GOD’S WORD FOR DECEMBER 28 ~ ~Lamentations 3:40-41 ~ ~ “Let us search out and examine our ways,
and turn back to the Lord; Let us lift our hearts and hands to God in heaven.”
Still in Chapter 11 of “How to Read the Bible”, talking about the major prophets. Today we’re in the Book of Lamentations, written by the prophet Jeremiah.
LAMENTATIONS: OUT OF DESOLATION, HOPE!!
The book of Lamentations reflects the prophet Jeremia’s sorrow over the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jews’ exile in Babylon. The book is so intense in its emotions that, at time, it reads like an indictment against God for allowing the destruction of Judah. Yet Jeremiah had spent decades warning the people that their idolatries and abominations would lead to this very end. “I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of the Lord’s wrath,” he laments. “He has driven me away and made me walk in darkness rather than light.” (Lamentations 3:1-2)
But Jeremiah ultimately comes to a place of peace with and hope in God. In the same chapter, he writes these words of comfort and faith:
This I recall to my mind, Therefore I have hope.
Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I hope in Him!”
The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,
To the soul who seeks Him.
It is good that one should hope and wait quietly
For the salvation of the Lord.
Lamentations 3:26-28
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POEM BY HELEN STEINER RICE
“THE WAY TO LOVE AND PEACE”
There is no thinking person who can stand untouched today and view the world around us slowly drifting to decay
Without feeling deep within them a silent, unnamed dread as they contemplate the future that lies frighteningly ahead.
And as the CLOUDS OF CHAOS gather in man’s muddled mind, and he searches for an answer he ALONE can never find,
Let us recognize we’re facing problems man has never solved and with all our daily efforts life grows more and more involved.
But our future will seem brighter and we’ll meet with less resistance if we call upon our Father and seek Divine Assistance.
For the Spirit can unravel many tangled, knotted threads that defy the skill and power of the world’s best hands and heads.
And our plans for growth and progress, of which we all have dreamed, cannot survive materially unless OUR SPIRITS ARE REDEEMED.
For only when the mind of man is united with the soul can LOVE and PEACE combine to make our lives complete and whole.
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Galatians 5:22
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,”
James 1:2-8
“My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”
Psalm 130:5-6
“I wait for the Lord, my soul does wait and in His Word do I hope.”
Charles H. Spurgeon:
“The waiting itself is the benefit. The answer is already wrought out and laid up with Jesus.”
Ps 34:22
“None of them that trust in Him shall be desolate.”