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Lamentations
4 readily gives us two thoughts to ponder.
Neither of the thoughts is difficult to see in the text. Both of these thoughts lead to deep places
for contemplation.
The first
thought is regarding the Hebrew people.
Jeremiah teaches us that repentance is hard. After all, if someone dies by the sword it is
over in minutes. Sodom was consumed in a
moment. Jerusalem, however, has been besieged. It has gone into exile. It is being purified.
Purification
is hard work. It is never easy to have
one’s impurities stripped out. It is
never easy to face one’s consequences and realize that we have to deal with them. Sometimes we can look at the victim of a
quick punishment with jealousy when we are enduring a drawn out hardship.
This ignores
one important fact, though. Purification
leads us to a better place. We know the
grace and love of God because we walk with Him through the Valley of the Shadow
of Death. God doesn’t punish us to watch
us suffer, He judges us to make us better!
The second
of these thoughts is how Jeremiah speaks regarding Edom. Notice that while Jeremiah is lament the
judgment of the Hebrew people, he indicates that Edom’s punishment is
coming. The cup will be passed to
her. She will drink and be stripped bare. Edom’s sin will be exposed.
There’s a
deep truth here. As bad as punishment
is, isn’t it far better to be through punishment than anticipating it? Once we get through punishment, we can turn
our attention to restoration, recovery, restitution, forgiveness, and everything
else that follows the repairing of brokenness.
Punishment is just the beginning of restitution. That doesn’t make it fun. Nor does it make it enjoyable. But I’d rather know punishment and be done
with it than still be waiting for it to happen!
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