LAMENTATIONS
(Week ending 05/27/12)
Lamentations = wailings = a dirge = a funeral poem
Author = probably Jeremiah but there is some uncertainty about that.
The Lamentations give a vivid picture of a desperate situation. All the people of Jerusalem and surrounding Judea have been killed, captured or ruined. Solomon’s temple has been torn down. The city’s great buildings and fine houses have been reduced to rubble.
The poems (there are five of them) admit that this destruction is well-deserved and long overdue. God has punished his people for their sins, by letting their enemies conquer them. But God is also merciful. His people dare to hope and pray that he will accept their repentance and restore them. (The Bible Guide)
A day of grief:
The Jews remember the destruction of the temple on the 9th of the month of Ab — that is, in mid-July. On this day, the ‘Lamentations’ are read aloud to the east of the temple site.
The temple was destroyed twice in its history. The temple built by Solomon was destroyed by the Babylonians in 587 bc. The temple built by Herod the Great was destroyed by the Romans in ad 70. (The Bible Guide)
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Needs Met By Lamentations:
Lamentations takes the particular event of Jerusalem’s downfall and shapes it into a timeless cry of anyone of God’s children who suffers—for his own or for others’ sins. The core confession of trust in God’s love, even in the most tragic of situations (3:32–33), forms the center of the book’s answers to these questions regarding the Israelites’ life needs.
• Why has the nation of Israel’s life fallen apart (1:8)?
• Why was God not on the side of Israel, his chosen people (4:12)?
• What should be Israel’s next step (3:39–40)?
• What could possibly provide the security for any hope for the future (3:32–33)?
Jeremiah’s agony over Jerusalem’s destruction mirrors God’s own pain over disciplining his children (3:31–33). The reason for discipline is the sin of God’s children. The application of discipline comes from God’s love and holiness. The purpose of reading about the past act of God’s judgment on Jerusalem is hopefully to avert the need for God disciplining believers today in a similar way (3:40). In the flurry of present activities it is easy to forget that God exists and still demands holy living. Reading about the great judgment on God’s holy city of Jerusalem should remind believers that as temples of God’s Holy Spirit they also are not immune to God’s severe discipline should they fall into sin. The book also serves as an example of how to mourn for sins and cry to God. Grief and pain are to be expressed, not denied or kept within. Lamentations gives believers something to identify with when they experience discipline. God’s anger toward sin is real. But it is the anger of a loving father who will deal out pain if it is necessary to mature his children. And believers can always say, with Jeremiah, the “punishment will end” (4:22).[1]
[1]Hughes, R. B., & Laney, J. C. (2001). Tyndale concise Bible commentary. Rev. ed. of: New Bible companion. 1990.; Includes index. The Tyndale reference library (290). Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House Publishers.