Lamentations chapter 3

vs 23

Jeremiah has just started telling us how great God's compassion, love and faithfulness are, even in the face of tragedy.

The idea that compassion is new every day is really nice. Even though we might stuff up daily, God looks at us with fresh, shiny, new love. And he is faithful, which is really quite important in a god. Who wants a god who you can't trust?

vs 24

Portion is more like inheritance and less like part of a meal, I think. The idea that God is your inheritance, something that is undeserved and not worked for, that all you can do is wait on him, that's a very strong picture. Doubly so for the jew, who feels that inheritance strongly through the land and historic relationship with God.

vs 25

At this point Israel might say, "But we cried out to God, and he let our city fall to the enemy? How is that good? We had hoped he would save us!" Nice try. But Israel's hope wasn't in God at all, by this point. Hence the punishment. They didn't seek him until the army were knocking the walls down. You've got to follow God's rules of hope and faith and waiting and trusting. Doing it when convenient is a nice way to have God rip the carpet out from under you.

vs 26

Jeremiah is probably feeling pretty quiet at the moment. I mean, humble quiet. He may well be wailing and lamenting, but he's not about to get all, "Told you so" preachy.

vs 27

The yoke of this lesson of humility and suffering, I think. Better to understand God's discipline while young, rather than learn the misery of it when old, when they are your children who are dying.

vs 28

The silence has come from God. It's a pretty awful silence - the silence of defeat. But it should help them to recognise the importance, the potency, of God's discipline, help them to recognise the evil that led them to this spot.

vs 29

Let them mourn, then. Let them realise how sad it is that they have come to a place where they need to be punished this hard. And let them see that they are still alive, and while God's people exist, there is hope for them.

vs 30

Turn the other cheek, eh? Jesus was a lot of things, but creative isn't one of them. It's interesting to see it in this context, though - the idea of non-retaliation is in the context of accepting the pain of the exile for the purpose of realising their fault.

vs 31

This is a big idea. Without realising that people can be separated from God, but he won't leave them languishing forever, we could feel that his discipline is really him telling us to go away, pushing us away. But it's not. God treats us like children so that he might accept us as family.

vs 32

Grief, compassion, and love, all from God. Hard to fathom, sometimes. The more and more I read this, the more and more I realise that there are others who need this message so much more than I do. I'm thankful to be being equipped with it.

vs 33

Willingly... he still does it, but it's not like he wants to? I think that's the idea that they're going with here. There is so much tied up in this idea of what God wants, and what he doesn't really want but still does. The thing is, he wants a result, and he knows perfectly how to get it. The means aren't justified because of the ends - but they are justified because of the perfect wisdom of God.