Lamentations
5 reminds me of the expression so overused that it has lost its
meaning: “Been there, done that”. Sometimes, instead of
listening to the voice of experience, we shrug it off as not related
to our life. We tend to disregard the down and out, but sometimes the
hard lessons in life are learned the hard way. Today’s chapter is
in the form of a prayer, but it is also a message to the faithless.
It begins, remember “what has
happened to us; look, and see our disgrace. Our inheritance has been
turned over to strangers“.
Many of us would stop listening at this point. We listen to the guy
with the shiny car and sparkling watch without hesitation, but what
could the disgraced tell us? His sad story makes us uncomfortable,
“We have
become fatherless, our mothers
are widows… we are weary and find no rest“.
We begin to look for excuses to exit as he confesses his mistakes,
“We submitted to Egypt and
Assyria… Our ancestors sinned… and we bear their punishment“.
Unpleasant smells and unpleasant sounds make us try to create
distance, “there is no one to
free us from their hands“.
We
want stories of love and harmony, but he says, “Our
skin is hot as an oven, feverish from hunger“.
We prefer coexist bumper stickers to the wisdom gained through
failure. “The elders are gone
from the city gate; the young men have stopped their music… Joy is
gone from our hearts“. Our
tendency is to equate our own “tragedies” to dismiss and discount
the doom and gloomers. Are you too comfortable to hear?
The
chapter and book close with a dirty finger pointing out the source of
the problem with tired eyes looking upward. “The
crown has fallen from our head.
Woe
to us, for we have sinned!”
This is the tipping point of mankind. Many reading this will not
relate. Our calloused reaction says, “Thanks, but I’m fine”.
But some may earnestly seek to know the writer’s solution. Friend,
how do you react? He concludes, “You,
Lord, reign forever; Your throne endures from generation to
generation… Restore us to Yourself, Lord, that we may return; renew
our days as of old“.
There is a place for renewal and restoration. Hardened soldiers
have found it, as have the frail, the proud and the broken. At the
foot of the cross, the thief mocked, the soldiers taunted, the crowd
cheered, but the Savior said, “Father,
forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing”
(Luke 23:34). “The
centurion, seeing what had happened, praised God and said, ‘Surely
this was a righteous Man.’”
The Messiah came from His throne in heaven to pay the debt of our
sin. How do you react to the Son of God when He says “I’ve been
there and done that for you”?