Lamentations 3
Apil 7 Sermon outline
Help me God – Week 1 “I’m sad” Lamentations 3
HELP!
This is a hard word for many to say
At times it can be hard to give as well
Who has ever had to ask someone for help before?
Who has ever given help to someone before?
Because God created us to be co-dependent creatures (Adam needed a HELPMATE) we will utter this word occasionally or even often
In this series we are going to look at how to ask for help from God
Today – Help me God “I’m sad”
Sadness almost always accompanies loss. We all feel sad sometimes. When we say goodbye to a loved one, we usually feel sad. The sadness is even deeper if a close relationship has ended or a loved one has died.
But sadness is a normal emotion that actually can make life more interesting because much of art and poetry is inspired by sadness and melancholy.
And sadness can actually help us appreciate happiness.
If and when our mood eventually changes from sadness toward happiness, the sense of contrast adds to the enjoyment of the mood.
Experts say that if you are sad, you should allow yourself to be sad. If you force those feelings underground, they can do more damage over time.
But rather than staying sad, one should try to discover the cause of the sadness, or at least try to understand the factors involved.
Because sadness can be an overwhelming feeling that drags us down into despair.
Therefore it is wise to look for help, help from God.
Book background:
The scripture that deals with sadness the most, and in the most agonizing way, is the book of Lamentations written by the prophet Jeremiah.
It is called “Lamentations” after the word “lament,” which means to cry. Jeremiah was crying, he was lamenting,
This book does tell us about God’s faithfulness, but it doesn’t gloss over the evil and suffering that we have to endure here on earth.
Lamentations describes just about every evil that people have ever had to endure: war and destruction, rape and pillaging, human trafficking, starvation, and even cannibalism … all of these are described and lamented.
Chapter 1 describes the destruction of city of Jerusalem.
Chapter 2 explains God’s righteous judgment against Judah.
We will pick up in Chapter 3
Lamentation 3:14-20
14 My own people laugh at me.
All day long they sing their mocking songs.
15 He has filled me with bitterness
and given me a bitter cup of sorrow to drink.
16 He has made me chew on gravel.
He has rolled me in the dust.
17 Peace has been stripped away,
and I have forgotten what prosperity is.
18 I cry out, “My splendor is gone!
Everything I had hoped for from the Lord is lost!”
19 The thought of my suffering and homelessness
is bitter beyond words.
20 I will never forget this awful time,
as I grieve over my loss.
The sadness is GREAT
Jeremiah has lost people
Lost provisions
Lost his very home
He cannot find joy in anything
Been mocked by those he wanted to bring back to God
We see here Jeremiah openly sharing his sadness
He laments openly rather than push his sadness inside
Sometimes people give up on God wondering if God is really faithful.
Feeling like God has forsaken them and everything they care about has been taken away, no one understands their pain. And they can’t find release.
What about us
Would we ever dare be this open about of sadness with God?
What about when the church gathers?
Would we ever answer a “how are you” with “My splendor is gone!
Everything I had hoped for from the Lord is lost!”
Sometimes SAD just fits the facts...we would not put down Jeremiah in this time of grief that he should not feel sad
The same is true for us...sadness fits the facts when we experience sorrow and loss
The FIRST step in saying “Help me God I’m sad” is to allow that sadness to exist rather than push it away.
DO we allow ourselves to experience SADNESS...to cry out to God and those that God has placed around us...
It’s okay to honestly express your feelings … just like Jeremiah did.
But it’s not okay to stay there.
It’s healthy to express your true feelings to God, but don’t get stuck there!
Jeremiah sits in this sadness for 2 and a half chapters – 77verses
Then...
Lamentations 3:20-31
20 I will never forget this awful time,
as I grieve over my loss.
21 Yet I still dare to hope
when I remember this:
22 The faithful love of the Lord never ends![b]
His mercies never cease.
23 Great is his faithfulness;
his mercies begin afresh each morning.
24 I say to myself, “The Lord is my inheritance;
therefore, I will hope in him!”
25 The Lord is good to those who depend on him,
to those who search for him.
26 So it is good to wait quietly
for salvation from the Lord.
27 And it is good for people to submit at an early age
to the yoke of his discipline:
28 Let them sit alone in silence
beneath the Lord’s demands.
29 Let them lie face down in the dust,
for there may be hope at last.
30 Let them turn the other cheek to those who strike them
and accept the insults of their enemies.
31 For no one is abandoned
by the Lord forever.
Sadness turns to Hope
No matter how bad life gets, God can give us HOPE in the middle of deep sadness.
No matter how bad life gets...God can give us hope
No matter our sadness...there is a YET
Jeremiah found help to overcome his deep sadness because of this YET… and reminds himself
1. God’s mercies are new every morning
One minister told about a woman years back who used to come to him about once a month … to rehearse her troubles. And he used the word “rehearse” on purpose, because that’s what she did.
Every time, she’d tell him the same set of complaints over and over and over again. She had her misery memorized where she could recite it the same way every time.
He said that he was young and inexperienced back then, but it didn’t take him long to realize that endlessly rehearsing her troubles wasn’t getting her anywhere!
Like a computer that defaults to a certain setting, some of us have a “despair default.”
If we don’t reset our minds, we’ll spiral down into despair. We need to take a cue from Jeremiah and snap out of it.
He says, “Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: God’s mercies are new every morning!” (NIV)
The word “mercy” comes from the Hebrew word for “womb.” It indicates gentle concern and care, nurturing, sustenance, and pretty much everything that is needed for life!
If that isn’t good enough, notice … it’s not just mercy, it’s mercies – plural. Everything we need for life and then some! And these mercies are new every morning!
God never stops working, never stops blessing, never stops caring, never stops protecting – even during those times when it seems as though God has failed. There is no such thing as a “God-failure”.
“my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:19
2. The LORD is good
God’s blessings may not come early, but they aren’t late either.
God’s blessings come when we need them - not earlier and not later.
We may struggle, but God gives strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow.
If we needed more, they would give us more.
When we need something else, they will give us that as well.
Nothing we truly need will ever be withheld from us.
God is faithful, but that doesn’t mean that we won’t have to endure seasons of sadness and grief.
C.S. Lewis, who wrote Chronicles of Narnia, described his own painful experience of grieving after the death of his wife. He said he discovered that “There is nothing we can do with suffering except to suffer it” (A Grief Observed). And he describe grief as “The monotonous treadmill march of the mind around one subject.” He also described the times when he felt as if God had abandoned him. That is the way Jeremiah felt.
He says in Jeremiah 3:28-29, “So let a man sit alone in silence, for the LORD has laid it on him. Let him bury his face in the dust.” (NIV)
Jeremiah found himself in a “Catch 22” situation --- he needed God to comfort him in his grief, but he couldn’t feel God’s comfort because of his overwhelming grief.
In spite of this, Jeremiah continued by saying in verse 29, “There may yet be hope.”
And in verses 31-32 he says, “he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love.” We can have HOPE in the middle of DESPAIR and DEEP SADNESS because GOD can HELP
Lamentations 3:52-59
52 My enemies, whom I have never harmed,
hunted me down like a bird.
53 They threw me into a pit
and dropped stones on me.
54 The water rose over my head,
and I cried out, “This is the end!”
55 But I called on your name, Lord,
from deep within the pit.
56 You heard me when I cried, “Listen to my pleading!
Hear my cry for help!”
57 Yes, you came when I called;
you told me, “Do not fear.”
58 Lord, you have come to my defense;
you have redeemed my life.
59 You have seen the wrong they have done to me, Lord.
Be my judge, and prove me right.
3. Peace comes from focusing on God’s faithfulness.
In this passage, Jeremiah describes an experience that reminds him he can trust God.
When we go though troubles, grief, and sorrow today, let this sad book, Lamentations, lift our spirits. There is HOPE to be found even in the middle of despair.
We can wait with confidence, if we put all our hope in our great God. Their Mercies are new every morning and Their love is never fails.
I heard of a minister who was visiting a hospital when the nurse told him about a patient that had just been transferred from a nursing home because her condition was worsening.
The nurse said, "Someone really ought to visit her. She is very deformed and her body has been twisted since childhood. I think she really needs someone to go by and try to cheer her up."
So the minister went by to visit her. He always carried around a little booklet that he gave to people to read who were very depressed because it was such a cheerful and uplifting book.
Thinking that the woman needed this encouragement he told her, "I have something for you. It’s a happy book, an uplifting book, an encouraging book, it’s a good book. I want you to read it because I believe it can give you strength."
The woman looked at the book he gave her and she smiled and said, "I really ought not to take that book sir." He replied, "Why not? Have you already read it?" She said, "I not only have read it. I wrote it!"
This woman, her body twisted and deformed since childhood, wrote a book that spoke of encouragement and hope.
Friends, our happiness and joy are not dependent upon our physical condition, or the circumstances around us, but upon the Lord and their grace and mercy.
God is there when we are sad – will we say “Help me God”?