God Centered Podcast - Episode 19 - The Day Of God's Burning Anger - Lamentations 1:10-15

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Hello and welcome back to God Centered Bible Study. This is Andy Kane and it's a joy to be back with you once again, and we are continuing our study through the book of Lamentations.

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Today we'll be looking at verses 10 through 15 of chapter one, and we've already noted the great reversal of fortune that Jerusalem has gone through here, and now we're just going to see a greater extension of this.

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Verse 10, it talks about their circumstances and says, the adversary has stretched out his hand over all her desirable things, for she has seen the nations enter her sanctuary, the ones whom you commanded that they should not enter into your assembly.

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So notice here, we are still seeing the consequences of sin, specifically the consequences of sin for Jerusalem in this time, not just that Babylon has carted them away into captivity and has killed many of them, taken out the city and the temple and all that, but also is the enemy here,

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Babylon, that has stretched out their hand over her desirable things. This is now nations that are coming in who had been commanded not to, who were not supposed to be there.

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So you see things happen. You see people be in places they shouldn't be. You see things happen that shouldn't happen.

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Sin always destroys and causes havoc and causes things that should not be.

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And they are entering the assembly that they should not be in. This should be the holy temple of God.

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And so in like fashion, when the New Testament tells us that our bodies are a temple of God and we're supposed to take care of them, the same application is there.

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We shouldn't be putting things inside of us that shouldn't be there. We shouldn't be using our bodies to engage in things that are not holy and righteous.

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And that is what Jerusalem had done. And now they're paying the consequences for it. Verse 11, all her people are sighing, seeking bread.

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This is not the state of the people of God. It should not be the state of the people of God.

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God's people should not be seeking bread and wondering where their next meal is going to come from.

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In Psalm 146, we learned that it is God that feeds the hungry. He feeds his people. He clothed them when they wandered in the wilderness for 40 years.

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Their shoes didn't wear out. They had clothes. They had food when they were obedient. And there's always blessing for God's people.

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And here we find them seeking bread. And notice here, they have given their desirable things for food to restore their souls.

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See, O Yahweh, and look, for I am despised. Notice that things that previously would have been very precious to them, that would have carried a very high value, are suddenly not so valuable.

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When you start getting down to, am I going to eat or not? Am I going to be sustained or not?

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Am I going to be able to live, restore the soul, restore the strength?

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They're very much in destitution. They are, if they live through the siege of Babylon coming in and causing destruction and destroying everything and killing and carting off into slavery, if you live through that, it doesn't mean that now everything's great.

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They are in a bad place. This sin has been devastating.

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Now they're taking things that, you know, you think of an equivalent, you know, something that you have that is in your possession or belongs to you that's very valuable, that you would never think of trading for anything less than a certain amount, but all of a sudden you'd be willing to take that same thing and give it away just for food.

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Think about how sad that is. Verse 12, is it nothing to all you who pass this way?

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They've got this feeling of loneliness and the feeling that people are passing by, looking, seeing what's happened to them, and they just don't care.

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And think about how you feel like that sometimes in your life, where you feel like something very tragic has happened to you and to feel as if no one cares.

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This is how lonely and how destitute they feel and how they are. And think about the sad irony here that for the child of God, this shouldn't be.

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You shouldn't be the safest you should be. And yet sin has done this to them. Sin has put them in this position.

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Look and see if there is any pain like my pain or look to see if there's any sorrow like my sorrow.

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They're saying this is, they're lamenting here. The author is lamenting here and on behalf of and acting as the, you know, embodying

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Jerusalem and saying, there's no pain like this. There's no sorrow like this.

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And ultimately what we're going to see as we move forward in the book and we understand that the repentance comes, the true child of God understands that the true pain and sorrow of sin is not these consequences.

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It's that we sinned against our God. It's we've sinned and disobeyed and displeased him.

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He says there's no pain like my pain, no sorrow like my sorrow, which was dealt severely to me, which

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Yahweh grieved me with on the day of his burning anger. The day of the

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Lord is a term often used in the scriptures, particularly in the old Testament. The day of the

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Lord was a day of judgment. There will be a final day of the Lord when all sin is judged and eternity is ushered in.

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But this day of his burning anger, this day of the Lord that had come to Jerusalem is when

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Babylon came in and destroyed the city, destroyed the temple, killed the prophets, killed many of the people.

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And so now notice the attribution here. It's our sin, but it's

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God who brings the justice on this sin by grieving us with this pain on the day of his burning anger.

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Now, we're going to see when we get down into the latter half of this chapter, we will see how particularly in verse 18, it talks about how

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Yahweh is righteous. We're the ones that rebelled against him, but we see how it is

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God that brings justice against sin. It's God that brings consequences for sin. And so we move on here, verse 13 from on high.

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Notice the repetition in this verse. He did this. He said this. He has done this. The attribution to God and his sovereignty and how he is the one that brings justice on sin.

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We bring the sin, he brings the justice. Of course, we must also know that thanks to the grace and mercy of God, we bring the sin, he brings the salvation.

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And we'll ultimately see that hope of salvation in this book as we move forward. But notice it's he sent fire into my bones.

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It dominated them. Now, he's probably thinking too about when he had the fire in his bones to preach the message, even when no one wanted to hear it, even when he was under a threat of being harmed and possibly killed for saying it.

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And so Jeremiah knows all too well about the fire of God being in your bones. It dominated his bones.

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But notice he has spread a net for my feet. He has turned me back.

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He has made me desolate. Faint all day long. He's speaking here, not speaking just about himself.

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He's speaking here on behalf of Jerusalem. It's a personification of Jerusalem, taking an inanimate object or a city.

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When we talk about a city, if I were to talk about the city I live in, Roanoke Rapids, if it was under great distress and if it had been very wicked and I was having judgment,

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I would say she, Roanoke Rapids, her gates are falling down. Her roads are in despair.

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Her people are wailing. It's the same language here, only he's saying they're in this place,

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Jerusalem, because he, God, has sent this burning anger, this judgment.

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He spread the net. He turned us back. He made us desolate. Because notice verse 14, the yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand.

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They are knit together. They have come upon my neck. He has made my strength stumble.

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The Lord has given me into the hands of those against whom I am not able to stand. Notice that when we talk about the armor of God, Ephesians 6, we're told that by taking on the armor of God, we can stand firm against anything that comes our way through the power of God.

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Notice here that when you have sinned against God, he's not going to provide that power to you and you're going to fall under the pressure of your own sin.

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He talks about the yoke of not God's transgressions because he changes the tune.

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It goes from God did this. He spread the net. He turned us back. But then it's my transgressions.

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So in a way, Jeremiah is repenting on behalf of the people here.

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That's one thing as a pastor you can do if you have sin in the church that you're leading, to repent on behalf of the people and say,

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Lord, we repent. It's a we, but it's my. It's all of it. The yoke of Jerusalem's transgressions has been bound by God and his hand, he knits them together.

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It puts on his neck, sort of like if you had cattle in a field with the yoke on there. He puts that yoke on their neck and it makes their strength stumble.

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So it's no mistake that Jesus says, you know, take my yoke upon you for it's easy.

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It's righteousness. You want to take on the yoke of your sin. You will not hold up under the pressure of the weight.

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It's always better in God's way, in obeying God's command. And they're seeing here that the yoke of their transgressions, when it is knit together, when it's forced down on the neck of you, it makes you stumble.

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You get given it. Lord gives you into the hands of those you're not able to stand. You're not able to hold up.

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The pressure won't be too great. Finally, in verse 15, the

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Lord has rejected all my mighty men in my midst. He has called and appointed time against me to break my young men.

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The Lord has trodden, as in a winepress, the virgin daughter of Judah. Notice this utter and total destruction.

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It's the Lord that has rejected the mighty men. The Lord has given this battle to Babylon. All throughout

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Joshua, the conquest that the Lord gave to his people, and they've always had safety and peace and safety, and been able to ward off enemies, and now it's completely reversed.

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The Lord's rejected and calls the mighty men and defenders to lose. This appointed time under God's sovereignty, now it's come and it's broken down the mighty men.

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The Lord is trotting as if he's in a winepress and grapes, smashing grapes and things like that, and just trotting down and stomping the virgin daughter of Judah.

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Trotting down on Jerusalem. Trotting down on their sin. Bringing this judgment.

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Now we'll see next time we go into verse 16, so on how he's, you know, Jeremiah has gotten the title of the weeping prophet for the next verse.

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Talks about how, you know, I'm weeping, I'm crying. The children are desolate. They're stretching out their hands, no one to comfort them.

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But then we'll get to verse 18 next time, when we talk about where the turn starts to happen.

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Where the declaration that Yahweh is righteous, and we are the ones that have rebelled. So you're going to start to see that.

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So far in this, we've seen nothing but destruction and judgment and great reversal of fortune.

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And now they're taking their valuable things just for food. And they've been defeated. They've been broken. They've been, they're destitute.

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They're just all these horrible things. Because you have to really get in tune with the depravity of yourself and understand how woefully sinful you are.

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Before you can be in the right place to truly repent. And repent with a heart aimed towards God.

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Amen. Well, certainly not the happiest scripture in all the

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Bible for sure. But it still is a great picture for us of what sin can do to you in your life.

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And what sin always takes more from you than what you really were willing to give. You know, sin will tell you, oh man, it's going to be great.

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All you got to do is this. And you know, it won't, it won't cost you nothing. And we're seeing that it does.

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It does every time. So I encourage you to repent of your sin. Turn to Christ. Find that his yoke is easy and his salvation is full and free by his grace and mercy.

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Amen. Well, thank you for joining me on this God -centered Bible study of limitations. I hope you have a wonderful day.