GOD’S WORD FOR YOU
LAMENTATIONS 3:2-3
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2 He drove me away
and made me walk in darkness rather than light.
3 He surely turned against me;
turned his hand against me all day long.
Under the first cross, our author remembers being driven from Jerusalem and Judah. Even Jeremiah, who was released from his chains by a Babylonian officer (Jeremiah 40:4), was forced to walk away from the city when murderous thugs took him with them to Egypt (Jeremiah 43:1-7). The prophet had to walk in the darkness of unbelief with those people who were rejecting the direct message from the Lord, which said, “You must not go down to Egypt” (Jeremiah 42:19).
Whether our author was truly Jeremiah or not (I think that it was, but we don’t need to make a doctrinal point about it), he was oppressed by the people who forced him to go where he did not want to go. God’s hand was turned against him. Notice in verse 3 that he uses the phrase “turned against me,” twice. This doubling of the verb adds emphasis to the statement, and to the terrifying prospect that God himself has turned against the speaker, and turned his hand (that is, his power and actions) against him. This is not just God looking away, but God taking the offensive against one who has so displeased him as to cause retribution in this lifetime.
This takes us to the second cross, the suffering of Jesus, when a company of soldiers marched up to arrest him in the Garden. He said, “Have you come out with swords and clubs to capture me like a robber?” (Matthew 26:55). This was when he was arrested, and it was also the moment when his disciples fled and left him all alone. They took him to Caiaphas, the high priest.
Nobody was standing up for Jesus then. Nobody came to his defense. His words were not going to be taken seriously; his words were going to be ignored.
As the Son of God and second person of the holy Trinity, this is unmasks the deeper sin of the high priest and his underlings. They thought that they were upholding the Law of Moses, but they were rejecting the very words of God, spoken by his own lips. How could creation turn on the Creator? How could that which came into being when he said, “Let there be…,” act as if he said nothing, as if he had no value, and no power?
We heft and carry our own crosses, in which sinners and enemies scorn us even when we want to proclaim God’s word, teach about Christ, and tell what he has done for us. The world dismisses our testimony, and the world elevates the theory of evolution, the theory of the big bang, the theory of the so-called ascent of man, and dismiss the truths of God’s word. Like the temple guard that brought Jesus to Caiaphas, the world refuses to take responsibility for what it does. For rejecting the word of God. The world, our government, our public schools, and even many, many mainstream churches, shrug their shoulders and say, in effect, “It isn’t our fault– someone else told us it was so. God has not evolved like our divine world, and so we will not listen to God.”
But we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus and the cross that he carried, and we shoulder our crosses with a new effort to follow him where he leads.
There is an old tradition that the temple soldiers would have led Jesus in through one of the north gates, avoiding the Beautiful Gate on the east side of the city, the one that faced the Mount of Olives. In fact, that would have been a gate that was shut and locked for the night. There are many who speculate that Jesus was brought in through the Sheep Gate, the one repaired by the high priest in the days after the captivity (Nehemiah 3:1) and dedicated by him for service to the Lord. It was through the Sheep Gate the animals were brought into the temple court for inspection and sacrifice. “They deplorably dragged him,” wrote Professor Gerhard, “like an evil-doer, until they had brought him to the sheep door, so-called because the sheep that were intended to be used for sacrifice were herded before this same gate. And if one wanted to sacrifice a sheep from this herd, it was then led through this door up to the temple.” And Isaiah said, “He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter” (Isaiah 53:7).
He had taught openly and defenselessly in the this city for years– and even several days of this very week before. Now he was brought in secretly as a prisoner, to be put to death; to atone for the sins of the world. We heft our crosses and follow him, not because our burdens atone for anything or pay for anything at all, but because our burdens are made light by his burden. Our troubles are made so very small by the Burden, the unbearable Burden, that he bore for us. So now our yoke is easy. Our burden is light.
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
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Archives at St Paul’s Lutheran Church https://splnewulm.org/daily-devotions/ and Wisconsin Lutheran Chapel: www.wlchapel.org/connect-grow/ministries/adults/daily-devotions/gwfy-archive/2025
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, New Ulm, Minnesota
God’s Word for You – Lamentations 3:2-3 Turned, turned against me