Tag: grief
Lament over Jerusalem!
Scripture reading for August 16: Lamentations 1-5
Jeremiah composed a series of five funeral songs about the death of Jerusalem and the captivity of God’s people. As a pastor, this book is helpful to gain insight into the process of grief and helping families and individuals deal with death and loss. Grief takes time and energy to process. Mourning people go through stages ranging from disbelief and shock, to mourning and wailing, blaming others or God, to quiet acceptance and finally readiness to move on. God understands our grief and sorrows for His Son, Jesus, was a man of sorrows and familiar with suffering. (Isaiah 53:3)
Jeremiah was known as the weeping prophet because he had a tender heart of compassion for God’s people. (Lamentations 1:16) He had warned them faithfully of the coming judgment and destruction of Jerusalem. He had witnessed the destruction and now wrote to chronicle the grief process. Jeremiah was a lot like Jesus Christ, Who also wept over the city of Jerusalem as He saw prophetically the destruction that was to come upon it for their rejection of Him as their Messiah. (Matthew 23:37-39) God values tears so much that the Psalmist said He gathers them up in a bottle and records them on a scroll. (Psalm 56:8) Tears are a sign of compassion and were cried by Jesus at Lazarus’ tomb and again over Jerusalem.
In Lamentations 3, the prophet is recounting his misery and described it with images that bring Isaiah 53 and the crucifixion to mind. In the middle of his rant, he turned his thoughts to hope! (Lamentation 3:20-21) He remembered God’s steadfast love and great compassion. Jeremiah declared that His mercy is “new every morning” and that “great is God’s faithfulness”. (Lamentations 3:22-23) Because God was Jeremiah’s portion, he chose to wait for the Lord, Who is good to those who wait for Him and put their hope in Him! It is truly God’s mercy that gives us hope and leads us to repentance! (Romans 2:4)
This funeral lament ends with words of faith and hope and a prayer. God is sovereign and reigns forever. In His compassion, He would restore them as they prayed. Take a moment and offer a prayer of thanksgiving and trust in the Lord for His loving compassion today. His Son Jesus Christ wept over us and bore our sorrows and tears that we might live in His love and receive new mercies every morning!
“You, O Lord, reign forever; your throne endures from generation to generation. Why do you always forget us? Why do you forsake us so long? Restore us to Yourself, O Lord, that we may return; renew our days as of old unless You have utterly rejected us and are angry with us beyond measure.” Lamentations 5:19-22
Godly grief and true repentance
Scripture reading for September 24th: 2nd Corinthians 7
Key Scriptures: 2nd Corinthians 7:8-12 “For even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it–though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you, though only for a little while. As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting. For you felt a godly grief, so that you suffered no loss through us. For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment! At every point you have proved yourselves innocent in the matter.”
Sin in our life or the church causes us or the church family grief. Sin, when confronted, also can cause grief to the individual who is harboring it or to the church family to whom the one caught in sin belongs. Paul had confronted the elders in Corinth of their need to discipline the man caught in sexual sin with his own mother-in-law. They had responded by putting him out of the body, as he recommended. In this letter Paul had asked them to receive back the one they had disciplined lest he be overcome with excessive grief. There are two kinds of grief–worldly grief is just sorry that they were found out. This kind of grief leads to more sin and eventually death. Godly grief leads to a deep regret that causes a change in mind, attitude and behavior and produces restoration and spiritual life. All discipline has the goal of restoration and life.
2nd Corinthians 7:1 “Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of the Lord.”
Faith confession and prayer: Father God, thank You for being our Father and calling us to repentance and a life of holy separation to you. Thank You for a Father’s discipline that leads to godly sorrow, repentance and life. Deliver me from any worldly sorrow and always lead me in true repentance. Help me as a father, pastor and Christ-follower to call those caught in sin to godly grief and true repentance.
Psalm 51:10-12 “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from Your presence, and take not Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of Your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit.”