contemporary world. I even read the Cross of Christ, in an edition we had at home which managed to shed pages at an alarming rate (IVP must have been saving money on book binding at the time I think).

I remember rereading the Cross of Christ on the train to and from Durham University and thoroughly appreciating the clear way in which Stott wrote of the cross, and of the breath of his work, and engagement with others. I loved the way that he sought not just to explain what the cross achieved, and how it achieved it, but also what the implications of that should be for us today as church communities and as individuals.

I think the Cross of Christ is particularly valuable for its clear and gracious presentation of the atonement, and specifically the concept of penal substitution. In many quarters this concept has been under attack for a while – but Stott’s presentation is winsome, and careful – showing clearly the unity of the Trinity in achieving our salvation. Caricatures of this doctrine as pitting Father against Son are avoided and instead we see what an act of love Christ’s death on the cross for us was, as God in Christ substituted himself for us to achieve our salvation. You can get the Cross of Christ from IVP here: https://ivpbooks.com/the-cross-of-christ.

There are so many key lessons that could be learnt from Stott’s life, but for me one of the most critical is surely that somehow we need to hold together the things that Stott managed to hold together. We need people who will both read Scripture carefully, listening attentively to what the Spirit is saying through the text to the church and the world and who will listen carefully to our culture, and our world, to understand its heart cry.

That is why we need the organisations Stott founded like LICC (London Institute for Contemporary Christianity) https://licc.org.uk/ who do so much work on helping Christians in the workplace engage the whole of life for Christ, and Langham Partnership – https://uk.langham.org/, who work to support pastors and scholars in the Majority World, equipping them to minister in their contexts.

If you want to read more it is well worth reading some of these reflections on John Stott’s life and work: https://johnstott100.org/blog/ (the Melba Maggay one is particularly good I thought).

One of the key lessons from many of the stories on that blog is humility – John Stott seemed to have a humility that enabled him to actually listen and learn from others from all over the world and all walks of life that is all too rare, even in Christian leaders. In this I think he learned from one of his heroes, the great Anglican Evangelical leader of the 19th Century, Charles Simeon, who said that the three great principals of the Christian life were: “humility, humility, and humility”

It takes humility to read the Bible well – to set aside our preconceptions of what we believe it says and listen to what the text is actually saying. It takes humility to listen to our world and hear where we have not lived well. It takes humility to relate those two things together. It takes humility to change, and to live differently. It takes humility to live well without expecting reward or recognition. It takes humility to call others to that path also, knowing that some will not respect or heed the call, and will think less well of us.

Reading and absorbing Stott’s works without heeding the call to humility will just puff us up. The call to humility should drive us back to our knees in dependence on the one who has called us to a life of love and service. In that life there are great resources to be found for different stages on the way in John Stott’s books and teachings – resources that will help to point us back to the Bible and back to God’s world to listen carefully to both and live out of that listening.

Waiting for compassion

This next section of chapter 3 is the section that has struck me most profoundly. We see in these verses God’s complete goodness in the midst of what seems like utter darkness. The poetry of these verses leads us deeper into the heart of God – a God who is always and completely good, and who is always and totally still the God who reigns. That often leads us into a deep tension – and often I try to solve such tension by my theology. This poetry reminds me that such tension is woven into the fabric of our relationship with a God who is above and beyond our understanding, yet who stoops down to hold is in our sorrow and our tears.

v25-30 Goodness in the midst of darkness

Each line of verse 25 begins with the same Hebrew word – tov, meaning good. It was this word that more than any other struck me nearly 12 years ago when I had just started at Regent College as I sat in the Introduction to OT course. I had often thought of God as defined by holiness, but to see him as defined by goodness was a new concept. 

Yet it is fundamental to trusting God in the midst of bad times. If we are going to keep following God then above all else we need to believe that he is good, and seeks good for his people. Verse 25 of chapter 3 reminds us of this fundamental reality – that God is good to those who wait for him, who seek him. 

Because God is good to those who wait for him it is therefore good that we should wait quietly, in silence, for Yahweh’s salvation. There is a point in the waiting. Yahweh will save. But more than that is the final, slightly cryptic good of the last line. It is good for a man to bear the yoke in their youth. This reminds us of 3:1, where the poet describes himself as ‘the man’ who has seen affliction. Both in 3:1 and here the word used for ‘man’ is not the usual word for man, but one that is often (although not always) used for a ‘strong man’, perhaps a capable soldier. The sense therefore is of a young man in his prime enduring suffering.

Here he is reminding himself that it is good to bear the yoke. These are not easy words to hear. How can suffering be a good thing? The poet seems to be advocating a silent bearing of suffering, even while that suffering is caused by the striking and insulting of others – a teaching echoed by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.

This need not necessarily mean passivity.  If we are suffering some kind of abuse we should go to appropriate authorities and ask for help. We should seek the justice that will enable the abuse to stop. The yoke in that situation is to be able to do that well, without seeking personal vengeance and without becoming bitter. If we are in a situation where we can do something about the source of our suffering through legitimate means then we should do so.  

That wasn’t an option for the man of this chapter in a city flatted by the Babylonians. All he could do was sit and mourn for the loss of his city, and his people. As a strong young man that must have been hard to bear – and perhaps he has had his sources of self reliance and pride stripped away, leaving only the silence of waiting for God to act.

Whatever the source of our suffering may be the poet here is reminding us that God’s goodness is not called into question by our suffering – however horrible that suffering may be. 

We may feel alone in silence, with a heavy weight on us. It may seem like our mouths are in the dust – yet there is still hope. A hope that enables us not to seek revenge on those who are attacking us, but to sit and to wait for Yahweh’s salvation. Somehow in the midst of what may be appalling personal suffering we recognise that God is still good, and that to wait for his salvation rather than working everything out for ourselves remains the best way.

v31-33 He does not afflict us from the heart

As we do that there is great encouragement to be found in v31-33. Yahweh will not cast off forever. He may bring grief, yet he will have compassion according to his steadfast love – notice those keywords again. Compassion and steadfast love. These words are the bedrock of our hope because they are the core reality of Yahweh and who he is. He may bring grief – but he does not do so willingly (he does not afflict from his heart) – and he does not grieve us (notice the subtle distinction between v32 and v33).

Yahweh’s heart is never to cause us pain. He is always working for our good. There is sorrow, and in some mysterious way Yahweh is sovereign over that too – but behind and beyond the sorrow is his desire for our good. He calls us to trust even when we cannot see, perhaps especially when we cannot see, where that good could possibly be.

It feels like that pain and sorrow comes in waves through our lives. Over and over again we are called to trust. Each new wave brings new trouble. It is hard to understand how that works. There are no theologically watertight answers to give. 

Somehow we have a God who does not willingly afflict, a God who is good for those who wait for him – yet a God who permits terrible affliction and evil to happen to each of us. That tension must be held. Evil happens to us. Evil things should never be called good. It is not good that you were bullied and humiliated. It is not good that you were abused. It is not good that you were sick. Yet God did not step off his throne when that happened. I don’t think it is right to say that God causes such things – yet he is the one who placed each star in place – and he is the one who chooses not to intervene to stop such things from happening.

Reading Lamentations places us in this tension – it gives us words to speak to the God who is still God in the midst of such tension – and who is still the God who is utterly good. While God may permit the most terrible of things he himself is still good, and he himself is not the cause of pain. That is the most fundamental thing we have to hold on to in the midst of the silence. God is good, and salvation is coming. He will put all things to rights. We don’t have to understand why some things happen. We just have to know that God does not do evil to us, and that he will judge that evil. 

Here is John Goldingay reflecting on the book of Job in the context of his wife’s illness:

Job himself never knows about chapter 1 and 2 of “his” book. So he goes through pain the same way we do. And he illustrates how the fact that we do not know what might explain our suffering, what purpose God might have in it, does not constitute the slightest suggestion that suffering has no explanation. After all Job could never have dreamt of the explanation of what happened to him.

I cannot imagine the story that makes it okay for God to have made Ann go through what she has been through. But I can imagine that there is such a story. I do not know whether we will ever know what the story is.

John Goldingay (“To the Usual Suspects”)

For the Lord will not cast off forever,
but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
for he does not afflict from his heart
or grieve the children of men.

Lamentations 3:31

He is Risen Indeed! Hallelujah!

Happy Easter!  I’ve posted this before – but I couldn’t not post this again, because this year Easter day is also April 4th. It would be wonderful to think that this day someone would enter into a full assurance of salvation and have the same impact as Charles Simeon an Anglican Evangelical minister in Cambridge in the 19th century. Simeon here describes the Easter week he was converted in 1779.  May we all know the joy of Christ’s resurrection this April 4th Easter Day!

In Passion Week, as I was reading Bishop Wilson on the Lord’s Supper, I met with an expression to this effect – “That the Jews knew what they did, when they transferred their sin to the head of their offering.” The thought came into my mind, What, may I transfer all my guilt to another? Has God provided an Offering for me, that I may lay my sins on His head? Then, God willing, I will not bear them on my own soul one moment longer. Accordingly I sought to lay my sins upon the sacred head of Jesus; and on the Wednesday began to have a hope of mercy; on the Thursday that hope increased; on the Friday and Saturday it became more strong; and on the Sunday morning, Easter-day, April 4, I awoke early with those words upon my heart and lips, ‘Jesus Christ is risen to-day! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!’ From that hour peace flowed in rich abundance into my soul; and at the Lord’s Table in our Chapel I had the sweetest access to God through my blessed Saviour.

Or if you like a picture better:

The rising of the sun had made everything look so different – all colours and shadows were changed that for a moment they didn’t see the important thing. Then they did. The Stone Table was broken into two pieces by a great crack that ran down it from end to end; and there was no Aslan…

“Who’s done it?” cried Susan. “What does it mean? Is it magic?”

“Yes!” said a great voice behind their backs. “It is more magic.” They looked round. There, shining in the sunrise, larger than they had seen him before, shaking his mane (for it had apparently grown again) stood Aslan himself.

“Oh, Aslan!” cried both the children, staring up at him, almost as much frightened as they were glad.

“Aren’t you dead then, dear Aslan?” said Lucy.

“Not now,” said Aslan…

“But what does it all mean?” asked Susan when they were somewhat calmer.

“It means,” said Aslan, “that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know: Her knowledge goes back only to the dawn of time. But if she could have looked a little further back, into the stillness and the darkness before Time dawned, she would have read there a different incantation. She would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitors stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backwards…”

“And now,” said Aslan presently, “to business. I feel I am going to roar. You had better put your fingers in your ears.”

And they did. And Aslan stood up and when he opened his mouth to roar his face became so terrible that they did not dare to look at it. And they saw all the trees in front of him bend before the blast of his roaring as grass bends in a meadow before the wind.

Go back to the garden, where death died.

11 But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. 12 And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. 13 They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” 14 Having said this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. 15 Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). 17 Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” 18 Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”—and that he had said these things to her.

And so this is true also

50 I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. 53 For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. 54 When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

“Death is swallowed up in victory.”
55 “O death, where is your victory?
    O death, where is your sting?”

56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

58 Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labour is not in vain.

From Revelation 7

15 “Therefore they are before the throne of God,
    and serve him day and night in his temple;
    and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence.
16 They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more;
    the sun shall not strike them,
    nor any scorching heat.
17 For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd,
    and he will guide them to springs of living water,
and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

And from Isaiah 25

On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples
    a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine,
    of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.
7 And he will swallow up on this mountain
    the covering that is cast over all peoples,
    the veil that is spread over all nations.
8     He will swallow up death for ever;
and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces,
    and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth,
    for the Lord has spoken.
9 It will be said on that day,
    “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us.
    This is the Lord; we have waited for him;
    let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

Christ is Risen!

He is risen indeed – Halleljuah (Praise Yahweh!)

Easter Saturday: Waiting

This is a strange day in the church’s year.  A day caught between the sorrow of Good Friday and the joy of Easter morning.  A day to remember.  A day for reflection for all who are caught in between times.  We have several children’s bibles, and one, the Big Picture Story Bible has a chapter for Easter Saturday.  I love the text of this particular chapter especially because I think it captures how the disciples might have felt wonderfully.

Darkness fell upon the land.

Jesus was dead.
He was buried in a tomb.
A big stone was rolled in front of the entrance,
and the people all went home.
For Jesus’ followers, that dark day
was followed by a long night.

The hours passed very slowly.
Jesus’ friends cried.
They had thought he was the king.

But now their hearts were filled with sorrow,
and their minds were filled with fear.

“What happened?”
“Why did Jesus have to die?”
“Wasn’t Jesus God’s forever king?”

The questions kept coming until the next
day turned into night.

As Jesus’ followers tried to sleep, they thought,
We will be sad forever.

“Will God ever rescue his people from sin?”
“Will we ever have our place with him?”
“Will God ever bring again his blessings on
all peoples of the earth?”

There are Psalms written for these kind of times.  They are called ‘lament’ – a word that indicates a pouring out of the heart to God in grief, sadness and even anger.  The language used expresses the heart.  It isn’t always neat, tidy and precise – sometimes it is shocking to our ears (try Psalm 137), but it gives us permission that we can always take our feelings to God and express them (after all he’s not going to be surprised or shocked). One such Psalm is Psalm 88, which starts off on a note of hope, but from then on is increasingly dark until the last line (famously echoed by Simon & Garfunkel):

Lord, you are the God who saves me;
    day and night I cry out to you.
2 May my prayer come before you;
    turn your ear to my cry.

3 I am overwhelmed with troubles
    and my life draws near to death.
4 I am counted among those who go down to the pit;
    I am like one without strength.
5 I am set apart with the dead,
    like the slain who lie in the grave,
whom you remember no more,
    who are cut off from your care.

6 You have put me in the lowest pit,
    in the darkest depths.
7 Your wrath lies heavily on me;
    you have overwhelmed me with all your waves.[d]
8 You have taken from me my closest friends
    and have made me repulsive to them.
I am confined and cannot escape;
9     my eyes are dim with grief.

I call to you, Lord, every day;
    I spread out my hands to you.
10 Do you show your wonders to the dead?
    Do their spirits rise up and praise you?
11 Is your love declared in the grave,
    your faithfulness in Destruction[e]?
12 Are your wonders known in the place of darkness,
    or your righteous deeds in the land of oblivion?

13 But I cry to you for help, Lord;
    in the morning my prayer comes before you.
14 Why, Lord, do you reject me
    and hide your face from me?

15 From my youth I have suffered and been close to death;
    I have borne your terrors and am in despair.
16 Your wrath has swept over me;
    your terrors have destroyed me.
17 All day long they surround me like a flood;
    they have completely engulfed me.
18 You have taken from me friend and neighbor—
    darkness is my closest friend.

Psalm 88

At different times everyone lives in such times.  We may wish we had not seen such times, but as Gandalf points out in the Lord of the Rings so do all who see such times.

“Frodo: I wish the Ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened.
Gandalf: So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil.”

That is the note of hope we have as those who know the next day in the story.  And for all the implications of that to dawn in our world we wait.

Faithful Mercy, Steadfast Love

In the middle of this third chapter of Lamentations we finally reach some hope in the book as we come to the words many of us are familiar with from the great hymn of hope: Great is Thy Faithfulness. As we look at these words we need to notice that the poets outward circumstances have not changed. Chapter 1:1-3:18 is still real, and it still hurts, and yet there is more. Even in the depths there is the reality of good and faithful God who holds us. 

In this post we will look at 3:19-24. The poet continues to call on Yahweh – this time to remember his afflictions – the wormwood and gall which we saw he accused Yahweh of feeding him earlier in the chapter. He calls on Yahweh to remember, because it is all too prominent in his own mind – he repeats the word ‘remember’ twice for emphasis – so english translations have “my soul continually remembers”. He is haunted by the affliction and is crushed by it, bowed low underneath it.

But this he calls to mind – literally ‘heart’, viewed as the control centre of the body in Hebrew thought, and encompassing more than just abstract thought. Therefore he has hope. The next verse begins with the word that brings hope: hesed,  the word for God’s covenant love, his love that is based on his promise and cannot be altered. This steadfast love never ceases. It never stops. 

Likewise his mercies never come to an end.  The word is plural, not merely describing the abstract concept of Yahweh’s mercy but the concrete everyday expressions of his mercy in daily life. His mercies never come to an end. Indeed they are new, or fresh, every morning. Like the manna that Yahweh provided in the wilderness, so with his mercies which come fresh for each day. Yahweh’s faithfulness is great indeed. 

Notice the connection: his steadfast love is expressed by his tender mercies. In Hebrew the word for mercy is related to the word for womb, and conveys something of the tender love of a mother for her children. There is an organic connection between God and his people expressed in his mercies, his continually giving of us things that we cannot earn or deserve.  

Finally for this verse we need to notice a small Hebrew word that is almost untranslatable in English – in fact you don’t notice it in most English translations. In many contexts it is translated as ‘that’ or ‘because’ – but to do that doesn’t quite make sense here.  In this context the word seems to be used for emphasis as much as anything else. Hyperliterally you could translate it like this:

The kindness of Yahweh, surely they never cease
Surely the mercies of Yahweh never end.

Nothing is more certain than this. Nothing can be relied upon more. Steadfast love, faithfulness and mercies are all words from the great moment of Yahweh’s self revelation in the aftermath of the golden calf in Exodus 34:6-7. Yahweh is the God who defines himself by these characteristics – and therefore there is hope. Because even in that moment of the greatest catastrophe in Israel’s history Yahweh was still ready to forgive and bring a new start. 

Israel’s hope, and our hope too, is grounded not in any external circumstances or internal turmoil which may both be bleak indeed, but in the unchanging, unswerving faithfulness, steadfast love and mercies of Yahweh. It is Yahweh who is our inheritance (portion) – he is where our security lies, and therefore it is in him that we have hope, and for him that we wait.

It brings back to my mind a wonderful quote from a commentary on the book of Exodus by OT scholar Brevard Childs:

Then again the story of the golden calf has found a place in scripture as a testimony to God’s forgiveness. Israel and the church have their existence because God picked up the pieces. There was no golden period of unblemished saintliness. Rather the people of God are from the outset the forgiven and restored community.

There is a covenant – and a new covenant – because it was maintained from God’s side. If ever there was a danger of understanding Sinai as a pact between partners, the rupture of the golden calf made crystal clear that the foundation of the covenant was, above all, divine mercy and forgiveness.

Brevard Childs, Exodus

Read that again. Especially this: “Israel, and the church, have their existence because God picked up the pieces”. In a year which seems to have brought wave after wave of new revelations of abuse and sin in the church it is important to remember this reality is true of every church. We exist, as individuals, and as communities because God is a God who picks up the pieces. He doesn’t sweep us all up and throw us in the bin. There is hope to start again for us all, whatever damage has been done to us, and even whatever damage we have been part of to others, if we will turn back to him in repentance, because he picks us up and fits us back together. At the bottom of it all is that foundation of “divine mercy and forgiveness”.

Lamentations 3: In the Depths

Lamentations 3 brings us a change of voice – rather than the voice of Jerusalem, or the poet’s description of Jerusalem we hear from the poet himself about his personal experience of grief. This chapter is even more highly structured than the previous 2. In English it is split into 66 verses, although it is actually the same length in terms of lines as chapters 1-2. It is split into 66 verses because each individual line in each group of 3 lines begins with the same letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

The chapter begins, as with previous chapters in the pit of despair, but this time from the perspective of an individual. If the writer is Jeremiah, as some think possible, it is the writing of one caught up in Jerusalem’s sin and punishment, but who has not participated in that sin. Be that as it may, the poet is expressing his agony at being caught up in Yahweh’s punishment of Jerusalem in intensely personal terms. Not only has Yahweh handed over Jerusalem to Babylon, it feels to this poet that Yahweh has personally attacked him as part of that. 

We need to face that unflinchingly, and listen carefully to what the poet says. For he expresses the distress we may well feel one day, and certainly the distress of those who are in our churches in various situations.  One of the reasons that I’ve been slower to get this section of Lamentations done is that I’ve been processing my own reactions to the latest abuse revelations in the evangelical world, which have occurred in contexts I am much more familiar with than some of the other recent stories. There is not the space to explore that here – but one reaction we should all have at the very least is to sit with the victims of abuse, listen to their stories and lament the situation we are in.

v1-9 Darkness

Once more we have a litany of Yahweh’s actions, this time against an individual. “I am the man who…” This is a personal testimony of experiencing the rod of Yahweh’s overflowing anger. The rod and staff that comfort (Psalm 23) have turned into a rod of overflowing anger that drives the poet into utter darkness – there is no light. Yahweh’s hand is against him, repeatedly and continually. He feels continually under attack – and from Yahweh himself.

He accuses Yahweh of making him physically weak and broken, Yahweh has surrounded him with bitterness and tribulation. He dwells in darkness like those dead long ago. Yahweh has built around him walls so that he cannot escape. Even though the writer cries and calls for help Yahweh shuts out those prayers. Yahweh has made his paths crooked. 

This poet lives in the midst of appalling suffering, which he did not necessarily deserve, and so he cries out and accuses Yahweh. Each of these actions are attributed to Yahweh. Yahweh’s actions in saving and rescuing seem long ago. All the poet has experienced is distress and darkness.

v10-18 Bitterness

The poet moves on, if anything increasing his accusation in intensity. He has been hunted down, torn to pieces and left desolate. He has been shot with arrows into the innermost places of his body. It feels like Yahweh has completely turned on him, and instead of experiencing Yahweh’s rescue and protection he has been hunted down by Yahweh.

Yahweh’s turning on him has also meant that he is a laughingstock of all nations, taunted by those who have now invaded. He is filled with bitterness, the specific word can be used of bitter herbs, which fits with the imagery of being ‘filled’ and ‘satisfied’ – not with the good things that Yahweh delights to give, but with bitterness and wormwood. 

He is left cowering in the ashes, there is no peace – no wholeness, no wellbeing left in him. He has forgotten what it has to be happy. His endurance has perished, and so has his hope from Yahweh (or possibly because of Yahweh these things have perished). There is surely no blacker place to be. This sufferer is innocent, and yet is the subject of Yahweh’s attack.

If you are anything like me, what you want to do now is to try to reassure this poet – to persuade him, that while it may feel like Yahweh is against him, he isn’t really. I think the poet would reply: 

“But he’s God isn’t he? 
And he isn’t stopping anything – and he can can’t he? 
So even if it isn’t really Yahweh doing this directly, 
he is still standing by while I suffer all this? 
What is he up to?” 

What we need to realise, and what Lamentations must teach us is that no theology, no matter how profound will help to answer the question “why?”  in this moment of darkness. The problem of evil is not fully solvable, at least not this side of eternity. The Bible never solves this problem for us. To be a believer experiencing this, and feeling these things is no sign that we are not a believer, or that our experience is invalid. 

And so at this point in Lamentations we sit with the poet in darkness. There is a hope, and we will come on to that, and even these verses can echo something of that hope to us (more on that in another post hopefully), but right now we need to learn how to sit in the darkness and face the agony this poet feels.

Lamentations: The darkness of judgement

Lamentations is not an easy book to keep on reading, and in some ways I have found chapter 2 harder than chapter 1. For chapter 2 forces us to confront the reality that Jerusalem’s pain at this point in her history was in large part the consequence of her own sinful and foolish choices. Jerusalem had been warned – a reading of 1-2 Kings and the prophets will show that all too clearly. Yet she had not heeded the warnings.

Yet we need to read it to understand how it feels to be under Yahweh’s judgement, and what brings about that judgement. We also need to read it to see that sometimes Yahweh’s judgement comes about through means that we do not understand or approve of – there is a fundamental level of mystery here. 

We also read it as those who, in the main, do not know whether any given modern experience of suffering is Yahweh’s judgement on a nation, or whether it is simply a result of living in the midst of a fallen world. We read Lamentations against the backdrop of the prophetic writings, and we do not generally have the same degree of specific revelation about nations as the prophets were given. 

This may well be because God’s people are no longer defined by any given nationality (and should never try to be associated with any given nation) – we are strangers and exiles in the world. We live in the midst of nations that rise and fall, and any given failure may at the least be an outworking of God’s general judgement on human pride – but we do not know to what extent. 

At a personal level too, there are times when our sin has obvious consequences. But it does not always – there are many times when it seems that people ‘get away with it’ and the truth is only discovered later. 

For us this experience of Yahweh’s judgement on Jerusalem also forces us to look forward to the promised day when God will judge. Every act of human oppression and evil will be dealt with in a way that is perfectly just. Perhaps we should read these chapters and think – if this is how bad it is to experience Yahweh’s temporal judgment in human history, how much worse will it be to face his burning anger on the day when there is no place to hide?

v1-8 Yahweh’s Anger

There is a subtle shift of focus in Lamentations chapter 2. The same distress is clearly articulated, but the emphasis becomes on the one who has caused the distress. The tone is accusatory, and addressed to Yahweh, who has done all this. 

The writer is reflecting on the distress of Jerusalem, articulated in chapter 1, and crying out in anguish at her state. Yet he does this knowing that ultimately Yahweh is behind the fall of Jerusalem. Jerusalem is not simply the victim of the latest superpower maneuverings.  Jerusalem’s fate is a result of their sin.

The description of Yahweh’s actions is relentless, verb after verb describing Yahweh’s judgment in graphic detail. There is no letting up for the first 8 stanzas – 24 lines each describing a different aspect of Yahweh’s action in judgement.

The writer of Lamentations does not allow Yahweh to escape responsibility.  The Yahweh on whom Jerusalem was supposed to rely to be a wall of fire protecting them, whose presence in their midst was their security – it is this Yahweh who has destroyed his city.

v9-13 Yahweh’s Judgement

These verses move on to describe the resultant horror of Yahweh’s judgement. The kingdom is ruined, utterly disintegrated. Kings and princes are in exile, the law “is not” and even the prophets do not see any visions from Yahweh. From old to young the population is utterly desolated. 


In v11 the poet joins the weeping – in fact his eyes are spent with weeping. He sees children crying desperately for food that does not come as they waste away and die. There are no words left that can bring comfort. He addresses Jerusalem directly, but ultimately the conclusion is simply a question “your ruin is as vast as the sea – who can heal you?”

The ‘obvious’ answer is Yahweh – but in v14 the extent of the people’s departure is underlined. 

v14 Deceptive Prophets

 Your prophets have seen for you

false and deceptive visions;

 they have not exposed your iniquity

to restore your fortunes,

 but have seen for you oracles

that are false and misleading.

Lamentations 2:14

Anyone involved in any kind of Christian leadership should ponder these verses, and those of us who sit in churches should likewise ponder hard on what they uncover about our hearts and the results of deceptive ministry. Jeremiah and Isaiah spoke of times like these – prophets who only speak ‘smooth things’, and people who do not want to be confronted with the reality of the Holy One of Israel. 

As we ponder this we should resist the temptation to point the finger at other churches or other Christian networks. Instead we should measure ourselves against these words. Do we avoid the truth that will expose our iniquity, and hide behind false and deceptive visions? These falsehoods may not be the outright false teaching of some. It is possible simply to deceive by omitting small parts of the truth – and it is easy to deceive by omitting to uncover particular ‘minor’ sins. 

By contrast if they had listened to the prophets who did preach the truth, and exposed sin, then they would have seen their fortunes restored. Perhaps today, writing from a UK context, we need to have people who will expose our sins of respectability, our desire to conform and to be thought highly of, to be a part of establishment society. Perhaps we need to have our desires to be part of an ‘inner circle’ of those in the know rebuked.

So often we have overlooked the sins of those who were able to increase our influence, or sound convincing amongst those thought to be important. So often we have overlooked those who preach true doctrine but whose lives do not match that truth and who teach by example – if not by words – their protegees to follow the same gospel denying lifestyles. We have been fooled by deception, and we need to repent. 

If the ruined church of the West is to find restoration we will not find it by prophets with convincing schemes for a more successful or effective church. We will find restoration and healing in listening to those who expose our sin so that we can repent. We need, more than anything else in our day, to be confronted by a fresh vision and sense of the Holy One of Israel in our midst.

v15-19 The nations mock 

The attention of the prophet now turns to the reaction of the nations around who rejoice at Jerusalem’s fall. Yet even this rejoicing of the enemy is under Yahweh’s sovereignty. Yahweh has carried out his purposes, set out long ago. The poet concludes his words with this appeal to the city of Jerusalem.

The response of the ruined city of Jerusalem must be to cry out to Yahweh. To plead to him for life. The first response to disaster and devastation in God’s people must be to return to Yahweh. We need to pour out our hearts to him. We need to expose our hearts to his life-changing presence.

v20-22 Jerusalem speaks

The poet has made his appeal, but now we return to Jerusalem. She pours out her heart to Yahweh with a set of questions (v20) followed by a reiteration of the utter terrors of her situation. There may be justice in Yahweh’s anger, but it feels remorseless. It feels as if Yahweh has turned on Jerusalem. 

We are left almost where we started the chapter. Jerusalem knows the grief of her destruction, and at some level is aware of the reasons for that grief – and yet she is not able to move beyond the immediate pain. 

Again we may want to bring hope quickly, but is this not how grief so often works? Whether it is suffering brought about by our own sin, as here, or entirely innocent suffering, there are periods and times when we are stuck. We cannot get past one or other aspects of the problem. 

These verses in Lamentations show us that an important part of processing the darker times of life is allowing people to express their confusion and questions. Patience is needed to do this. We might feel that the answer is ‘obvious’, we may wonder why someone cannot simply ‘pull themselves together’ – and yet from the pit there are no easy answers – we simply need to be able to listen and encourage the person suffering to give a voice to their cry. 

There may come a time when we can help the sufferer to process the experience and work out the lessons to be learnt going forward – but the initial period will simply be a time to listen, and to hear, and to pray.  This is where the structure of Lamentations is a helpful guide for us in that it provides a way of giving space to our sorrows and pain by taking time to articulate them comprehensively, rather than trying to bury them. 

Lamentations: Alone in the Pit

As we move onto the second half of chapter one we are still listening to the voice of Jerusalem. She sees her suffering as brought upon her by Yahweh’s fierce anger. It is vital that we feel the force of this suffering, and that we do not try to water down her words. It is as we come to face the reality of what it means to be in utter desolation that we will see the power of this section of Scripture to speak to us and for us.

v12-16 Alone

Jerusalem sees that it is Yahweh who has done this, he has set fire to her bones, and made her desolate and faint all the day long. It is Yahweh who has woven together her sins, and hung them on her neck. It is Yahweh who has given her over into the hands of those that she cannot stand against. She longs for someone to look and see her suffering, to recognise what she is going through.  

She is all too aware that it is Yahweh who has rejected her own warriors and brought up an army against her. And so she weeps and her eyes overflow with tears. There is no one nearby who can comfort her. Jerusalem is alone.  The enemy has prevailed. 

This is an utterly bleak moment in the history of the Bible. We know that it is not the end of the story, but those living in the wreckage of Jerusalem could not see that. Perhaps, we would say they ought to have remembered God’s promises. They should have recalled all that had been said before. Perhaps, but it is not easy to remember the promises of God in the midst of disaster. 

There are surely moments in all our lives when we can recall feelings of utter abandonment. I vividly recall walking across a town first thing one Saturday morning, pushing my bike – the tyre had just punctured at my furthest point from home and it somehow seemed to symbolise my mood. For various reasons we had to move home by the end of that month, and we had nowhere to go, no job to move for. I had spent a fruitless few days looking for homes in one possible location, and faced the prospect of having to do the same thing in a different place in a few days time. The previous year seemed all rather pointless with all its different frustrations. I pushed my bike while frustratedly crying out to God asking why he had allowed things to get to this point.

It is possible to logically analyse that year, to point to different issues, to flaws in my own character, to the mistakes of others, to external circumstances making things difficult. I imagine it would be possible to draw up an allocation of where exactly everything went wrong. It is also possible to draw up a diagram of how different events in that year have made a difference to my self understanding and growth, of how they have contributed to my character and understanding of the world. And yet none of that understanding is of much use in the midst of the pit of despair, in the damp drizzle of a gray early spring morning. 

At times like those we need to remember that Lamentations is in the Bible. God gives space to the voices of those who, whether through ignorance, weakness or their own deliberate fault, are in the pit of despair. He makes those stories part of his stories. 

Whatever the story is in which you find yourself in right now there is a hope in the midst of it. Not an easy hope that makes everything feel good now, but a hope that in the end all things will be well, and a hope that even now in the midst of the pain there is one who has entered that pain, and who gives the strength to endure to the end.

v17 Recognition

This verse comes as something of an interjection from the poet – Zion (Jerusalem) is now spoken of in the third person, almost as if confirming or underlining her isolation. There is no-one at all who will comfort her. Yahweh has decreed her isolation, her neighbours are her foes. The switch of voice underlines that Jerusalem’s sufferings are no mere imagination. 

It is worth pondering this for a moment. Sometimes when we see suffering our instinct is to minimise it. To want to reassure quickly that it will be OK, that life is not really that bad. But sometimes what is needed is an external voice with the strength to say “this stinks”. I can vividly remember sitting in class at Regent a few days after our first miscarriage. A couple of people sympathised. One person though just said “it just stinks” (or something similar) and it was the most meaningful comment that day – because I knew that they got it.

Sometimes circumstances are awful, and the first step to helping someone is sometimes simply to recognise just how bad their situation is. Sometimes it is that simple act of recognition that makes all the difference. Sometimes suffering can make us believe we have lost our minds as well, so the simple act of recognition from someone else that validates our perspective can be vital.

v18-22 Despair

These verses switch back to the voice of Jerusalem. Here she recognises that Yahweh is righteous, and that she has sinned against him. The promised penalty has been enacted – and she calls on people to look and listen. Not so much at this point to sympathise, but to learn. It is almost a moment of calm before the emotion of the moment takes over once more. 

She called to her allies – but they did not come. Priests and leaders perished. Jerusalem is disturbed, and in torment, recognising her own sin, and the reality of the death it has brought.  She is alone, and her enemies rejoice over her. Her only hope is that the wickedness of Babylon will one day also be judged, and they too will be brought low. The chapter ends in the despair of groaning and a heart that is faint.  

It is hard to end at this point. If I was preaching on this passage I would want to bring in some hope at this point. But I think I would be wrong to jump too quickly to the hope. Yes, Lamentations is not the only book in the Bible, and not the only thing to say about suffering – but it is in the Bible, and it is in the Bible as a book that tells us it is OK to take some time to unpack and tell our story of suffering.

Perhaps that is the point of this chapter ending like this. Perhaps it is reminding me to let people tell their pain without trying to make it tidy. Perhaps it is reminding me that I need to sit with the person in pain and be able to validate what they say, to let them express in their words how their pain feels right now without needing to put it into my theological grid to help me understand things better.