What is the message of the book of Lamentations? If we respond too quickly, our answer is liable to be superficial. We might conclude that its major lesson is: “Sin is bad” or “Sin will make you unhappy.” And while both these things are true, they are not the primary message of this book. Nor do they accurately express the primary message of the Bible itself.

The chief lesson in Jeremiah’s Lamentations is about God. We find it in the affirmation of verse 19: “You, LORD, reign forever; your throne endures from generation to generation.” This could serve as a kind of epigraph for the entire book. It is the moral of the story. Even when every earthly kingdom crumbles, including those personal kingdoms we foolishly try to build for ourselves, the Lord still reigns.

Even though the prophet concludes with a final complaint in verse 20, he is not going backward in his thinking. The very fact that he complains is itself evidence of hope. As a rule, those who despair do not complain because despair exhausts hope. In a way, Jeremiah demands God’s attention. The two questions of verse 20 are like a claim check presented to God on the basis of promises made long ago (v. 21). Yet, what are we to make of Jeremiah’s final words in verse 22? They unnerve us. The final hymn of Jeremiah’s book finishes on a discordant note with two implied questions that seem wholly out of step with the overall theme of hope. Have you completely rejected us? Are you angry with us beyond measure? The tone fits the situation. We have come to the end of the book but not of Judah’s story. Jeremiah speaks to those who are still in deep pain. They have every reason to claim God’s promises but no right to make demands. It is the Lord who reigns.

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Many stories are shaped like a pyramid. They rise to a climax and then descend into the resolution, sometimes called the denouement. Jeremiah’s Lamentations is a little bit like this. The climax occurs not at the end of this book but in its exact center, where the prophet affirms God’s reluctance to bring affliction and grief to anyone along with His unfailing love (Lam. 3:31–33). The beating heart of this book focuses on the prophet’s hope in God’s enduring love combined with the conviction that He will not permanently cast off His people. As Jeremiah’s fifth song of lament moves toward its resolution, we see that the prophet’s confidence is justified.

God’s strong and loving hand has done its painful work. Judah is now in a position to understand her error. She describes her situation openly and honestly. Her joy is gone. Sorrow has replaced celebration. Judah has fallen from the lofty place of privilege that she formerly enjoyed. As Jeremiah so vividly puts it in verse 16, “The crown has fallen from our head.” Yet, this is not sorrow for sorrow’s sake. It is the kind of grief that the apostle Paul describes as “godly sorrow,” which “brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret” (2 Cor. 7:10). All these things, as terrible as they were, were intended to bring God’s people to this all- important admission: “Woe to us, for we have sinned!”

The Lord’s goal in repentance is that we would understand not only what we have done wrong but also why it was wrong. He removes the blinders from our eyes so that we may finally grasp that every time we sin, we commit an offense against ourselves as much as against Him. Sin makes us enemies against ourselves (vv. 17–18).

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How do you calculate the cost of war? You can count the money spent to support troops, supply arms, and then rebuild the damage. You can add up the number of lives lost on all sides. But there are hidden costs, like social disruption, as well. This is less obvious and harder to measure. It may take generations before the full effects become apparent.

Lamentations 5:11–14 identifies several of the things that Judah and Jerusalem felt. First, he mentions the trauma endured by the women of Zion (v. 11). Jeremiah does not try to be delicate in his description. In verse 11, he uses a word that appears elsewhere in contexts that speak of sexual violence and humiliation (Judg. 19:24; 20:5; 13:14). The second effect was the dismantling of Judah’s leadership. The princes had been “hung up by their hands,” and the elders “shown no respect” (v. 12). A third effect was the crippling of Judah’s workforce by means of enslavement (v. 13). Finally, the prophet mentions the emotional cost. The picture Jeremiah paints in verse 14 is one of silence and desertion. The city gate, usually a social hub and center of business, is empty. The elders are no longer in their customary place dealing with the day-to-day affairs of the city. The young men have stopped their music.

As Jeremiah’s Lamentations move toward their conclusion, the unspoken question that shapes them comes home with great force. Why does God allow the unthinkable to happen? It is the question that has haunted every one of these songs like a ghost. The answer, at least in part, is that the Lord does not do so lightly. Deep need often requires extreme measures. God allows such things to bring us to the end of ourselves.

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Hunger was an important element in Israel’s history before and after the Exodus. God used hunger during the time of Jacob to move Israel down to Egypt. He used it during the journey through the wilderness to show “that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD” (Deut. 8:3).

As Jeremiah continues to describe all that Judah and Jerusalem had suffered, the images of slavery, bread, and heat may be intended to recall lessons learned earlier for Israel. It was a great irony that the people whom God had once freed from Egyptian slavery were slaves once again. More than this, they were now the slaves of slaves, forced to submit to the servants of their enemies (v. 8). In the wilderness, they lived on “bread from heaven” (Ex. 16:4; Neh. 9:15). After Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians, they could obtain food only at the risk of their lives “because of the sword in the desert” (v. 9). This metaphor may suggest that Judah’s situation was similar to Gideon’s day when the harvest had to be threshed in secret to hide it from bands of marauders (Judg. 6:11). The people who once drank water from the rock now suffered from heat as well as hunger (v. 10).

As was true of the previous verses in this poem, these statements are not complaints or grumbling but a sober reflection on the consequences of disobedience. Jeremiah’s allusions to blessings of the past are tacit admissions of present guilt placed on Judah’s lips by the prophet. They are an implicit acknowledgment that Judah’s suffering is deserved. Therefore, although these heart-rending descriptions are indeed a cry for help, they are also the first stirrings of a confession. That confession will become more explicit as Jeremiah’s lament moves toward its conclusion.

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It is one thing to reflect on the problem of suffering in the quietness of the philosopher’s study. It is something entirely different to think about it while lying in a hospital bed or standing beside the coffin of someone we love. It is important to remember that the observations recorded in the book of Lamentations are not mere poetic abstractions or philosophic speculations. They are reflections forged in the fire of extreme affliction.

The conditions for those who remained in Jerusalem continued to be grim even after the city fell. Necessities like water and wood were to be had “only at a price” (v. 4). Meanwhile, Babylonian victory did not necessarily mean the end of hostilities. In Hebrew, verse 5 speaks of defeat mixed with exhaustion. In the original text, the first half of the verse literally says, “Our pursuers are at our necks.” Some translators see this as an allusion to the yoke, a common symbol of oppression in Scripture. Others interpret it as a reference to an enemy’s close pursuit.

Either way, the basic point is the same. Life was hard. After the siege was over, it must have seemed even harder. The hope of victory was now gone. Circumstances were so difficult that Judah was reduced to begging their enemies for help. The Hebrew in the first phrase of verse 6 pictures Judah as having “given the hand to Egypt and Assyria” in order to get enough bread. The mention of these two nations, both ancient enemies of God’s people, is probably symbolic, pointing to past treaties as a point of comparison for Judah’s current plight. Their mention also sets the stage for the theological explanation for Judah’s suffering given in verse 7: “Our ancestors sinned and are no more, and we bear their punishment.”

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Memories can haunt us. For someone suffering the loss of a loved one, remembrances such as photos and even ordinary beloved objects can bring both comfort and pain. This fifth and final poem of the book once again expresses sorrow for all Judah had suffered. Everything said by Jeremiah here had already been said previously.

Yet, this chapter of Lamentations is more than a repeated complaint. Jeremiah’s closing song is a true act of worship. It includes both a confession of sin and a confession of faith. Speaking in Judah’s collective voice, this lament opens with a plea: “Remember, LORD, what has happened to us; look, and see our disgrace” (v. 1).

This is not grumbling or self-pity. The tone is subdued without being sullen. The prayer begins with a framing statement like the first petition in the Lord’s Prayer (Matt. 6:9). Also, like Jesus’ model prayer, this prayer begins with a statement of need (vv. 2–3). In this way, the worshiper who voices this lament can see what has been suffered in a context that is larger than Jerusalem’s shattered streets. Judah’s inheritance has been “turned over to strangers,” and their “homes to foreigners” (v. 2). But it is not lost forever (see Lam. 4:22). Jerusalem’s children “have become fatherless” and her “mothers are widows” (v. 3). But the fact that this prayer begins with a plea to Yahweh to “remember” and to “look and see” is testimony to the fact that Jerusalem has suffered under the watchful eye of God. Even when we are at our lowest point, we have not fallen out of God’s memory. Nor have we wandered beyond His sight. God knows our story. He sees our circumstances. He will also hear us when we cry out to Him.

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According to an old saying, “Revenge is a dish that is best served cold.” It means that revenge is most satisfying when it is delayed. However, Scripture offers a different perspective when it warns us not to take revenge but to “leave room for God’s wrath” (Rom. 12:19).

The Scriptures speak so often about vengeance that we shouldn’t be surprised to find that Jeremiah concludes this fourth poem with a warning to Edom that the tables will eventually turn. The people of Edom, the descendants of Esau, had long been the enemies of Judah. Their animosity dated to the time of Jacob, and they had a history of rejoicing in Judah’s troubles. After Jerusalem’s fall, Nebuchadnezzar gave Edom land that had previously belonged to Judah, apparently as a reward for refusing to join their coalition with Egypt against him.

Judah’s loss may have been Edom’s gain, but not for long. Edom might celebrate now, Jeremiah warns, “But to you also the cup will be passed; you will be drunk and stripped naked” (v. 21). Some may be troubled by Jeremiah’s words, which sound to the modern ear like nationalism at best and ethnic prejudice at worst. Yet the fact that the descendants of Esau are addressed as “Daughter,” just as Jerusalem is, indicates something else. The people of Edom also traced their lineage back to Abraham. They were the fruit of God’s promise to make that patriarch a “father of many nations” (Gen. 17:4–5; Rom. 4:18). Their long-standing hostility toward the descendants of Jacob was ultimately a hostility directed at the God to whom they owed their existence. With this reminder of divine justice, Jeremiah ends this fourth song on an upbeat note. The just God who had cast Daughter Zion out of the land He had promised to give her would turn the tables again. Exile would not be permanent.

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In 1937, 18 broken pieces of pottery from the time of Jeremiah were discovered during an excavation of Lachish. On one piece, a scribe had written that he was “watching the signal fires of Lachish because we cannot see Azekah,” perhaps suggesting the city had already fallen to the advancing Babylonians. When the Babylonian army besieged Jerusalem, the only other fortified cities in Judah still holding out were Lachish and Azekah (Jer. 34:7).

In Lamentations 4:17, we find a similarly anxious tone. The author is describing the vigil of those “looking in vain for help” and watching from towers “for a nation that could not save us.” As the signal lights dimmed out one by one, no help appeared. Meanwhile, hostile forces stalked the street. At that point, the city’s inhabitants realized: “Our end was near, our days were numbered, for our end had come” (v. 18).

In verses 19–20, Jeremiah describes the desperate flight of those who left the city. King Zedekiah and the army departed through a gate near the king’s garden and fled toward the Jordan Valley, but they were followed in swift pursuit by Nebuchadnezzar’s army. While on the plains of Jericho, the king separated from his scattering troops and was captured. The Baby- lonians placed shackles on him and carried him to the king of Babylon in Riblah (Jer. 52:4–11).

Jeremiah speaks more of the symbol of Zedekiah’s office than his character when he refers to the king as “our very life breath” and laments, “We thought that under his shadow we would live among the nations” (v. 20). To say that someone’s “days are numbered” implies a threat of death. In the New Testament, Jesus turns this phrase upside down by reminding us that even the hairs on our head are numbered by God (see Matt. 10:30; Luke 12:7).

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According to a study done by the Pew Research Center, when people search for a new congregation, good preaching and friendly leaders are their top two concerns. But what constitutes “good” preaching? And is friendliness more important than truthfulness?

In Lamentations, the prophet Jeremiah tells the truth, even though it is a hard message. He answers the implied question at the heart of this entire book. How do we explain the destruction of Jerusalem? Why did God allow its enemies to enter the city that He had chosen for His dwelling and where He had placed His name (see 1 Kings 11:36)?

The answer is in verse 13: “it happened because of the sins of her prophets and the iniquities of her priests, who shed within her the blood of the righteous.” Those who should have provided God’s people with spiritual guidance were not only complicit in Jerusalem’s sin; they were responsible for its destruction. As a result, they also shared in its punishment. The prophets and priests “grope through the streets as if they were blind” (v. 14). Those who should have been wise leaders now needed someone to guide them. They used to be instructors in holiness but were now themselves treated like the unclean. People drove them from the city like lepers (v. 15).

But the worst blow of all came from Yahweh, who “scattered them” and “no longer watches over them” (v. 16). The Hebrew text says that He will “no longer regard their face.” The priests had lost the privilege of serving in His presence, and the elders had been stripped of the dignity of their calling. It’s easy to see why today’s churchgoers want a pastor who is friendly and interesting. Yet neither is a substitute for faithfulness to God and a holy character.

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The Donner Party’s infamous tale of starvation on the Oregon trail has become a symbol of the shocking lengths to which people will go under extreme circumstances. Some in the party actually resorted to cannibalism.

Jeremiah gives us a similarly grim picture of some in Jerusalem who were so desperate with hunger that they “cooked their own children” (v. 10). Although the act itself was monstrous, those who did such a shocking thing were not. Jeremiah actually says they were “compassionate women.” How, then, do we explain such inconsistent behavior? It may partly be explained by the rationale of verse 9, which says that those who were killed by the sword were better off than those who died of famine. Perhaps those unfortunate mothers convinced themselves that what they were doing was actually an act of mercy that would protect their children from being so “racked with hunger” that they would “waste away for lack of food from the field” (v. 9).

In the end, however, Jeremiah opts for a theological explanation for such unbelievable extremity. The sufferings and atrocities described in this poem are signs of God’s judgment (v. 11). They are also a warning to the rest of the world that God will one day call everyone to account (v. 12). This is truth poignantly summarized by the apostle in 1 Peter 4:17: “For it is time for judgment to begin with God’s household; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God?” Judah ignored God’s warnings, and the consequences make us shudder.

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