This message was given on March 5, 2017 at New City Church in Calgary by Pastor John Ferguson. For more info, please visit: www.newcitychurch.ca

1. “Honest to God”
An Intro to Lamentations
~ Lamentations 3:19-24 ~

2. ~ Lamentations 3:19-24 ~

4. A Sacred Sorrow
Studies in
the book of
Lamentations
~ The Season of Lent 2017 ~
Finding Your Voice When
Life Doesn’t Make Sense

5. “Honest to God”
An Intro to Lamentations
~ Lamentations 3:19-24 ~

6. 19 Remember my afflictions
and my wanderings,
the wormwood and the gall!
20 My soul continually remembers it
and is bowed down within me.
21 But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
Lamentations 3:19-24

7. 22 The steadfast love of the Lord
never ceases; his mercies
never come to an end;
23 they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 “The Lord is my portion” says my soul,
“Therefore I will hope in him.”
Lamentations 3:19-24

8. We need the book of
Lamentations because...
……...we need to remember
the pain of the past.

9. 12 Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by,
look and see,
if there is any sorrow like my sorrow,
which the Lord inflicted
on the day of his fierce anger.
Lamentations 1:12

10. “Part of the horror of
human suffering is to be
unheard, forgotten and
nameless… Lamenta-
tions is a summons to
remember realities
endured by real people
like ourselves, to bear
witness, and pay heed
to their voice.

11. Quick Fact # 1
God called Abraham and
promised to bless the world
through him and his family.

12. Quick Fact # 2
Abraham’s family became
known as the nation of Israel—
a nation who was supposed
to be a model society.

13. Quick Fact # 3
Instead of being a blessing,
Israel became exceedingly
wicked, even teaching the
nations new ways to sin.

14. Quick Fact # 4
God sent prophets to call
them back to God in repentance,
but they were ignored (& worse).

15. Quick Fact # 5
Israel thinking herself invincible
provoked Babylon to war, and
Babylon utterly destroyed them.

16. 605BC

17. 605BC

18. 605BC 597BC

19. 605BC 597BC

20. 605BC 597BC 587/6BC

21. 605BC 597BC 587/6BC

22. This was unquestionably
the most traumatic moment
in the whole history of the OT.
~ Christopher Wright
The Message ofLamentations
“

24. “And it came to pass after Israel had
gone into captivity, and Jerusalem
was laid waste, that Jeremiah sat
weeping and composed this lament
over Jerusalem….”
Introduction to the Septuagint
(the Greek Translation of the OT in 2BC)

25. Lamentations helps us
to remember and enter into
the sorrow of people
just like us.

26. We need the book of
Lamentations because...
……...we need to learn the
language of Lament.

27. Woven throughout Scripture
is an unguarded type of
prayer known as lament. To
lament is to ask ‘Why?’ and
‘Why not?’ as well as ‘What
are you doing God?’ and
‘Where are you?’ To lament is
to pour out our hearts, holding
nothing back. It is to pray
without trying to be more full
of faith than we actually are.

28. “Why, O Lord, do you
stand afar off? Why
do you hide yourself
in times of trouble?”
~ Psalm 10:1

29. “My God, my God, why
have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from
saving me, from the words
of my groaning? O my
God, I cry by day, but you
do not answer, and by
night, but I find no rest.”
~ Psalm 22:1

30. “Awake! Why are you sleeping Lord? Rouse
yourself! Do not reject us forever! Why do you
hide your face? Why do you forget our
affliction and oppression? For our soul is
bowed down to the dust; our belly clings to the
ground. Rise up; come to our help! Redeem us
for the sake of your steadfast love!”
~ Psalm 44:23ff.

31. “It seems to me that
we do not need to be
taught how to lament.
What we need is
simply the assurance
that we can lament.”
~ Michael Card,
A Sacred Sorrow

32. Lamentations helps us
to find our voice when
life doesn’t make sense.

33. We need the book of
Lamentations because...
……...we need to wrestle
honestly with God.

34. Is there a God? No. What is
the purpose of the universe?
There is none. What is the
meaning of life? Ditto. Why
am I here? Just dumb luck…
Does history have any
meaning or purpose?
It’s full of sound and fury,
but signifies nothing.

35. Where are you, God?
If you care, then why…?

36. Where are you, God?
If you care, then why…?
Is God good?
Can he be trusted?

37. Lament is prayer that honors
the honesty of pain and anger
while also honouring the truth
that God is the one who
reigns and whose hesed love
never fails. Lament holds in
tension all the suffering that
seems to make no sense with
a determination to believe
that God is just.

38. Lament draws us to God
when we are tempted to turn
away. Lament enables us to
keep moving forward with
perseverance…; it is a way to
remain deeply connected to
the God who loves us and
loves justice even when
injustice makes us ask the
hardest questions of God.

39. Lamentations helps
our troubled faith
to seek understanding.

40. Let’s walk with Jeremiah
over the next 5 weeks
leading up to Easter.
1

41. Let’s begin to practice
the language of lament
2

42. “Why are Christians, of all
people, embarrassed by tears,
uneasy in the presence of
sorrow, unpracticed in the
language of lament? It
certainly not a biblical heritage,
for virtually all our ancestors in
the faith were thoroughly
‘acquainted with grief.’ And our
Saviour was, as everyone
knows, ‘a Man of Sorrows.’”
~ Eugene Peterson, Author

43. Let’s long for Christ’s
kingdom to come
3

44. “This I call to mind, and
therefore I have hope: The
steadfast love of the Lord
never ceases; his mercies
never come to an end.”

45. other images used for educational purpose
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/THE-SLAUGHTER-OF-THE-SONS-OF-ZEDEKIAH-Gustave-Dore-Antique-Bible-Print-c1880-/181748940252
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/11/26/article-2513819-19A7DED000000578-492_306x423.jpg
http://www.yorww.com/607bce_files/image2981.jpg
http://www.artbible.net/1T/Jer0101_Portrait_misc/images/18%20LUIKEN%20ENGRAVING%20BURNT%2036BB.jpg
Image Credit: Hoach Le Dinh
https://unsplash.com/@hoachld?photo=5DJqsjAYlmk
https://unsplash.com/license
Image Credit
http://raphael-lacoste.deviantart.com/art/Sunset-on-Babylon-62864369
https://www.itickets.com/parts/aimagesL/127.jpg