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© Family Times | About Us | Donate | Contact Us
Search for sermons by: Commentaries | Scripture search | Topics
Lamentations 2:11–22
» View this passage in NIV (Bible Gateway)
In 1858 Scottish missionary John G. Paton and his wife sailed for the New Hebrides. Three months after arriving on the island of Tanna, his wife died. One week later his infant son also died. Paton was plunged into sorrow. Feeling terribly alone, and surrounded by savage people w … More
This passage contains Jeremiah’s anguished cry as he wept over the destruction of the city he had loved and he calls for the people to cry out to God (vv. 11-19). He vividly portrays five sketches of Jerusalem’s condition which prompted his cry:
A horrific description is given as in desperation children were being eaten by those who bore them (cannibalism), a most reprehensible crime against humanity, was resorted to by the Hebrews only as a last desperate act (v. 20). Priest and prophet alike were massacred in the Temple; young and old lie unburied in the street; virgins, young women and young men are fallen by the sword (vv. 21-22). God had warned Israel what would happen if she disobeyed Him (Lev. 26:14-39 and Deut. 28:15-68).
Application
What is my reaction to moral degradation? I need to be deeply moved, like Jeremiah was, as I see the moral decay surrounding us today. The only answer is a revival which needs to start in my own heart.
Lamentations 2:11-22 (English Standard Version)
My eyes are spent with weeping; my stomach churns; my bile is poured out to the ground because of the destruction of the daughter of my people, because infants and babies faint in the streets of the city. They cry to their mothers, "Where is bread and wine?" as they faint like a wounded man in the streets of the city, as their life is poured out on their mothers' bosom. What can I say for you, to what compare you, O daughter of Jerusalem? What can I liken to you, that I may comfort you, O virgin daughter of Zion? For your ruin is vast as the sea; who can heal you? Your prophets have seen for you false and deceptive visions; they have not exposed your iniquity to restore your fortunes, but have seen for you oracles that are false and misleading. All who pass along the way clap their hands at you; they hiss and wag their heads at the daughter of Jerusalem: "Is this the city that was called the perfection of beauty, the joy of all the earth?" All your enemies rail against you; they hiss, they gnash their teeth, they cry: "We have swallowed her! Ah, this is the day we longed for; now we have it; we see it!" The LORD has done what he purposed; he has carried out his word, which he commanded long ago; he has thrown down without pity; he has made the enemy rejoice over you and exalted the might of your foes. Their heart cried to the Lord. O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears stream down like a torrent day and night! Give yourself no rest, your eyes no respite! "Arise, cry out in the night, at the beginning of the night watches! Pour out your heart like water before the presence of the Lord! Lift your hands to him for the lives of your children, who faint for hunger at the head of every street." Look, O LORD, and see! With whom have you dealt thus? Should women eat the fruit of their womb, the children of their tender care? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord? In the dust of the streets lie the young and the old; my young women and my young men have fallen by the sword; you have killed them in the day of your anger, slaughtering without pity. You summoned as if to a festival day my terrors on every side, and on the day of the anger of the LORD no one escaped or survived; those whom I held and raised my enemy destroyed.
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