Lamentations | Knowable Word

The Fragility of Hope in Lamentations 3

February 4, 2022 By Peter Krol

Last year, my collaborator Ryan wrote a wonderful piece on why context matters in Lamentations 3. We sing Chisolm’s comforting poetry (“Summer and winter, springtime and harvest … Great is Thy faithfulness!”) but can easily miss how hard-fought and hard-won such hope really is.

The hope of Lamentations 3 is not the hope of a college acceptance letter or a career promotion. It is more like the cautious and suspicious hope of a positive pregnancy test for a chronically infertile couple. Or the slippery and fragile hope of a brand new widow learning how to manage the finances that had been handled all those years by her dearly departed. Yes, there is hope of good things to come. But such hope has come at great cost.

I encourage you to read Ryan’s piece before continuing, because I would like to build on what he wrote there.

Photo by **RODNAE Productions** from **Pexels**

What is Good, Good, Good

Study Bibles are typically quick to point out that chapters 1 through 4 of Lamentations are all acrostics in the original Hebrew, where each verse begins with the next letter of the Hebrew alphabet in order. In other words, if it were English, verse 1 would start with the letter A, verse two with the letter B, and so on. However, chapter 3 triples the pattern, which is why that chapter has 3 times as many verses. In that chapter, verses 1, 2, and 3 all start with the first letter of the alphabet, verses 4, 5, and 6 with the second letter, and so on.

Now while studying Lamentations 3, I recently read Christopher Wright’s commentary (Bible Speaks Today series), and he observed that there are two places in the chapter where all three verses in a group start with not only the same letter but with the same word. That more emphatic repetition draws closer attention to those stanzas.

The first such stanza is Lam 3:25-27, which all begin with the Hebrew word that gets translated as “good.” Good is Yahweh to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him (Lam 3:25). Good it is that one should wait quietly for Yahweh’s salvation (Lam 3:26). Good it is for a man to bear the yoke in his youth (Lam 3:27).

These three reminders of what is good, good, good, take on a crucial role in the poem. In the first 18 verses, the poet took a number of metaphors from the Psalms, such as “Yahweh is my shepherd” and “Yahweh is a mighty warrior,” and he gave them a sinister spin, such that this shepherd has apparently turned the weapons of his warfare against his own sheep. In the midst of such raw feelings and wrestlings, it is critical to recall what is good, good, good.

And note that he does not say that “my suffering is good.” No, he says Yahweh is good. And it is good that my suffering makes me wait for him to show up and rescue. And it is good to learn such patient waiting while we’re young. All of this deepens our trust that our greatest hope is not even the fact that Yahweh’s love and mercy never cease (Lam 3:22-23); our greatest hope is that, at the end of all this suffering and waiting, we get more of him as our share of inheritance (Lam 3:24). Yahweh is my portion; therefore I will hope in him.

So when we go through hard times, let’s make sure to get our definitions right of what is good, good, good.

What It’s All For, For, For

Wright observes that the second stanza with a repeated word at the start of all three lines is Lam 3:31-33. And that word is typically translated as “for.” But this stanza is the second one we should look to for special emphasis.

In these three verses, the poet takes the glorious truths of Lam 3:19-30 and applies them to the dark feelings of Lam 3:1-18. This stanza shows the poet in action, fighting vigorously for that fragile hope in the midst of his agony. This is what it looks like to take truth and apply it to circumstances or feelings.

According to Lam 3:31, the Lord is, without question, the one who has cast him off. His circumstances are not the product of blind fate, angry enemies, or a callous universe. His situation has been decreed from God (“Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come?” Lam 3:38). The Lord has cast him off. But he will not do so forever. His mercies never come to an end.

According to Lam 3:32, the Lord is the one who has caused the poet grief. But that is not the end of the story. His steadfast, covenant love never ceases. This love is so abundant that it is bound to spill over and pour out in compassion.

According to Lam 3:33, the Lord afflicts and grieves the children of men. Again, they are not victims to competing forces of good and evil striving for supremacy. No, the Lord has done it. But he does not do it from his heart. His heart toward his people is not one of disappointment and condemnation. His heart of hearts is one of compassionate love.

Fight for Hope

So often in life, hope comes only after a hard fight. Fight to admit how hard life really is. Fight to believe what you know to be true. Fight to confess God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as the one behind all you are going through. If he is responsible for having gotten you into this mess, then only he can truly be responsible to get you out of it. Jesus died and rose to make it happen. The process of learning this and waiting for him to show up and make it right is so good for you and me. That is what inspires us to hope and to trust that what we most need is more of the Lord himself. However fragile that hope may be amid deep affliction.

What We Miss When We Skip the Book of Lamentations

August 30, 2021 By Ryan Higginbottom

As a book, Lamentations is overlooked and ignored. Bible readers often don’t know what to do with it. It’s short and poetic, but it is found among the major prophets instead of within the wisdom literature. It is full of lament, so inspiration-seeking Christians cannot easily hop between uplifting verses. The book is heavy and sad, filled with the sorrows of the aftermath of the destruction of Jerusalem.

But this book is a gem. God has given it to us as his inspired word, and if we’re willing, we have much to learn from this volume.

An Extended Lament

The main thing we miss if we bypass Lamentations is an extended look at lament.

Many books of the Bible contain lament—including as many as one third of the Psalms. But Lamentations is the only book which is only lament. When we read this book, we face sorrow and grief from beginning to end.

Most Western Christians are not familiar with lament; it makes us uncomfortable. With Lamentations we are forced to wrestle with lament as a legitimate, biblical form of prayer.

The laments in Lamentations differ from those in many of the Psalms in important ways. The author of Lamentations confesses guilt on behalf of the Israelites (Lam 1:5; 1:8–9; 1:18; 1:22; 4:13–16) and recognizes God’s hand in the destruction of the city and the holy temple (Lam 2:1–10). Even though God’s anger is justified against his people, their sorrowful cry in the midst of a terrible situation is still legitimate.

This book of laments also makes Bible readers grapple with the issue of complaint. Complaining to God cannot be inherently wrong because most of Lamentations is a detailed list of all the ways the people are suffering. Therefore, we must learn to distinguish between godly complaint and ungodly complaint. (It may be helpful to use the term “grumbling” instead of “complaining” to make this distinction.)

Repeated readings of this book also force the reader to learn to live with the tension inherent in lament. Each of the five chapters of Lamentations is a separate prayer of lament, and none of these prayers resolve in a way that is satisfying to the modern ear. Far from being a problem, this feature of lament naturally turns the sorrowful Christian back to God, again and again seeking his face.

Trust in the Midst of Destruction

Lamentations helps us to acquire a taste for biblical lament, but it also gives us a brief glimpse into the moment in history after the fall of Jerusalem. The walls are down, the temple is demolished, and most of the population has been captured; how will the people who remain react?

We read the people confess their sins and the sins of their leaders (Lam 4:13–16). We see them cry out to the Lord in pain, wanting to be seen in their affliction (Lam 1:9,11,20; 2:20; 5:1). And we also witness these believers cling to the promises of God (Lam 3:31–33; 4:22).

A Lesson in Waiting

The most famous verses in Lamentations (Lam 3:22–23) have been quoted and misquoted at length, and they have inspired a wonderful hymn. But the middle section of the middle chapter of Lamentations is worthy of extended reflection.

In this passage we learn the importance of looking to God’s character—not our circumstances—for hope. We see that waiting on the Lord is not something we may need to do occasionally, but rather it is a baked-in part of following Yahweh (Lam 3:25–33).

Pointing to Christ

Reading Lamentations is a healthy challenge for those who believe that all the Scriptures speak of Jesus (Luke 24:44). How could a book so sad and filled with devastation speak of the Savior?

The judgments described in Lamentations are devastating and, in some cases, graphic. The people have been justly visited by God’s wrath, through the vehicle of the Babylonians, because they turned away from him.

In Lamentations we have a detailed picture of the wages of sin. We have a faint sense of what we deserve when we stand before holy God. And, therefore, we also glimpse a shadow of the judgment Jesus suffered for his people when he took their sins upon himself (1 Peter 2:24).

Lamentations is worthy of our attention. If, as the Church, we soaked in this book more regularly, we would develop greater sympathy for others, firmer trust in God’s promises, and a deeper understanding of God’s character and what it means to seek him.

Identifying Stanzas in Lamentations

July 30, 2021 By Peter Krol

For a number of years, I have been following Joe Carter’s excellent Bible reading plan: Read an entire book of the Bible 20 times. Pick another; read it 20 times. Repeat. I just finished working through Lamentations, which was surprisingly refreshing. As my wife just had a baby, I don’t have time to compose a full interpretive walkthrough just yet. But I’d like to comment briefly on the book’s literary units.

Lamentations seems quite straightforward, with five main poems, matching the five chapters in our English Bibles. This seems all the more straightforward when you learn (perhaps from a commentary or study note) that the first four chapters are all acrostic poems in Hebrew, where each verse (or, in the case of chapter 3, every three verses) starts with the next letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

In fact, my initial take on the book labeled the five chapters with the following headings:

Grief
Loss
Wrestling
Shellshock
Appeal

But David Dorsey, in his masterpiece The Literary Structure of the Old Testament, makes a compelling case for recognizing an additional structure superimposed over the acrostic structure. Upon reading the entire book in one sitting, day after day, I observed that the poems ebb and flow with periodic shifts in the pronouns. For example, chapter 1 begins in third person (“the city … she … her … Judah … Zion … Jerusalem” — Lam 1:1-11) but shifts to first person exactly halfway through, as the people express their groaning (“I … my … me … my” — Lam 1:12-22).

I hadn’t yet sat down to map out the shifts and consider how they might affect the structure and flow of thought. But I was not surprised when I read Dorsey’s analysis pulling it all together. By collecting the pronoun-shifts into the main stanzas, Dorsey (p.251) identifies 13 sections (perhaps we’d consider them lengthy stanzas?) in the book, which match up in mirror-image pairs:

she—Zion—is desolate and devastated (Lam 1:1-11)
- I—Zion—was betrayed and defeated (Lam 1:12-22)
  - he—Yahweh—has caused this in his anger (Lam 2:1-8)
    - they—princes, maidens, nurslings, children, mothers—suffer (Lam 2:9-12)
      - you—Zion—should cry out to God (Lam 2:13-22)
        he—Yahweh—has afflicted (Lam 3:1-20)
        CLIMAX: Yahweh’s great love! (Lam 3:21-32)
        he—Yahweh—afflicts humans (Lam 3:33-39)
      - you—Yahweh—to you I cry out (Lam 3:40-66)
    - they—princes, maidens, nurslings, children, mothers—suffer (Lam 4:1-10)
  - he—Yahweh—has caused this in his anger (Lam 4:11-16)
- we—the people of Zion—were betrayed and defeated (Lam 4:17-22)
we—the people of Zion—are desolate and devastated (Lam 5:1-22)

The heartbreaking poetry of Lamentations is quite moving, and it gives us a vocabulary for our own losses and laments. And the book’s structure greatly helps us to recognize the book’s overall message, which is one of profound hope in the midst of the deepest suffering. Even when the king who was supposed to save is himself wrecked (Lam 4:20), the law and the prophets have failed to provide the life and direction you need (Lam 2:9), and the place where God and man are supposed to be able to dwell together in peace is no more (Lam 5:18)—there is a big “but” writ large across time and space:

But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of Yahweh never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. (Lam 3:21-22)

The structure gives us every reason to look to the book’s center for the key message, which just might become a hinge for our perspectives on dark situations. As Ryan put it, when he explained why the context of Lamentations 3 matters:

We should remember the steadfast love of the Lord every day, but we need reminders most when we feel it least. When we’re tempted to lose heart, when our souls are cast down, we need to remember what God is really like.
Join the author of Lamentations. Recall the mercies of God throughout history and in your own life. Remember that he is your portion. Wait for him; he will have compassion according to his abundant, steadfast love.

Context Matters: God’s Mercies Are New Every Morning

May 10, 2021 By Ryan Higginbottom

Perhaps you’ve heard that God’s mercies are new every morning. You’ve been told that his steadfast love never ceases, and you’ve sung “Great is Your Faithfulness.”

Perhaps your reminder about God’s mercies was splashed on an inspirational calendar above the perfect dew-brushed meadow. Or maybe you heard a perky Christian radio disc jockey quote this enthusiastically in an effort to motivate listeners to get out of bed.

I’ve heard this sentiment about God’s mercies on retreats, during good times, when the group I’m part of wants to extend its current momentum. We’re experiencing God’s blessings—both in ministry and life—and from this verse we’re told we should have confidence these blessings will continue. But does this use Lam 3:22–23 in the correct context?

When we learn to read the Bible as an actual book and not as a professionally-bound collection of pull-quotes, we’ll find that some of our favorite passages take on deeper and more sobering meanings.

The Book of Lamentations

The book of Lamentations is not cheerful. The author was not writing from a mountain top, riding the spiritual high of God’s favor.

In fact, picture the exact opposite of that setting. That’s the background for this book of laments.

(A quick note: Many people assume the prophet Jeremiah wrote Lamentations. There is wide disagreement about this, however, and I don’t think any interpretation changes if we drop this assumption.)

In 589 BC, Jerusalem was surrounded by the armies of Babylon and endured a long siege. The city fell in 587 BC and Babylon crashed in with fire and fury. The temple was desecrated and destroyed. The city was burned. Many Israelites died, and most of the rest were led away by the enemy forces. A scattered few people remained, and they were starving.

The author of Lamentations wrote in the midst of this terrible landscape. In five heart-wrenching prayers, he cried out to the Lord. He knew God’s hand was behind Babylon and that the Jewish people deserved this judgment for their idolatry. His laments were raw acknowledgments of their terrible, warranted state.

The Need to Recall Truth

If we’re going to read Lamentations 3:22–24 in context, we need to pay close attention to the preceding verse (among others).

But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope. (Lam 3:21)

The author had to remind himself what was true, because his circumstances offered no hope. In fact, he wrote that his “soul is bereft of peace” and his “hope from the Lord” had perished (Lam 3:17–18). It was remembering foundational truths (found in verses 22–24) that restored his hope. This is a glorious effect of calling God’s word to mind!

So, when we are low—when we feel God is absent or that his hand is against us—what should we remind ourselves? What should we remind each other?

God’s love is steadfast; it never ceases. God’s mercies are so plentiful and steady that they never end. We never run out of his mercies; they are new every morning. God is faithful and great in his faithfulness. God has given himself to his people as their portion, and because they have him, they have hope.

We need to rehearse these truths; they are as staggering as they are sustaining. And though they are appropriate when life is good, we should especially call them to mind when life is stubborn and hard.

Our circumstances will seldom sustain us. But God’s truth will cultivate hope in his people.

Seeking Means Waiting

This passage of Scripture also describes the posture of those who recall God’s mercies. I’ll warn you—in our flesh, it’s not what we want to hear.

“The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him” (Lam 3:25). The parallel construction here tells us that seeking the Lord requires waiting. Seeking the Lord may involve more than waiting, but it does not involve less.

Those who seek God should “wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord” (Lam 3:26). This is a good habit for everyone to learn from an early age (Lam 3:27).

Why can we wait? Why does seeking the Lord in this way make sense? What truth can give us the patience we need?

These questions are answered just a few verses later.

For the Lord will not
cast off forever,
but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
for he does not afflict from his heart
or grieve the children of men. (Lam 3:31–33)

In his judgment, God may cause grief. But his steadfast love is so abundant that he will have compassion. He does not afflict or grieve from his heart; he will not cast off forever.

Rejoice in the Steadfast Love of the Lord

We should remember the steadfast love of the Lord every day, but we need reminders most when we feel it least. When we’re tempted to lose heart, when our souls are cast down, we need to remember what God is really like.

Join the author of Lamentations. Recall the mercies of God throughout history and in your own life. Remember that he is your portion. Wait for him; he will have compassion according to his abundant, steadfast love.

Context matters.

For more examples of why context matters, click here.

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How Structure Conveys Meaning

November 30, 2018 By Peter Krol

What is the difference between the following statements?

Because the Bible is the authoritative word of God, I must submit every area of life to its instruction.
God doesn’t just want me to work on the Bible; he wants the Bible to work on me.

The first statement is obviously more precise. But I bet most would consider the second statement more inspirational. More memorable.

And why is this? Because structure conveys meaning. In this case, the structure of the sentence itself packs a persuasive punch. The sentence makes use of a “concentric pattern” or “chiasm” to drive its point:

Me … work … Bible

Bible … work … me

The symmetry of the phrases catches your attention. You can feel the hinge in the middle that unwinds until the tension finally lands with force on the final “me.” The very structure of the sentence conveys additional inspirational or persuasive meaning that goes beyond what the first, more precise, statement could ever communicate.

Biblical authors do this very thing, when they embed their primary emphases, their authorial intentions, within the very structure of the texts they compose.

Observe the Structure

Before we can talk about interpretation, we must first develop the skills to observe the structure. I wrote on this topic a few weeks ago, so I just want to underscore the need to do this well.

Get your chapter and verse divisions out of the way. Drop the extra headings that most Bibles put in. Get a reader’s version, use software such as Logos, or print a numberless manuscript from Bible Gateway. Get yourself looking at the naked text so you can actually observe the literary signposts the author drops in like paint blazes on a wilderness trail.

Identify the constituent units. Then take note of how those units are arranged. If your structural observation is poor, your interpretation won’t be any better.

But once you’ve discovered the units, and you’ve mapped their arrangement (typically parallel, symmetric, or linear—again see the previous post for explanation), you are ready to consider what this structure communicates about the author’s intended meaning.

But how do you do that? David Dorsey (chapter 4) explains 3 main ways that structure conveys meaning.

George Pankewytch (2014), Creative Commons

Overall Structure

Sometimes historical narratives follow a linear pattern to simply communicate the progress of time. But at other times, they follow a cyclical pattern to communicate, through the structure itself, the spiraling up or spiraling down of the protagonists’ fate. For example, Judges gives us 7 cycles of Judges, following the pattern established in Judg 2:11-19, which clearly spiral downward into greater fallenness. But the book of 1-2 Samuel gives us 3 main overlapping narrative arcs: Samuel’s, Saul’s, and David’s. Those three arcs advance from one degree of glory to another, yet all three are ultimately tragic in their shape (narrating a rise, a peak, and then a fall).

Another example of the overall structure conveying meaning is the book of Lamentations. Hebrew poetry often works in parallel lines with parallel stresses (A-B-C/A-B-C). For example, “Serve (A) the LORD (B), with gladness (C)/Come (A) into his presence (B) with singing (C)” (Psalm 100:2). But scholars of ancient literature have pointed out that laments cut this pattern short. The second line loses one of the stresses, yielding a 3-2, or something like an A-B-C/B-C pattern. For example: “O my God (A), I cry by day (B), but you do not answer (C)/and by night (B), but I find no rest (C)” (Psalm 22:2).

Lamentations takes this pattern of laments and drops it into the book’s overall structure. Not only do we see a 3-2 pattern in almost every verse (for example: “She (A) weeps bitterly (B) in the night (C)/with tears (B) on her cheeks (C)” (Lam 1:2a). But we also see this pattern across the chapters.

Chapter 1: long acrostic with 66 lines

Chapter 2: long acrostic with 66 lines

Chapter 3: long acrostic with 66 lines

Chapter 4: shorter acrostic with 44 lines

Chapter 5: even shorter acrostic with 22 lines

The whole book takes on the 3-2 shape of lament that visually and audibly peters out by the end, leaving the sadness hanging heavily.

Structured Repetition

When you observe matching units in parallel or chiastic structures, you should investigate why and how they match. Do they present a comparison or contrast? Is a promise in the first section fulfilled in the second? Does one section better explain the other? Is some sort of reversal taking place?

The Gospel of Mark divides into two main divisions: 1:1-8:30 and 8:31-16:8. The first verse outlines the structure: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” The first half of the book concludes with Peter’s confession that Jesus is the Christ (Mark 8:29). The second half concludes with the centurion’s confession that Jesus is the Son of God (Mark 15:39). By comparing the closing sections of each half of the book, we see that Peter gets part of Jesus’ identity (chapter 8), but he doesn’t understand all of it (chapter 14-15). By the end, Peter is denying that he even knows this man (Mark 14:71), while a Gentile military officer grasps something remarkable about the nature of Jesus’ suffering. “When the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said…” (Mark 15:39).

The parallel between Jonah’s prayer in chapter 2 and his prayer in chapter 4 leads us to question the sincerity of his repentance in the belly of the fish.

When you observe these repetitions, these matching units, you are well prepared to ask “Why” and better uncover the author’s intentions.

Positions of Prominence

The final way structure conveys meaning is through positions of prominence.

This is neither mechanical nor foolproof, but often the most prominent part of a parallel structure is the end. And the most prominent part of a chiasm is the center.

Don’t apply that principle woodenly, but you should at least investigate the matter.

For example, Mark 6-8 follows a parallel structure, surrounded by an inclusio (bookends):

Intro: When Jesus sends out the twelve, Herod fears John the Baptist has risen from the dead. But others think he’s Elijah or one of the prophets (Mark 6:7-29).

A. Feeding a multitude (Mark 6:30-44)

B. Crossing the sea (Mark 6:45-56)

C. Disputing with the Pharisees (Mark 7:1-23)

D. Discussing bread with a follower (Mark 7:24-30)

E. Healing a malfunctioning sense—deafness (Mark 7:31-37)

A. Feeding a multitude (Mark 8:1-9)

B. Crossing the sea (Mark 8:10)

C. Disputing the Pharisees (Mark 8:11-13)

D. Discussing bread with followers (Mark 8:14-21)

E. Healing a malfunctioning sense—blindness (Mark 8:22-26)

Conclusion: When Jesus questions the twelve, they claim people think he’s John the Baptist or Elijah or one of the prophets. But Peter (who used to be deaf and blind—Mark 8:18) now sees clearly enough to know “You are the Christ” (Mark 8:29).

What is Mark’s point here in chapters 6 through 8? Jesus is healing his disciples’ own deafness and blindness so they can hear and see who he is.

And what is my point with this little exercise? If you find yourself fretting over why Jesus would call someone a dog (Mark 7:27), what the disciples failed to understand regarding the number of baskets of leftovers (Mark 8:19-21), or why it took Jesus two tries to heal the guy’s blindness (Mark 8:23-25), you need only take yourself to the position of prominence. In this case, the end of the parallel sequence gives us the author’s emphasis and intention: to help Jesus’ disciples perceive who he really is. When we get this, the rest will make more sense.

Conclusion

Observing structure is hard work. But it bears fruit thirty-, sixty-, and a hundred-fold when it comes time to interpret the author’s meaning.

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