GOD’S WORD FOR YOU
LAMENTATIONS 3:33
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33 For he does not willingly afflict
or cause grief to the sons of men.
The Jews struggling under the first cross understood– or at least this prophet understood– that the Lord God is not delighted when he brings suffering or strife to people. Even though they are sinners, he wants them to be his own dear companions in eternity. This is what he created us to be, and with that in mind. So when God corrects and punishes, it is with the final good of the person in mind. When he sent the Jews into exile to the steep, fearsome banks of the Tigris and the wide, sleepy shores of the Euphrates, it was to bring them to their senses, to bring them to repentance, and to bring them back to faith in him.
Look up with me to the second cross, the cross of Jesus our Lord. He was not punished by his Father because his Father hated him, but because he and his Father hate sin. And therefore the Son of God accepted the affliction and the grief set aside for mankind as the Son of Man. He knew precisely what was going to happen to him.
“The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men” (Matthew 17:22). According to both his natures, God and man, Christ was betrayed and handed over to wicked men posing as servants of the Almighty God.
“The Son of Man is going to suffer” (Matthew 17:12). They would hit him, spit in his face, strip him, humiliate him, beat him, flog him with whips until the blood ran from his body like spilled water, and nail him to a cross to die.
“They will kill the Son of Man” (Matthew 17:23). The agonies of crucifixion were protracted by the expert Roman guards to last days. But their intention with Christ– the intention of the Jews– was always to kill him (Mark 11:9; John 5:18). After he was nailed and raised up above the hill outside the city, he only lasted about six hours before breathing his last– from the third hour, or nine in the morning (Mark 15:25) until the ninth hour, or three in the afternoon (Mark 15:34).
“The Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Matthew 12:40). Jesus had foreseen this and made prophecies about it more than once (Matthew 26:61; Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:34; John 2:19). But do we have an error here in Matthew 12? We know that we count Friday before sundown as a day, Saturday before sundown as a day, and Sunday morning as a day. But Jesus clearly says “three days and three nights.” Is he using hyperbole? If some critic or skeptic wants to press the Lord of the Universe on this point, I will stand humbly in the shadow of my Savior and say this: The three days are accounted for: Friday’s sunlight, Saturday’s sunlight, and Sunday’s early morning before dawn. And yet the three nights are also accounted for, too: The night that followed Friday, the night that followed Saturday, and the darkness before dawn on Sunday– or, if you accuse me of counting that time as both the third day and the third night, then so be it. He also spent time in the darkness of the pit of hell, where it is always “gloomy” in the dungeons (2 Peter 2:4), and surely that accounts for a night in and of itself. Not that my Savior needs me to speak up for him. And I beg his mercy on being so bold as to do so when he can command, call upon, explain, and expound on any matter with infinitely more wisdom than this unworthy servant in the shadow of his wings. I can’t explain myself, but I shake and I feel tears having said these things on his behalf. May he forgive me for stepping forward like Peter with his unwelcome sword.
“The Son of Man will be raised from the dead” (Matthew 17:9). This is the glory of Gospel, and there is nothing for us but gospel and good news in these words. Jesus knew everything that would happen to him, and that included his resurrection from the dead. And he has seen ours, as well: yours and mine, and that of everyone we have loved and lost. “For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable” (1 Corinthians 15:52).
Under our crosses, these third crosses of ours, we act, speak, and even think for the good of one another, imitating in a meager sense what God does so gloriously at all times. We even rebuke one another, but “not willingly to afflict or cause grief,” but to call to repentance and to be true to our faith. Paul had to rebuke Peter in Antioch when Peter slipped away from the truth (Galatians 2:11-13), but Paul didn’t do this out of anger or to put Peter in his place, or to remove him from his Apostolic office. He opposed Peter to lead him to repentance and a change in his heart as well as a change in his life.
This life of being a cross-carrying Christian weighs down on us because each one of us is at the same time saint and sinner. We want to do good, and we want to do God’s will, but we have a double weight that pulls down. We stumble into sin, and we also remember that we are sinful, and we accuse ourselves: “Who am I to say this or to do that in the name of God my Lord?” The answer comes from God himself. First, we are forgiven sinners, and he gives us our baptism to remind us that we are washed in the blood of Christ. He gives us the Lord’s Supper to repeat his forgiveness again and again. And he reminds us in his word and through his called ministers to proclaim forgiveness to us, in the name of Jesus.
And as for who are we to do this or to do that…? We are forgiven children of God, put into this world to serve him and to proclaim him. Remember the angel at the tomb of Jesus? The one that was sitting so jauntily atop the stone that had been rolled away? Mathew records his words after proclaiming the resurrection: “Now I have told you!” (Matthew 28:7). I love that sentence. It’s not necessary at all. The angel adds it, and it comes out like an eruption of pure joy from the messenger: “And I got to be the one to tell you!” May we do all of our tasks in the service of God with the same joy, the same eagerness, the same happy service, even when we do such things bearing up under our crosses. Even sharing a message like this is a service under God. Now I have told you.
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 3:33 not because his Father hated him