| Good morning everyone, Our theme for this month: “The end of anxiety and despair” Our Bible verse for today: “Because of the Lord’s faithful love we do not perish, for his mercies never end. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness! I say, “The Lord is my portion, therefore I will put my hope in him.” Lamentations 3:22-24 (CSB) Our thought for today: “Hope never gives up on you” Do you find the words of Jeremiah in Lamentations 3:22-24 comforting and encouraging? I do. But did you know they were written in the middle of the worst possible circumstances? Jeremiah was an Old Testament priest and prophet. He spent more than five decades calling the people of Judah to repent of their ways and to return to the Lord. If they didn’t, their bad choices would have terrible consequences. But the people refused to listen and they refused to repent. As a result, the nation continued in a downward spiral. While all that was happening, over a period of fifty years, Jeremiah endured terrible suffering. The leaders and the people hated him and abused him. Jeremiah is known in history as “the weeping prophet”. Now, in Lamentations, judgement has finally come upon the nation. The armies of the enemy swept in, they conquered the land, Jerusalem was in ruins, the people were in captivity, and there was devastation, hunger, and death all around (think eastern Ukraine in our day). It was in that setting that Jeremiah spoke the words of Lamentations 3:22-24. It was as he walked the streets of the destroyed city, circled around the rubble, stepped over the dead bodies. Calamity, despair, and destruction was all around him. And yet, he professed unequivocal faith in God. He knew that God still loved His people and that He wanted to bless them. So, Jeremiah’s focus was on the Lord, and he had faith that God would yet show Himself mighty and merciful, compassionate and kind, in the middle of the disaster. “Therefore, I will put my hope in him.” I doubt that any of us are experiencing anything close to what Jeremiah was experiencing when he wrote those words. But still, our own situations are hard and often painful in their own right. The words of Lamentations 3:22-24 are as true for us today in our circumstances as they were for Jeremiah in his day in his circumstances. Whatever it is you’re dealing with today, I encourage you to put your hope in God. The worse the situation is the closer you need to be to Him and the more you need to trust Him. God is hope. It’s not just something that’s true about Him, it’s who He is. So, never give up hope, because Hope never gives up on you. God bless, Pastor Jim |
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