Jeremiah 48:1 - Lamentations 1:22
(Overview of Lamentation)
Lamentations is an interesting book. There are two books in the Bible that deal directly with suffering: Job and Lamentations. Job deals with personal suffering, while Lamentations deals with national suffering.
It consists of five distinct poems corresponding to the five chapters of the book. Just like a few of the Psalms, each of the five poems may be called an alphabetical poem, the first four being acrostic poems. Chapters 1, 2 and 4 each have 22 verses, the first verse beginning with aleph, the second with beth, and so on through the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. In chapter 3 there are 66 verses, three to each of the letters in turn. In chapter 5 there is no planned sequence to the initial letters of the verses, but there are just 22 verses in the poem all the same, so that it too might rightly be called an alphabetical poem.
If we were to assign themes to the each poem they would be
Jerusalem is deserted and forsaken (1)
Divine judgment and call to repentance (2)
Prophetic lament and hope (3)
Zion past and present (4)
Prayer for divine mercy (5)
There will be times in our lives when we face communal suffering. It could be a family that loses a patriarch or matriarch. A church that suffers a division or disgrace. Other times it may be in a community due to national disasters like tornadoes, hurricanes, or earthquakes. Or due to man-made disasters like the Murrah Building and 9/11. Sometimes its affects a whole nation like during times of war. It's those times where we have community suffering that Lamentations can be a comfort, instead of a difficult book of the Bible to get through.
We can hide into our hearts for times of national suffering the encouraging words found in Lam 3:21-26.
21 Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:
22 Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
23 They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him.”
25 The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him,
to the one who seeks him;
26 it is good to wait quietly
for the salvation of the Lord.
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