Lamentations

Great Is Thy Faithfulness

A note before we begin: this book was missed when the series moved from Jeremiah to Ezekiel, so it comes to you out of order. It belongs right after Jeremiah, and it is too important to leave out. In some ways, it is fitting that it comes now, near the end, because Lamentations is a book about what happens to God’s people when their spiritual leaders fail them, and about the faithfulness of God that holds when everything else falls.

The Hebrew title is the book’s first word, “How”: “How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become as a widow!” (1:1). Jerusalem has fallen. The temple is ash. The people are dead, starving, or marched off to Babylon. Lamentations is five funeral songs for a city. And right in the middle of the darkest chapter, one man remembers something that changes everything: “It is of the LORD’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness”(3:22–23).

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Authorship & Setting

The book does not name its author. Jewish and Christian tradition has long credited it to Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, who warned for forty years that this day was coming and lived to see it. Scripture records that Jeremiah wrote laments before (2 Chronicles 35:25), and the Greek Old Testament opens the book with a note that Jeremiah sat weeping and lamented over Jerusalem. Whoever held the pen, the poems were written by an eyewitness, soon after the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem in 586 BC.

Lamentations is carefully built. Chapters 1, 2, and 4 each have 22 verses, and each verse begins with the next letter of the Hebrew alphabet, from aleph to tav, like an A-to-Z of grief. Chapter 3 has 66 verses, three for each letter. Chapter 5 has 22 verses but drops the alphabet pattern, as though the poet’s strength finally gives out. The order is not a cold technique. It is a way of grieving completely, everything from A to Z, without letting grief run wild.

In the Hebrew Bible, Lamentations sits among the Writings rather than after Jeremiah. To this day it is read in synagogues on Tisha B’Av, the fast that remembers the destruction of both the first and second temples. When the final verse is read, the congregation repeats the verse before it, so the reading does not end on rejection but on “Turn thou us unto thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned” (5:21).

Key Figures

• The weeping poet — traditionally Jeremiah, who saw the city fall and refused to look away from it.
• The daughter of Zion — Jerusalem pictured as a widow, weeping in the night with none to comfort her (1:1–2).
• The man that hath seen affliction — the speaker of chapter 3, who represents the suffering of the whole nation in his own person (3:1).
• The prophets and priests — Jerusalem’s spiritual leaders, who saw “vain and foolish things” and covered sin instead of exposing it (2:14; 4:13).
• Zedekiah — the last king of Judah, “the anointed of the LORD”, captured as he fled (4:20).
• Edom — Judah’s brother nation, who rejoiced at the city’s fall. Its own cup of judgment was coming (4:21–22).
• The children — the most heartbreaking figures in the book, fainting for hunger in the streets (2:11–12; 4:4).

Hebrew Word Study

אֵיכָה · eikhah

“How!” The cry that opens chapters 1, 2, and 4, and gives the book its Hebrew name. It is not a request for an explanation. It is the gasp of someone looking at ruins that used to be home. It is the question of someone who knows exactly who God is and cannot square it with what he sees.

חֶסֶד · chesed

“Mercy,” “lovingkindness,” God’s loyal, covenant love. “It is of the LORD’s mercies that we are not consumed” (3:22). The word is plural here: mercies. Not one act of kindness, but a steady supply of them. Chesed is the love that keeps its promises when the other party has broken theirs.

אֱמוּנָה · emunah

“Faithfulness,” firmness, reliability. It comes from the same root as “amen.” “Great is thy faithfulness” (3:23). In a book where everything solid has collapsed, the city walls, the temple, the throne, one thing stands firm: God’s emunah. He is the one thing that did not move.

חֵלֶק · cheleq

“Portion,” a share of land or inheritance. When Israel entered Canaan, each tribe received its cheleq, except the priests and Levites, to whom God said, “I am thy part and thine inheritance” (Numbers 18:20). Now the land is lost. And the poet says, “The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him” (3:24). He lost his land, and found he still had his true inheritance.

Eight-Movement Narrative Outline

MOVEMENT ONE

How Doth the City Sit Solitary (1:1–11)

Jerusalem, once a princess among the nations, now sits like a widow. “She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks: among all her lovers she hath none to comfort her” (1:2). The roads to Zion mourn because no one comes to the feasts. Her enemies prosper. The poet does not hide why: “Jerusalem hath grievously sinned”(1:8). The phrase “none to comfort” runs through the chapter like a tolling bell.

MOVEMENT TWO

Is It Nothing to You? (1:12–22)

Then the city herself speaks: “Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow” (1:12). She describes fire sent into her bones and a yoke of her transgressions bound on her neck. But even in her agony, she does not accuse God of injustice: “The LORD is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment” (1:18). Honest grief and honest confession sit side by side.

MOVEMENT THREE

The Lord Was as an Enemy (2:1–10)

Chapter 2 looks straight at the hardest truth: this destruction came from God’s own hand. “The Lord was as an enemy” (2:5). “The Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his sanctuary”(2:7). The walls are down, the king and princes are among the nations, the law is no more, and “her prophets also find no vision from the LORD”(2:9). The elders sit on the ground in silence with dust on their heads.

MOVEMENT FOUR

Thy Prophets Have Seen Vain Things (2:11–22)

The poet’s eyes fail with tears as he watches children faint in the streets and die in their mothers’ arms. Then he names one of the causes: “Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for thee: and they have not discovered thine iniquity, to turn away thy captivity; but have seen for thee false burdens and causes of banishment”(2:14). The prophets told the people what they wanted to hear. They never exposed the sin that was destroying them, and so the people never repented. Those passing by now clap their hands and wag their heads. The poet’s answer is to turn to God: “pour out thine heart like water before the face of the Lord” (2:19).

MOVEMENT FIVE

I Am the Man That Hath Seen Affliction (3:1–20)

“I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath” (3:1). The poem turns personal and goes darker still. He has been led into darkness, his flesh and skin made old, his bones broken. “He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy. Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer”(3:7–8). “I was a derision to all my people” (3:14). He says his strength and his hope have perished from the LORD. “My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me” (3:20). This is the bottom.

MOVEMENT SIX

Great Is Thy Faithfulness (3:21–39)

And then: “This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope” (3:21). Nothing in his circumstances has changed. What changed is what he chose to remember. “It is of the LORD’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness. The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him” (3:22–24). “The LORD is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the LORD” (3:25–26). “For the Lord will not cast off for ever: But though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies. For he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men” (3:31–33). Discipline is real. It is not God’s final word.

MOVEMENT SEVEN

Let Us Search and Try Our Ways (3:40–66)

Hope leads to repentance. “Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the LORD. Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens” (3:40–41). The poet still weeps, and his enemies still hunt him. But he remembers crying from the lowest pit, and God answering: “Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee: thou saidst, Fear not. O Lord, thou hast pleaded the causes of my soul; thou hast redeemed my life” (3:57–58). He leaves his enemies to God’s justice.

MOVEMENT EIGHT

The Gold Become Dim; Renew Our Days (4:1–5:22)

“How is the gold become dim! how is the most fine gold changed!” (4:1). The precious sons of Zion are treated like clay pots. Nursing infants thirst. The nobles who were whiter than milk are unrecognizable in the streets. And again, the poet names the leaders: “For the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her” (4:13). They wander like blind men, so defiled that people cry, “Depart, unclean.” The book closes with a prayer: “Remember, O LORD, what is come upon us” (5:1). “The crown is fallen from our head: woe unto us, that we have sinned!” (5:16). “Thou, O LORD, remainest for ever; thy throne from generation to generation” (5:19). “Turn thou us unto thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned; renew our days as of old” (5:21).

Christ Typology

Is It Nothing to You, All Ye That Pass By?For centuries, Christians have heard Lamentations 1:12 as the voice of Christ on the cross, and the Gospels give good reason. The poet describes passers-by who “clap their hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head”(2:15). At Calvary, “they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads” (Matthew 27:39). Jerusalem suffered for her own sins. Christ suffered the same scorn at the same city for ours. There truly was no sorrow like His sorrow.

The Man of Sorrows. The “man that hath seen affliction” of chapter 3 speaks for a whole nation in his own body. Isaiah saw another such Man: “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3). The details match. “He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with wormwood” (3:15), and at the cross they gave Jesus “vinegar to drink mingled with gall” (Matthew 27:34). “He giveth his cheek to him that smiteth him: he is filled full with reproach” (3:30), and they spit in Jesus’ face and struck Him. The suffering man of Lamentations becomes the Suffering Servant of Isaiah, and both meet in Christ.

The Tears of Jesus over Jerusalem. When Jesus asked who people said He was, some answered, “Jeremias” (Matthew 16:14). It was a fitting guess. Six centuries after Lamentations, Jesus came over the Mount of Olives, “beheld the city, and wept over it”(Luke 19:41), and foretold its coming destruction. The weeping prophet grieved over the ruins. The Son of God wept before they came, and then went into the city to die for its people.

The Anointed of the LORD. The poet calls Zedekiah “The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the LORD”, who “was taken in their pits” (4:20). The word “anointed” is mashiach, Messiah. Israel’s earthly anointed king was captured, blinded, and carried off, and the throne of David seemed finished. But God had promised another Anointed. He too was taken by His enemies, and He did not stay in the pit. He rose, and His throne is from generation to generation.

New Every Morning. In the wilderness, God gave Israel manna, and “they gathered it every morning” (Exodus 16:21). Yesterday’s manna would not do for today. Lamentations says God’s mercies work the same way: new every morning. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life”(John 6:35). The daily mercies of Lamentations 3 are found in Him, fresh each day.

Personal Application

Grief is not unbelief. An entire book of the Bible is given to weeping. God did not edit out the tears, the questions, or the cry of “How?” If you are grieving a loss, including the loss of something you thought would always be there, you are allowed to say so to God. Pour out your heart like water before Him.

Honest grief includes honest confession. The poet never pretends Jerusalem was innocent. “The LORD is righteous; for I have rebelled.” Lament is not blaming God for our choices. It brings both our pain and our sin to the only One who can heal either.

A pulpit that never exposes sin is not kind. Lamentations names the prophets and priests twice. Their failure was not just their own wickedness. It was that they “have not discovered thine iniquity,” so the people never repented until it was too late. Teachers who only comfort and never warn are not loving their hearers. Jeremiah warned for forty years and was hated for it. The false prophets were popular, and the city burned.

Hope is something you recall. “This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope.” The poet’s circumstances did not change in verse 21. His memory did. When you are in the pit, deliberately call to mind who God is: His mercies, His compassion, His faithfulness, His promise that He will not cast off forever. Hope is not a feeling that comes over you. It is a truth you reach for.

His mercies are new this morning. Whatever happened yesterday, whatever you lost, whatever you are walking away from, today’s mercies have not been used up. The LORD is your portion. Wait quietly for Him, search your ways, turn to Him, and pray the last prayer of the book: “Renew our days.” Great is His faithfulness.

TO GOD BE ALL THE GLORY · MARANATHA

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