Pages

Friday 15 August 2014

Lamentations 3:25-66 - Waiting patiently

v25-27 declare the goodness of God and the virtue of waiting patiently for Him and bearing the yoke. Bearing the yoke means living by the Lord's ways, according to His commands. In society there is a lot of talk about the need to rebel when we are young. This is nonsense. Man is naturally rebellious from the day he is born until the day he repents and turns to Christ. So the sooner we end the rebellion the better. The best thing a young man (or woman) can do is to adopt God's ways.
v28-30 tell us that sometimes it is best just bear our suffering in silence. There are times when we have no idea why things have happened the way they have, or where it is all going to end up. In those times we just trust the Lord and wait for Him. v30 is of course reminiscent of Jesus teaching in the Sermon on the Mount. 
v31-33 give the reason for this waiting quietly. In the midst of trouble it seems as if there will be no end, but it will not last forever. For the Lord does not cast off forever. And God's nature is to show love and compassion. In the end the love and compassion will come, and it will far outweigh the suffering.
v34-36 speak of the things that the oppressors were doing. The writer was confident that God would intervene at some point with judgement on this.
The natural reaction can be to complain about God, but we are actually better to examine our own ways, to see what we need to put right in our lives. 
Then after this interlude of hope he returns to his lament, before turning back to hope.

No comments:

Post a Comment