The NXR Podcast - THE SERMON - Living in a Time of Judgment ｜ Lamentations 2

00:00:00.000 our text this morning will be lamentations chapter 2 and as is customary we will stand to read it

00:00:19.180 but i want to say a couple of introductory remarks about why i picked this passage so

00:00:23.900 as you're looking that up in your bibles i'm going to take just a few minutes here

00:00:28.320 to explain myself. Why did I pick this passage? We live right now in a time of judgment.

00:00:40.860 God is judging individuals, God is judging nations, and God is judging his people.

00:00:49.260 It is good to ask, what should we do as faithful followers of Christ in times of judgment? How

00:00:56.680 should we live? As I look at the state of the church in America, who ostensibly is God's people,

00:01:03.940 I'm grieved by the fall of the evangelical and the Protestant church. I'm grieved by the fall

00:01:10.180 of Christendom. I'm grieved by the collapse of public religion. At best, what we have now are

00:01:17.540 orthodox churches doctrinally who still maintain their worship of God only privately. The church 0.84

00:01:25.900 is in decline. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America lost about 30 percent of its congregation

00:01:31.700 and closed 12.5 percent of its churches in the last 15 years. Even before the debacle recently

00:01:38.240 with the affirmation of gay pastors, the United Methodist Church had already lost 16.7 percent 0.97

00:01:45.000 of its congregation and closed 10.2 percent of its churches. The Presbyterian Church was the 0.92

00:01:52.680 hardest hit. It's lost over 40% of its congregation and 15.4% of its churches closed between 2000

00:02:01.000 and 2015. The Southern Baptist Convention, while more solid, has also experienced decline. Between

00:02:08.580 2006 and 2020, it lost 2.3 million members. It's not a coincidence that as this is happening,

00:02:18.400 these churches and denominations are moving further and further into apostasy false teaching

00:02:26.360 and heresy the PC USA the United Methodist Church the United Church of Christ the Episcopal Church 0.55

00:02:33.100 and many others have openly embraced feminism the homosexual agenda and all sorts of false teaching 0.54

00:02:40.380 and on the one hand their rejection of the one true god angers me they violate the third

00:02:48.820 commandment because they put the name church christian church on their building or on their

00:02:55.180 sign they say we are those who worship the lamb who was slain and then right next to that name

00:03:02.820 they hang the rainbow flag. It's an abomination and a slap in the face to Christ. We know that

00:03:12.340 these are not true churches, but many in our culture do not know that. They see the name church

00:03:16.940 on the side of the building, and they think these people will lead me to God.

00:03:21.580 And so on the one hand, I'm angered by this violation and by this deception. And on the

00:03:26.540 other hand, my heart breaks as well. These were once faithful churches. These were once faithful

00:03:34.840 denominations. They preached a true gospel. People could go there and hear how to be saved and how

00:03:41.040 to live in a way that honors God. I feel a little bit like the nation of Israel in Judges when the

00:03:49.760 tribe of Benjamin, the entire tribe, had engaged in massive wickedness and God commanded the rest 0.64

00:03:55.340 of the nation to utterly destroy the tribe of benjamin and the judgment was so severe that 0.95

00:04:00.560 only 600 men of the tribe of benjamin were left alive and after that had finished the rest of the

00:04:09.160 tribes gathered together and this is what judges 21 2 through 3 says it says and the people came

00:04:14.940 to bethel and they sat there till evening before god and they lifted up their voices and wept

00:04:20.160 bitterly, and they said, O Lord, God of Israel, why has this happened in Israel, that today there

00:04:26.640 should be one tribe lacking in Israel? They could not imagine the nation of Israel without the tribe

00:04:35.420 of Benjamin, and even though I disagree with the points of doctrine of many of these other 0.87

00:04:41.040 denominations, I also can't bear to imagine Christendom without Christians who descended

00:04:47.220 from Calvin and Luther and Wesley.

00:04:51.060 And so I grieve for what's going on in the American church.

00:04:56.400 And that's why we're looking in Lamentations today.

00:04:58.820 My goal today is to help us understand what God is doing,

00:05:02.660 both in the church and in our own lives,

00:05:05.500 and to help us to understand how to live in a time

00:05:08.240 when God is judging his people.

00:05:11.040 Will you stand with me, please, for the reading of God's word?

00:05:14.100 Once again, it's Lamentations chapter 2.

00:05:16.960 When I finish reading, I'll say this is the word of the Lord,

00:05:19.460 at which point I would appreciate if you would say, thanks be to God.

00:05:23.500 I'm going to read the whole chapter.

00:05:27.500 How the Lord in his anger has set the daughter of Zion under a cloud. 0.87

00:05:32.020 He has cast down from heaven to earth the splendor of Israel.

00:05:35.320 He has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger. 0.55

00:05:39.660 The Lord has swallowed up without mercy all the habitations of Jacob. 0.64

00:05:43.440 In his wrath he has broken down the strongholds of the daughter of Judah. 0.92

00:05:48.060 He has brought down to the ground in dishonor the kingdom and its rulers.

00:05:52.440 He has cut down in fierce anger all the might of Israel.

00:05:56.540 He has withdrawn from them his right hand in the face of the enemy. 0.90

00:06:00.880 He has burned like a flaming fire in Jacob, consuming all around. 0.61

00:06:05.880 He has bent his bow like an enemy with his right hand set like a foe.

00:06:10.940 and he has killed all those who were delightful in our eyes.

00:06:15.480 In the tent of the daughter of Zion, he has poured out his fury like a fire.

00:06:21.600 The Lord has become like an enemy.

00:06:23.300 He has swallowed up Israel. 0.91

00:06:24.780 He has swallowed up all its palaces.

00:06:27.060 He has laid in ruins its strongholds 0.98

00:06:29.180 and has multiplied in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation. 0.97

00:06:34.440 He has laid waste his booth like a garden laid in ruins his meeting place.

00:06:39.120 the lord has made zion forget festival and sabbath and in his fierce indignation has spurned king

00:06:46.780 and priest the lord scorned his altar disowned his sanctuary he has delivered into the hand of

00:06:55.840 the enemy the walls of her palaces they raised a clamor in the house of the lord as on the day of

00:07:01.540 festival the lord determined to lay in ruins the wall of the daughter of zion he stretched out the

00:07:07.560 measuring line. He did not restrain his hand from destroying. He caused rampart and wall to lament. 0.54

00:07:14.720 They languished together. Her gates have sunk into the ground. He has ruined and broken her bars.

00:07:21.020 Her king and princes are among the nations. The law is no more, and her prophets find no vision

00:07:29.260 from the Lord. The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground in silence. They have thrown 0.80

00:07:35.700 dust on their heads and put on sackcloth, the young women of Jerusalem have bowed their heads 0.95

00:07:40.980 to the ground. My eyes are spent with weeping, my stomach churns, my bile is poured out to the

00:07:48.380 ground because of the destruction of the daughter of my people, because infants and babies faint in

00:07:53.920 the streets of the city. They cry to their mothers, where is bread and wine, as they faint like a

00:08:00.220 wounded man in the streets of the city, as their life is poured out on their mother's bosom.

00:08:05.700 What can I say for you? To what compare you, O daughter of Jerusalem?

00:08:10.300 What can I liken to you that I may comfort you, O virgin daughter of Zion?

00:08:15.440 For your ruin is as vast as the sea.

00:08:19.640 Who can heal you?

00:08:21.780 Your prophets have seen for you false and deceptive visions.

00:08:24.960 They have not exposed your iniquity to restore your fortunes,

00:08:28.880 but have seen for you oracles that are false and misleading.

00:08:32.600 All who pass along the way clap their hands at you.

00:08:35.700 They hiss and wag their heads at the daughter of Jerusalem.

00:08:39.560 Is it this city that was called the perfection of beauty, the joy of all the earth?

00:08:44.740 All your enemies rail against you.

00:08:47.240 They hiss, they gnash their teeth.

00:08:49.920 They cry, we have swallowed her.

00:08:52.020 Ah, this is the day we have longed for.

00:08:54.220 Now we have it.

00:08:56.300 We see it.

00:08:57.380 The Lord has done what he purposed.

00:08:59.740 He has carried out his word, which he commanded long ago.

00:09:03.500 He has thrown down without pity.

00:09:05.180 he has made the enemy rejoice over you and exalted the might of your foes. Their heart cried to the

00:09:12.440 Lord, O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears stream down like a torrent. Day and night give

00:09:18.160 yourself no rest, your eyes no respite. Arise, cry out in the night at the beginning of the night

00:09:24.820 watches. Pour out your heart like water before the presence of the Lord. Lift your hands to him

00:09:30.700 for the lives of your children who faint for hunger at the head of every street.

00:09:36.560 Look, O Lord, and see, with whom have you dealt thus?

00:09:39.960 Should women eat the fruit of their womb, the children of their tender care?

00:09:44.560 Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord? 0.87

00:09:48.400 In the dust of the streets lie the young and the old.

00:09:51.460 My young women and my young men have fallen by the sword. 0.93

00:09:55.040 You have killed them in the day of your anger, slaughtering without pity.

00:09:58.520 You summoned, as if to a festival day, my terrors on every side.

00:10:04.120 And on the day of the anger of the Lord, no one escaped or survived.

00:10:08.480 Those whom I held and raised my hand destroyed.

00:10:12.280 This is the word of the Lord.

00:10:14.560 You may be seated.

00:10:23.440 The book of Lamentations was written by the prophet Jeremiah.

00:10:26.980 He was a prophet during the time leading up to the devastation and destruction of Jerusalem.

00:10:33.140 The book itself is a series of five different poems.

00:10:37.220 They all stand on their own.

00:10:38.920 Chapter 2 stands on its own.

00:10:40.580 They were written at different times, but they worked together to convey a singular

00:10:44.400 message of Judah and Jeremiah's grief.

00:10:48.380 The first two chapters are an acrostic poem, meaning each verse starts with a sequential

00:10:55.700 letter of the Hebrew alphabet, 22 letters in the alphabet, 22 verses. Chapter three does the same

00:11:01.080 thing, but it's 66 verses because Jeremiah did three. So it'd be three that start with A, three

00:11:06.580 that start with B, etc. The last two, four and five, don't have the acrostic, but still intentionally

00:11:12.340 poetic. I think even before we dive in, there's a lesson here that when we grieve, it's good to pour

00:11:18.040 out our hearts, but it's good to be disciplined in our speech as we approach God. Even in his grief,

00:11:24.140 Jeremiah was not flippant. He wrote carefully. He wrote intentionally.

00:11:32.540 The word lamentation in Hebrew, which is the title, is ekha, which sounds less like a word

00:11:39.220 and more like a sigh, a groan, a grieving, ekha. One commentator said the book of lamentations is

00:11:47.920 the sound of a broken heart. The question to answer today is why is Jeremiah so grieved?

00:11:55.780 How does he respond to this grief? Notice back in verse 11 how intense this grief is. He says,

00:12:03.180 my eyes are spent with weeping, my stomach churns, my bile is poured out to the ground

00:12:07.840 because of the destruction of the daughter of my people. Jeremiah is having physical grief here.

00:12:13.720 he's convulsing, he's weeping uncontrollably, he's vomiting bile onto the ground.

00:12:21.340 What has happened to cause this? 0.84

00:12:25.280 In short, something has happened to Jerusalem that no Jew would really have believed was possible. 0.96

00:12:32.280 From the time of David, King David on, when Jerusalem was established as the capital, 0.86

00:12:37.240 Jerusalem for 400 years had been the blessed city of God,

00:12:40.820 totally protected by God the apple of God's eye listen to how David describes Jerusalem in Psalm

00:12:47.400 46 he says there is a river whose streams make glad the city of God the holy habitation of the

00:12:53.920 most high God is in the midst of her she shall not be moved God will help her when morning dawns

00:13:00.520 for almost half a millennia God had protected Jerusalem and by extension his people but now

00:13:08.360 when Jeremiah writes Lamentations, God has acted in an astonishing way. He has judged his people

00:13:15.960 utterly. And this leads us to the first point. How do we respond and live in a time of God's

00:13:23.520 judgment? First, we acknowledge that God is right to judge. That God has a right to judge sin.

00:13:32.720 let me give some historical context to help us understand how right indeed God was after

00:13:40.040 Israel's first three kings that was Saul David and Solomon the nation of Israel split the 10

00:13:46.640 northern tribes became the kingdom of Israel the two southern tribes became the kingdom of Judah 0.96

00:13:52.200 the northern kingdom was a wreck from the beginning they were wicked wicked wicked and 0.60

00:13:57.440 they didn't last very long. In 722 BC, God allowed the Assyrians to destroy the 10 northern tribes 0.99

00:14:03.720 to take them off into captivity, and they basically never returned and never had a land. 0.50

00:14:09.740 Judah, however, remained a little bit more faithful to God. It had some good kings, and

00:14:14.880 God allowed Judah to continue on for several hundred years after the northern kingdom of

00:14:19.660 Israel was destroyed. However, even that was a descent into sin, and even by the time of King 0.95

00:14:26.460 josiah who was a good and righteous king he found the book of the law he tore down the high places

00:14:31.800 he killed the false priests he instituted the law in the land even by then it was too late 0.88

00:14:37.700 the kings that followed king josiah were wicked and in response god allowed the babylonians

00:14:45.800 to invade jerusalem and to plunder the city that's the time that jeremiah lived and prophesied

00:14:52.740 during. Actually, Babylon invaded Jerusalem twice. During the first invasion, the Babylonians

00:15:01.320 won the battle, they marched into the city, they plundered the temple goods, the gold and the silver, 0.95

00:15:07.780 they plundered the palace, and they took captive all the promising young men and women. This is 0.52

00:15:13.180 when Daniel and his companions were taken off to Babylon. That was the first time. But they did not 0.99

00:15:21.600 destroy Jerusalem. Instead, they allowed for Jewish kings to continue to serve kind of as

00:15:27.000 governors, but they were definitely subjects to Babylon. They had to pay a tribute. They had to 0.65

00:15:33.000 follow Babylon's requirements. These took place for about 20 years, and finally the last king 0.95

00:15:40.460 of Judah, named Zedekiah, King Zedekiah, decided he had had enough of this, and he rebelled against

00:15:47.080 Babylon. And in particular, he made an alliance with Egypt to the south. And he thought, I'll

00:15:52.460 ally with Egypt. We can throw off Babylon's yoke. We can be a free country in an alliance rather 0.95

00:15:58.240 than a subjugated country. Now, all this time, Jeremiah was prophesying against Judah's sin.

00:16:07.820 He warned them to repent again and again. He warned them not to ally with Israel, 0.94

00:16:13.000 but to trust in god for their salvation but as we see in lamentations 2 14 that we just read

00:16:20.440 judah chose to follow false prophets they made their alliance with egypt and when they did the

00:16:26.900 babylonian king nebuchadnezzar had finally had enough he was going to come back to jerusalem

00:16:32.720 this time he was coming for blood and for destruction now interestingly enough nebuchadnezzar

00:16:41.200 knew his history and he was reluctant to destroy jerusalem and in particular the temple he knew

00:16:48.760 what had happened about a hundred years earlier when king sennacherib of the assyrians had invaded

00:16:55.380 judah and tried to destroy jerusalem you'll remember that was the time of king hezekiah

00:17:00.580 and second kings 19 tells us this and that night the angel of the lord went out and struck down

00:17:08.460 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians and when the people

00:17:12.500 arose early in the morning behold these were all dead bodies

00:17:16.720 Nebuchadnezzar knew that a divine

00:17:20.760 powerful deity protected Jerusalem and in particular

00:17:24.540 the worship going on in Jerusalem which was in the temple

00:17:27.600 he was reluctant so he enlisted

00:17:32.660 his own sorcerer to seek out his own divine guidance

00:17:36.340 And the records report that this sorcerer took a bow and arrows and shot arrows from Babylon in the relative direction of the nations around Babylon.

00:17:49.420 And the reports say that as he fired arrows at different nations, the arrow in mid-flight split.

00:17:57.880 And the only arrow that flew true and straight was the arrow that they fired in the direction of Jerusalem.

00:18:04.500 and nebuchadnezzar took this as a sign that he would prevail and that the divine power there

00:18:11.600 would not resist him and yet nebuchadnezzar was wiser than the jews and he still feared

00:18:20.500 retribution from god and so when he marched from babylon towards jerusalem he actually camped

00:18:27.220 outside of judah on the border of the northern israel and assyria in a city called riblah and

00:18:33.460 from there he sent his general in the army south and he stayed there out of the blast zone as it

00:18:39.180 were. His general Nebuchadnezzar marched south to destroy Jerusalem and Nebuchadnezzar actually 0.53

00:18:47.780 warned this general that he must be careful not to allow the Jewish people to pray to their God

00:18:54.500 or to repent because he knew that if they did God would intervene. It's amazing that even a pagan 1.00

00:19:02.760 king had the spiritual insight that the jews lacked that god's people lacked to see that if 0.94

00:19:08.120 they repented god may have intervened and they certainly had plenty of time to repent this siege 0.97

00:19:16.560 lasted two years the babylonian army set up siege works around the city and they just waited them

00:19:24.520 out and they cut off the food supply and finally because of that starvation the babylonians were

00:19:30.440 able to breach the walls in the month of Tammuz, which is July 587 BC. Second Kings 25 records the

00:19:39.780 event like this. In the ninth year of his reign in the 10th month, and on the 10th day of the month,

00:19:46.480 Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came with all his army against Jerusalem and laid siege to it,

00:19:52.140 and they built siege works all around it. So the city was besieged till the 11th year of King

00:19:58.180 zedekiah on the ninth day of the fourth month the famine was so severe in the city that there was

00:20:05.280 no food for the people of the land then a breach was made in the city and all the men of war this 0.61

00:20:11.120 is the jewish men of war fled by night by way of the gate between the two walls by the king's garden 0.84

00:20:17.900 and the chaldeans who are the babylonians were around the city and they went in their direction

00:20:23.100 of Arabah but the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king and overtook him in the plains of Jericho

00:20:29.580 and all his army this is Zedekiah's army was scattered from him then they captured the king

00:20:35.340 and brought him to the king of Babylon at Riblah and they passed sentence on him they slaughtered

00:20:41.060 the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes and put out the eyes of Zedekiah and bound him in chains and 0.54

00:20:46.680 took him to Babylon in the fifth month on the seventh day of the month there was that was the 0.52

00:20:52.040 19th year of king nebuchadnezzar king of babylon nebuchadnezzar that's the general the captain of

00:20:57.580 the bodyguard a servant of the king of babylon came to jerusalem and he burned the house of the

00:21:02.960 lord and the king's house and all the houses of jerusalem every great house he burned down and

00:21:09.260 all the army of the chaldeans who were with the captain of the guard broke down the walls around

00:21:14.020 jerusalem and the rest of the people who were left in the city and the deserters who had deserted to

00:21:18.800 king of babylon together with the rest of the multitude nebuzaradan the captain of the guard

00:21:24.320 carried into exile but the captain of the guard left some of the poorest of the land

00:21:29.040 to be the vine dressers and plowmen

00:21:35.920 after this destruction they sifted through everything and they even went so far as to melt

00:21:40.720 down the metals they had taken most of the gold and silver but they melted down

00:21:45.120 the bronze and the iron and they carried it off to babylon to use for themselves

00:21:53.040 the point here is it would have been impossible at this point for either civil government or

00:21:58.240 religious worship to have been carried out by god's people in jerusalem there was no temple

00:22:03.760 there were no articles in the temple there was no means to offer sacrifice nothing was left and

00:22:09.840 And that's why in Lamentations 2.7, Jeremiah says this,

00:22:15.900 The Lord has scorned his altar.

00:22:18.380 He has disowned his sanctuary.

00:22:20.580 He has delivered into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palace.

00:22:25.380 Here's the point. 0.58

00:22:28.300 Jeremiah wanted it to be very clear that it was not the Babylonians who were responsible for this destruction.

00:22:36.340 That it was God himself who was responsible.

00:22:39.840 you see the lord would rather that the instruments of his worship the place of his worship and the

00:22:49.540 people of his worship be burned destroyed and taken away rather than continue to be used

00:22:57.080 improperly for false and idolatrous worship god would prefer bringing this to modern times 0.92

00:23:05.380 that the buildings of the apostate and blasphemous churches

00:23:10.440 rot and become homes for mice and spiders

00:23:14.160 than that they continue in perpetuity

00:23:16.460 to reject and defame the name of Christ.

00:23:22.160 Brothers and sisters,

00:23:24.540 God would prefer to destroy this church, 1.00

00:23:28.680 Covenant Bible,

00:23:30.140 if we ever were to allow ourselves to devolve into idolatry.

00:23:35.380 or false worship. He would rather kill your body or remove you from the body of Christ 0.99

00:23:43.980 than allow you or us to worship and serve other gods. He loves the purity of his name 0.99

00:23:52.120 and the purity of his people more than anything else.

00:23:57.080 So there's an obvious application here. Be zealous to purify yourself before the Lord.

00:24:03.900 Be zealous to deal with sin.

00:24:05.900 Be zealous to follow and worship God as he commands.

00:24:11.960 At this time, the Babylonians killed the priests.

00:24:16.020 They killed the kings. 0.90

00:24:17.680 They killed princes. 0.98

00:24:18.960 They killed young people. 1.00

00:24:20.240 They killed old people. 0.98

00:24:21.320 They killed men. 1.00

00:24:22.040 They killed women.

00:24:23.580 The carnage was horrific.

00:24:27.300 Whatever was left of the rubble was covered in ash from the fires.

00:24:31.920 The siege had been so bad that the people were starving.

00:24:35.000 And we see in Lamentations 2.20 that they were so desperate that they had resorted to the worst and most vile form of cannibalism imaginable that I won't spell out here because of the young ears.

00:24:51.280 Jerusalem was not just conquered.

00:24:54.400 It was utterly ravaged and violated.

00:24:57.860 this is why jeremiah is in such shock

00:25:02.880 but notice how he responds as i said we are to acknowledge that god is right to judge

00:25:13.440 and that he is directly responsible for the judgment so first jeremiah acknowledges that

00:25:19.080 god is directly responsible for the destruction in spite of all of this destruction and war and

00:25:27.260 famine. Nowhere in this chapter and nowhere in the book of Lamentations do we see Jeremiah

00:25:33.180 accusing God of being unfair. In the chapter before this one, chapter 1 verse 18, Jeremiah

00:25:42.020 writes on behalf of Israel, the Lord is in the right. We have rebelled against his word. And in

00:25:48.520 chapter 3 verse 42, Jeremiah writes, we have transgressed and rebelled and you have not

00:25:55.060 forgiven you have wrapped yourself with anger and pursued us killing us without pity

00:26:01.200 jeremiah wants this lesson to be crystal crystal clear to the jews at that time even though

00:26:10.540 nebuchadnezzar his army yes had destroyed the city jeremiah says that it was god look back at

00:26:17.720 chapter 2 verse 5 the lord has become an enemy to us verse 6 the lord destroyed the temple and laid

00:26:24.760 the city in ruins verse 8 the lord humiliated his people verse 17 goes so far as to say the lord has

00:26:32.320 done what he purposed he has carried out his word which he commanded long ago he has thrown down

00:26:38.800 without pity he has made the enemy rejoice over you and he has exalted the might of your foes

00:26:45.220 jeremiah is only preaching what god has already said

00:26:51.220 god promised that this would happen long before when he gave them the law and commanded them to

00:26:58.080 follow him leviticus 26 has this stern warning that we see fulfilled here in jeremiah's time

00:27:06.980 moses said but if in spite of this you will not listen to me god but walk contrary to me

00:27:13.440 then i will walk contrary to you in fury and i myself will discipline you sevenfold for your 0.72

00:27:19.360 sins you shall eat the flesh of your sons you shall eat the flesh of your daughters and i will 1.00

00:27:24.300 destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars and cast your dead bodies upon the dead 1.00

00:27:30.260 bodies of your idols and my soul will abhor you and i will lay your cities waste and will make 1.00

00:27:37.660 your sanctuaries desolate and i will not smell your pleasing aromas and i myself i myself 0.99

00:27:46.460 will devastate the land 0.97

00:27:48.600 so that your enemies who settle in it 0.95

00:27:50.820 shall be appalled at it.

00:27:55.780 See, it was not just politics,

00:27:58.480 conquest, the nature of empires,

00:28:01.480 trade routes,

00:28:03.920 political decisions.

00:28:06.400 This was God's judgment.

00:28:07.960 He had done this to Judah. 1.00

00:28:11.680 God is able to weave 0.76

00:28:13.780 a thousand, thousand details

00:28:16.020 of natural consequences, divine intervention,

00:28:20.440 and the way the world is working exactly according to his will

00:28:23.420 to bring judgment on whom he will.

00:28:27.440 He is able to judge nations and individuals and churches.

00:28:33.840 And this, brothers and sisters, is one of the jobs of the church,

00:28:37.340 especially in times of judgment.

00:28:40.740 One of our jobs is to point out that God has, in fact, judged.

00:28:44.600 it's not just economic policy it's not just international politics god is the one judging

00:28:54.140 and as we confess this we pray and trust that some will have ears to hear that message and they will

00:29:02.880 see that it is indeed the hand of god that has brought calamity on their life their church or

00:29:08.280 their nation, and that they will repent. But Jeremiah did not just confess that God had done

00:29:16.060 it. That's only half of the equation, because if we leave it there, some might be tempted to think,

00:29:21.460 well, God is cruel. God is an angry God who is unreasonable. God did this? What kind of God is

00:29:29.740 this. So Jeremiah also affirms that God was right to do this. Even though Judah has just been

00:29:42.040 destroyed and devastated, I mean, think about it. There's dead all over. The people are in

00:29:47.400 complete desolation. Jeremiah writes chapter 2 and points out over and over and over how the people

00:29:55.680 abandoned God and is pointing out God is right to have done this yes even this God is right

00:30:01.720 in verse 3 of chapter 2 we see that they abandoned him and Jeremiah says you abandoned God

00:30:09.020 so he withdrew his hand from you in verse 4 we see that they sided with God's enemy so God made

00:30:16.200 himself their enemy in verse 6 we see that they did not keep the sabbath nor the festivals that

00:30:22.540 god had commanded so god replaced those joyous songs with screams of terror in the temple 0.63

00:30:28.240 in verses 5 6 8 and 9 we see that israel had put its hope or judah had put its hope in its walls

00:30:37.560 and fortifications so god utterly destroyed those verse 7 we see that they abandoned the worship of 0.59

00:30:44.600 god so god destroyed the temple in verse 9 and 14 we see that they abandoned the law and followed

00:30:51.940 false prophets so god destroyed the law that's a striking statement there that is he had destroyed

00:30:59.500 the ability for them to carry out the law both in the civil sense there's no more king in a

00:31:05.880 religious sense there's no more temple but also they now are carried off to babylon and they must 0.70

00:31:11.680 follow the laws of a pagan king they cannot any longer carry out and obey the law of god as they 0.87

00:31:18.960 ought. Though they were an exalted city, the last thing Jeremiah says, though they were an exalted 0.95

00:31:29.000 city, verse 15 and 16, that kings used to travel to and pay homage to and hold up as a jewel on the 0.86

00:31:37.880 earth, God had made them laughing stocks and beggars, disease, something to look at with 0.97

00:31:44.880 revulsion to mock in fact when nebuchadnezzar took this group of exiles back to babylon he did 0.98

00:31:54.880 something horrible many many of them he stripped naked and put in chains and made them march in

00:32:01.300 their chains along the side of the riverbank in babylon publicly for all to see and then he sat 1.00

00:32:07.700 on his boat out in the river and he observed them pass by and he took special notice of the jews who

00:32:14.380 were the most beautiful. And he ordered them executed on the spot and their bodies mutilated 0.96

00:32:22.160 and disfigured in a message to his people that this people, the Jews, are not to be 0.99

00:32:28.700 shown compassion, not to be mixed with. We are utterly shaming and scorning them. 1.00

00:32:34.520 what do we do with this

00:32:40.180 the first thing to do with this is to recognize

00:32:45.740 humbly that this is the kind of god that we serve

00:32:50.140 he is holy he will not be negotiated with

00:32:54.780 he will not be mocked he will not be patient forever

00:32:59.300 though he is slow to anger he was perfectly just

00:33:03.860 to do this to Judah. The second thing that we are to do is we are to bear witness to God's judgment

00:33:13.220 and to defend God, not man. We don't try to excuse man. We don't go to God and say, yeah,

00:33:21.880 but it's not so bad. You're kind of being mean here. No, we get that backwards. Our job is to

00:33:27.920 uphold god is right to do what he is going to do and you oh man are the one to repent

00:33:34.240 you are the one to question if you are in the wrong

00:33:37.480 so when we look at what's going on among god's people now by that i mean in our context the

00:33:44.460 evangelical church we are being judged for abandoning god's commands the judgment is not

00:33:52.020 complete we're a little bit different than jeremiah here and so we preach repentance and

00:33:57.680 we warn whenever possible. In Revelation 2 and 3, Jesus threatens to remove the lampstand from

00:34:04.660 churches that will not submit to Christ and repent. This is absolutely possible. God could 1.00

00:34:10.880 utterly destroy the churches and denominations in America, and it would be totally right to do so. 0.73

00:34:17.600 How do we think about this for our church? Here's a message I think we need to hear.

00:34:23.260 we live in a time of judgment which means we live in a time of chaos

00:34:28.400 we are all very diligent and concerned to try and figure out our place in culture

00:34:35.860 we're trying to figure out who is in charge what alliances to make how to remain faithful

00:34:41.560 who we can partner with who is an enemy we want to be like the sons of issachar

00:34:46.800 who understood the times and what to do and that's very good but remember the most important

00:34:53.480 thing that we can do is to fear and obey god and i mean publicly publicly i don't just mean

00:35:00.640 in your home although you must i mean we must publicly fear and obey god all the more

00:35:07.160 as the church around us abdicates its responsibility 0.52

00:35:10.500 god did not spare judah but he judged and disciplined them and our greatest zeal should 0.90

00:35:18.040 be for obedience to god's law and i am so thankful that i say this to you not as a rebuke

00:35:24.240 but as an encouragement to excel still more because this is the desire of most of us here

00:35:31.200 i'm very thankful for that individually we must get rid of sin

00:35:38.300 we must get rid of sin in our lives we must get rid of sin in our lives we must fear god don't

00:35:45.920 don't coddle your sin you know what coddle is it's to to treat it gently

00:35:49.800 don't play with it don't hide it don't minimize it john gill said that the prophets that now speak

00:35:59.840 are the entire bible open yourself up to the prophet of god which is his word that it can

00:36:06.860 examine and expose you. Matthew Henry, commenting on this chapter, says,

00:36:15.960 if we allow sin, our greatest adversary, to have dominion over us, justly or rightly will other

00:36:22.800 enemies also be suffered to have dominion. This is always the pattern. Israel allowed sin

00:36:30.280 to have dominion over them. Judah allowed sin to have dominion over them. Church after church 0.93

00:36:35.860 and friends sometimes we individually allow sin to have dominion over us and when sin has dominion

00:36:42.200 over over us it is not long after before other enemies of god have dominion over us so that's

00:36:50.160 the first point that's intentionally the largest one don't panic the other two are are shorter

00:36:57.200 but the first and main point of today's sermon is that when we live in a time of judgment we are

00:37:03.240 called to acknowledge that when God judges and punishes he is absolutely right to do so we have

00:37:09.980 no room to complain we only have room to grieve over sin and to hope in God's grace which leads

00:37:17.900 to the second point how do we live in a time of judgment we grieve over sin because sin dishonors

00:37:25.520 God and sin destroys. Jeremiah had preached and prophesied for a long time. And after Jerusalem

00:37:35.940 was destroyed, he could have gloated. He could have run around saying, I told you so. See,

00:37:42.620 you should have listened to me. You're all a bunch of idiots. I was right. 1.00

00:37:47.020 and yet instead god commands we see that in jeremiah god commands jeremiah to write lamentations

00:37:57.840 matthew henry again commenting on chapter 2 says this he says it is a great sin to jest or to mock

00:38:06.740 it is a great sin to jest at others miseries and adds much afflicted affliction to the

00:38:13.260 afflicted afflicted again it is a great sin he says to jest at others miseries

00:38:19.440 when someone makes an utter shipwreck of his life through sin and god judges him and he comes to the

00:38:31.600 point where it is obvious to all kind of like the prodigal son that he has indeed sinned that is not

00:38:38.480 the time to say, I told you so. This person really has dishonored God, which is tragic

00:38:46.960 and deserves grief. And he really has destroyed his life, which is tragic and deserves grief.

00:38:56.520 We need to be careful here, though. Grief has been weaponized in our time,

00:39:01.420 false grief for things that are not sin. It is true that there is a natural feeling of grief

00:39:06.620 when we see death and devastation, when a loved one dies, and this is good and appropriate.

00:39:13.460 But one of the reasons that we are to grieve, that we see in Lamentations 2, is that our grief

00:39:20.660 over people's sin is to, people who have been judged in particular, is to show them what the

00:39:29.260 proper response that they should have is. Over and over in the book of Lamentations, Jeremiah speaks

00:39:36.080 as though he had offended God.

00:39:38.440 He says, I have done this.

00:39:40.160 I am sorry for this.

00:39:41.680 I grieve over this. 0.51

00:39:43.800 He is modeling for what's left of the nation of Judah

00:39:47.100 and teaching them what their response should be,

00:39:50.760 that they should be grieved.

00:39:53.260 Here's the key.

00:39:54.200 Obviously, the people of Judah are grieving

00:39:56.460 over the devastation and the death.

00:39:59.940 But Jeremiah knows that that's not enough.

00:40:03.440 They need to grieve over their sin.

00:40:06.080 and over the fact that they have abandoned God.

00:40:08.040 And so I think that one of the reasons that God commands Jeremiah to write these laments

00:40:12.800 is to show the people that their primary grief,

00:40:17.440 the root of their grief and mourning, is not for the dead,

00:40:21.980 as terrible as that is, but for their rebellion against God.

00:40:28.360 And this is the difference between Jeremiah's approach and the modern evangelical approach.

00:40:33.260 as people are descending into sin jeremiah is warning and then after god judges and they're

00:40:40.580 left with wreckage jeremiah grieves but what we want to do is as people are descending into sin

00:40:47.660 we want to grieve and empathize with them as they're doing that

00:40:53.160 modern evangelicals often want to grieve with the woman who has just aborted her baby

00:40:59.200 they want to put their arm around the lgbtq member as that person mocks god's design 0.56

00:41:05.960 that is not when we are to grieve remember that as judah plunged into wickedness jeremiah did not

00:41:14.660 empathize he preached god's law and called them to repent and it was only after god judged that

00:41:21.460 jeremiah was commanded to grieve with them god's judgment is always designed to teach something

00:41:28.240 God doesn't waste his efforts doesn't waste his actions his judgment also is designed to teach

00:41:35.240 when God gives physical discipline he brings someone to ruin in their marriage when he is

00:41:42.320 unfaithful to his wife he brings the nation of Israel or Judah to complete destruction because 0.60

00:41:47.840 of their idolatry when God disciplines in a physically obvious way it's designed to teach 0.85

00:41:55.160 a spiritual truth. The truth that God is teaching to Judah is that though the destruction of the

00:42:01.940 city is great, the destruction for your sin in eternity will be greater. As horrific as this 0.63

00:42:08.360 is, it pales in comparison to what awaits those who do not repent. So Jeremiah calls Judah to 0.56

00:42:17.700 repent, and now as he does so, he grieves with them. Our grief over the sin of others who are

00:42:25.560 going through God's judgment teaches them what to do. I know someone whose children, one child

00:42:36.300 in particular, walked away from the faith, made terrible choices, received terrible consequences,

00:42:42.360 And when all of this came to light, the parents grieved stronger and harder than the children, than the child in this case.

00:42:52.180 But it was the parents' evidence and demonstration of this is a big deal and we are weeping and grieving for days and weeks

00:43:01.100 that eventually led the child to realize that is supposed to be my response.

00:43:06.680 I am kind of upset about my sin.

00:43:09.960 Mom and dad are crying.

00:43:11.720 Okay, I'm pretty upset about my sin.

00:43:14.300 Mom and dad are crying.

00:43:16.680 I am utterly overwhelmed at my sin because mom and dad are crying.

00:43:23.300 This is the progression.

00:43:24.260 When God's people weep, we don't weep just as an arm around the shoulder.

00:43:30.180 We weep as a teaching demonstration to people that this is what their sin has done.

00:43:37.220 Because sin always hardens.

00:43:39.720 and people who are going through god's judgment need to be told how to respond

00:43:44.700 some who go through god's judgment are hearing the voice of god what do i do ah i grieve 0.92

00:43:51.260 let me give one example from the culture that i think is coming down the line the transgender

00:44:00.300 agenda that is running rampant in our country really across the world right now this movement

00:44:08.400 and the people who engage in this are hardening their hearts to God.

00:44:11.400 And right now, our message is unequivocally,

00:44:14.460 repent for destruction is coming.

00:44:17.760 But I think we're not too far away 1.00

00:44:20.340 from the time when these so-called transgender people 1.00

00:44:24.360 realize that they have mutilated their bodies, 1.00

00:44:27.860 that they have utterly distorted all sense of sexuality 0.72

00:44:30.960 that God has given them,

00:44:33.280 and that they will begin to come to their senses.

00:44:35.000 And as they do, the sense of horror,

00:44:38.080 not just for what they have done to themselves but for some of how they have violated god's

00:44:43.840 standards will descend on them and we are called to grieve with them because they are called to

00:44:51.860 grieve we are called to point them to repentance the first step of repentance is grief for sin

00:44:58.680 we have received grace upon grace and as god judges churches and individuals who are we to

00:45:07.040 withhold that grace from them. Many people in AA realize that they have hit rock bottom.

00:45:15.500 That's not what they need to realize. Rock bottom is not the lesson that God is trying to teach

00:45:19.800 them. The lesson that God is trying to teach when he judges someone is you have offended me.

00:45:25.860 You have sinned against me. So how do we grieve over sin? A couple of pointers from Lamentations

00:45:33.900 two. It's not an exhaustive list, but it's helpful. We see in verse 10 of Lamentations two that

00:45:41.480 Jeremiah and the people put dust on their head. They wore sackcloth. They bowed their faces to

00:45:48.120 the ground. This is a public, humble posture towards God. They grieved publicly. They grieved

00:45:55.060 with their body saying, I am a wretch before you, God, and I have nothing to offer. We mentioned

00:46:02.620 already the the weeping and the vomiting this is a real grief not a fake grief it's the grief

00:46:08.140 that leads to repentance the godly sorrow that does if you are caught in a sin and you're not

00:46:15.640 grieved by it you need to pray for grief but i would also seek counsel from an older wiser saint

00:46:26.020 think about this you have a child who's sick the mom knows the child is sick and she's concerned

00:46:33.640 she goes to the doctor and the doctor runs some tests the doctor maybe knows the family a family

00:46:39.220 doctor the doctor gets the test results back and the doctor begins to weep that is serious

00:46:47.020 the mom was concerned the doctor weeps at the test results if you are hard towards sin go to

00:46:54.560 someone who is righteous and mature and let their response to your sin teach you. Let their, oh no,

00:47:07.120 this is devastating. This will destroy your life. I weep for the destruction you've already done.

00:47:12.900 Let that teach you. Jeremiah was silent in verse 13. Sometimes silence is the appropriate way to

00:47:22.620 grieve. He cried out day and night. Grief is a process, especially for serious sin. It's a

00:47:29.020 discipline, and it's a process. Don't beat yourself up, on the one hand, for a minor sin. Grieve it,

00:47:35.040 confess it, and move on. But for major sin, it's a process and a discipline.

00:47:41.800 Jeremiah grieved for the people, and God calls us when people are going through judgment,

00:47:47.460 especially when they're becoming aware of the judgment, to grieve with them.

00:47:50.900 but grief is not the final word we are christians we serve a triumphant king who is making all

00:47:57.920 things new and therefore last the third way for us to respond in times of judgment is to hope

00:48:04.200 it is proper even in times of judgment where we would be tempted to despair it is proper to hope

00:48:12.420 there are two reasons for this the first is that when god judges and removes wicked people

00:48:20.520 from his assembly from his people he is doing this to glorify his name

00:48:25.560 god can utterly destroy the wicked even those who call themselves christians

00:48:31.380 and as he does this he purifies his name notice he doesn't purify himself he has no sin 0.87

00:48:37.000 but the idolatry of his people can make his name look tarnished look dirty look broken and so when

00:48:46.680 he judges he removes people who are idolatrous and wicked and this lifts up his name this glorifies

00:48:53.760 his name and this is always very good because when God's name is elevated properly people

00:49:00.640 respect and fear and honor it and so even in judgment if the only thing that happens is god

00:49:07.840 utterly destroys and what's left after that is his name shining and bright and glorious

00:49:13.960 this is a good and worthy thing for us to hope in

00:49:18.120 but second when god judges it is the pattern that that same judgment that cleans and washes

00:49:29.840 away the unrepentant can also lead some back to repentance we know this in hebrews 12 it says that

00:49:40.660 for the lord disciplines whom he loves jesus says the same thing in revelation 3 he says those whom

00:49:48.120 i love i reprove and discipline jeremiah doesn't know who who were exiled or who of the survivors

00:49:57.280 is we'll repent. But he's diligent to call them to this. In chapter 3, 38 through 41, he says to

00:50:06.700 them, is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come? Why should a living man

00:50:12.740 complain, a man, about the punishment of his sins? Let us test and examine our ways and return

00:50:19.000 to the Lord. Let us lift up our hearts and our hands to the God of heaven. As Augustine said,

00:50:26.740 the same sun that melts the wax hard as the clay, and we don't know when God judges which is being

00:50:33.340 hardened and which is melting. And so when God judges, we are right to hope that he will save

00:50:40.360 some. But there's a vital lesson here for us to end with. Look with me at Lamentations 2.13.

00:50:50.500 jeremiah is so dismayed at the devastation of of judah he's casting about for some words comfort

00:50:58.460 guidance to give them and he says what can i say for you to what compare you o daughter of jerusalem

00:51:04.840 what can i liken to you that i may comfort you or o virgin daughter of zion for your ruin is vast as

00:51:11.820 the seed. Who can heal you? Here, Jeremiah has no answer. He doesn't know. Who can heal you? 0.78

00:51:21.380 How can God possibly heal after this level of destruction? We don't know if God will save

00:51:28.700 our lost family member or friend. We don't know if God will cause a church or denomination or

00:51:36.240 nation to repent we might be tempted to be overwhelmed when you look at the

00:51:42.660 church in America and what a disgrace it is but we know that God will judge and

00:51:47.920 attendance will decline and the church unless it repents will become the

00:51:51.960 laughingstock among the people and their buildings will rot and become home for

00:51:57.360 mice and spiders and this great loss is better than the alternative of those

00:52:03.360 churches continuing in idolatry but in the midst of this uncertainty jeremiah puts on truth he

00:52:12.720 girds himself with truth he fortifies himself with what he knows about god and he wraps himself

00:52:18.380 with faith and he writes one of the most famous passages in the bible in the very next chapter

00:52:25.400 Lamentations 3, 21 through 26. He says this, but this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope.

00:52:36.220 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new

00:52:43.920 every morning. Great is your faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, says my soul. Therefore,

00:52:51.680 I will hope in him. The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.

00:52:58.720 It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. Brothers and sisters,

00:53:05.020 it is vital for us to see that our hope in God during a time of judgment does not mean that we

00:53:15.300 will necessarily know what God is doing or how God is doing it. Let me say that again. Our hope

00:53:22.900 in God, rightful, proper, faithful hope in God, does not mean that we will know how God is going

00:53:32.640 to work or when he is going to work. On the one hand, Jeremiah says, your ruin is as vast as the

00:53:40.820 see who can possibly heal you. On the other hand, he said, the steadfast love of the Lord never

00:53:47.860 ceases. I hope in God because I know his character, he says. God will purify his name and he will call

00:53:56.020 some to repentance. Brothers and sisters, we live in a time of judgment. That is why things are so

00:54:03.560 chaotic god is punishing his people church he's making the church his enemy in a way he's making 0.70

00:54:11.920 the church a laughing stock but through this he will preserve a remnant he will purify his bride

00:54:18.820 because he loves her with an everlasting love and our response is to acknowledge that god is right

00:54:25.620 to judge, to defend God to the people around us who mock him, to warn people that God's judgment

00:54:33.700 is here and will likely get worse. Our second response is, especially as we see people go

00:54:40.540 through judgment, to grieve over their sin, to teach them what sin does through our grief and

00:54:46.220 then to grieve with them. And third, our response is to hope in God's character, to continue to build,

00:54:55.100 to continue to laugh, to continue to feast, to continue to preach repentance, to continue

00:55:00.960 to worship, to lead and shepherd your family. For God's faithfulness is great. His mercies are new

00:55:08.200 every morning. Therefore, we will hope in him. We will not give in to despair.

00:55:14.120 We will proclaim him and love him and worship him publicly. This is our call. This is our

00:55:20.780 privilege. This is our witness to the world and to the Apostate Church. Let's pray.

00:55:30.780 Gracious Father, our only hope is you.

00:55:37.220 Our only hope is your character and your faithfulness, the fact that you love your name

00:55:42.020 and you will do whatever it takes to purify your name. Lord, we pray that we would be

00:55:49.400 individually soft, that we would deal with sin, that we would weep over sin, that we would repent

00:55:54.980 over sin, that we would heed the warnings in your word about sin. We pray as a church that we would

00:56:01.500 be faithful to you, to obey you publicly and in our own dealings here in the church, that we would

00:56:08.560 be zealous to be a light for you and to stand for truth. Lord, we pray for the church in America and

00:56:16.960 in Canada, and in Europe, that is so, in many ways, so far from you.

00:56:23.760 We pray that you would judge in a way that spares many.

00:56:28.000 Lord, if that is not your will, that you would judge in a way that brings honor and glory to your name.

00:56:34.060 Lord, we trust you and we love you.

00:56:36.120 We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

00:56:37.840 Amen.

00:56:43.400 Amen. What a good word it is.

00:56:46.960 You

The NXR Podcast - June 10, 2024

THE SERMON - Living in a Time of Judgment ｜ Lamentations 2

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