Lamentations 3:19-26

[0:00] If you would like to, you can go ahead and be opening your Bibles to the book of Lamentations. In chapter 3, Lamentations is not a book that's very commonly read, so I'll tell you it is right after Jeremiah.

[0:22] Jeremiah, there's some debate in the theological world, if you'd like to call it that, as to who wrote the book of Lamentations.

[0:45] It's commonly attributed to Jeremiah, me personally. I think it's written by Jeremiah. Jeremiah, it's a very short book, but there's nothing in it that explicitly states that Jeremiah wrote this book.

[1:02] It is widely accepted by Hebrew scholars and rabbis that Jeremiah wrote it. Jerome, one of the early church fathers, he actually notated when he translated the Bible into Latin that it was written by Jeremiah.

[1:17] However, in recent decades, there have been some quote-unquote scholarly people that have questioned whether or not Jeremiah wrote the book of Lamentations.

[1:29] But folks, regardless of if Jeremiah did or Jeremiah didn't, regardless of my opinion or some German scholar's opinion or anybody else, it is God-inspired, it is God-breathed, and it is part of the 66 books of the closed canon of Scripture.

[1:47] Therefore, God wrote it Himself.

[2:17] And actually wrote this scripture, whoever wrote it for that matter. Obviously, shortly after the time that the Babylonians came in and raced Jerusalem, raced Judah, really.

[2:35] Jeremiah would have written this very shortly thereafter that time. We know that King Nebuchadnezzar came in and destroyed it, destroyed the temple, looted the temple.

[2:50] All these things happened about 586 B.C. And it was shortly thereafter that this book would have been written. This book is full of grief.

[3:03] It's full of sorrow. You read through the first couple of chapters of it, and that's all it is. It's talking about the sorrow of the Israelite people, namely the land of Judah.

[3:18] It's talking about their grief, talking about them going into exile. You can also read about these things in 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles, as well as other books of the Bible.

[3:31] We know that Daniel was written about those same matters, as well as other things in the Bible. So we've got this book that is just chock full of grief and sorrow and woe.

[3:48] And not only these things, but it's also chock full of the judgment of God because of the sin of His people. God warned them that judgment was coming. He warned them through prophets.

[4:01] They ignored His warnings. And what God says will come to pass. So when God says judgment's coming, judgment is coming. God can put that off if He wants to.

[4:13] He can delay that if He wants to. He can tarry that if He wants to. But nevertheless, if God says judgment is coming, judgment is coming. It's not much different than when Jonah went to the city of Nineveh and preached that the judgment of God was coming to the city of Nineveh and to the Syrians there.

[4:35] Those people, they repented. So God caused His judgment to tarry for several decades there. But the people fell right back into their ways and God's judgment did come.

[4:48] So in this book of Lamentations, we have what we would consider as human beings and what I consider as a human being. A bunch of negativity. Like I said, there's sorrow, there's grief, there's woe, there's judgment, there's all these things.

[5:04] But in Lamentations chapter 3, we find a very pivotal point in this book. And that's where I want to read from this morning. I hope to be an encouragement to you.

[5:17] I'll be honest with you, I've been looking forward to preaching this. And I can't say that I feel that way every time I get in the pulpit to preach. There's some messages that I absolutely dread to preach.

[5:28] But I get up and preach them if that's what God's got laid on my heart. But in Lamentations 3, beginning at verse 19, the writer says, Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall, my soul hath them still in remembrance and is humbled in me.

[5:53] This I recall to my mind. Therefore have I hope. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because his compassions fail not.

[6:04] They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul. Therefore will I hope in him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him.

[6:19] It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord. That completes the reading of that particular passage.

[6:29] Back to verse 19. Again, the writer says here, Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. So we have here the writer saying that he's remembering these things.

[6:44] He's remembering his affliction. But he's not only, if you go back to chapter 1 of Lamentations and read on through chapter 2 and on through the first 18 verses of chapter 3, you'll see that the writer here is not only remembering his own afflictions and his own misery, but he's remembering the misery and the afflictions of his people, of the Jewish people as a whole.

[7:09] But he says that he's remembering these things. And folks, when we remember things, sometimes in our lives we see something that causes us to remember.

[7:19] It causes us to flash back in our memories to a time that has since gone. But here the writer says he's remembering his affliction and his misery, telling me that he is choosing to remember these things.

[7:36] He's choosing to remember the affliction, the sorrow, the woe that he is feeling not only for himself, but for his people as well. And he goes on to describe it as the wormwood and the gall, talking about the bitterness of this memory that he has.

[7:53] Folks, in Jeremiah, he would have been alive at the time that the Babylonians came in, that King Nebuchadnezzar came in with the Babylonian army, and they overtook Jerusalem.

[8:05] Jerusalem in all of its splendor and all of its glory. This city called Jerusalem that God himself had set his own name upon the capital city.

[8:16] And in my own personal opinion, the very center of the universe in the eyes of God, the city of Jerusalem was raised. It was smashed. It was destroyed.

[8:27] The temple of God was destroyed. It was looted. People took all the furnitures out of the temple. They took all the plates, all the wares, and everything that was in there out of this temple.

[8:37] And Jeremiah would have fallen witness to all of this. And he's saying that this is bitterness in his soul. This is bitterness that he is remembering.

[8:48] It's woeful. It's sorrowful. And folks, things like this happen in our own lives. Things come about, whether it's sickness, whether it's death, whether it's heartache, whether it's bad news from the doctor, whether it's bad news from the bank, whether it's bad news from a job, whether it's bad news from anywhere.

[9:06] Things like this will come into our lives. And we might look back on some of these things and remember them with bitterness and remember them, as the writer here said, with gall, as gall or as wormwood, talking about the bitterness of these situations.

[9:23] But folks, it is not an awful thing for us to remember these times. It is not an awful thing for us to look back on the times where we were full of sorrow, on the times where we were outright depressed.

[9:37] It's not a bad thing to reflect back on those things because it brings to memory the goodness of Almighty God that has brought us out of those situations in the past.

[9:48] It doesn't matter how many times we've been sick. It doesn't matter how sick we have been. It doesn't matter if we were at the very point of death, on death's bed, right in a death's door, or if we just had a runny nose, God has delivered us more times than one out of our sickness and out of our affliction and out of our misery and out of our sorrow.

[10:09] Why would we think for one moment that God would not continue to deliver us out of these woeful times in our life when we look back and we see the times that God has delivered, God has picked us up, He has set us on the solid ground, He has established our goings, and He has given us everything that we need to sustain us in this walk.

[10:32] Why would we doubt that He would continue to do this? Hallelujah. God is good. Everything about God is good. The Bible says that every good and perfect gift cometh down from the Father of lights.

[10:46] That's my God that the writer is talking about in the book of James there in chapter 1. Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father of lights.

[10:56] The writer here is remembering the things that has happened. Remembering these things in sorrow and in woe. But he continues in verse 20, My soul hath them still in remembrance and is humbled in me.

[11:11] Folks, this is the place where every one of us need to get to. And when something causes us to remember or if we're just thinking back, taking a stroll down memory lane and we remember these things that should bring us to a point of humility.

[11:26] Our soul should be humbled. It should be humbled that God is so good. It should be humbled that God would look down on us finite, imperfect human beings and he would have compassion on us and he would have mercy on us.

[11:42] It should humble us that God would look down on us and have the compassion and the mercy and that he would be willing to help us, that he would be willing to pull us out of these sorrowful times that we all experience in our lives.

[11:58] He says, My soul hath them still in remembrance. And folks, his soul would still have them in remembrance all the days of his life. Anything negative that has happened in our lives, it seems like we remember those in more detail than we do the positive things in our lives.

[12:17] It seems like we remember the bad times in more detail than we do the good times and shame on us, shame on every one of us for having that attitude and for being able to recall details of the sorrowful times more so than the glad times.

[12:34] But every one of us are guilty of this. But folks, it should bring us to a state of humility and that humility should draw us closer unto God. That humility, it should cause us to praise God for the times that he has pulled us up out of the mire, for the times that he has saved us, for the times that he has delivered us from our afflictions.

[12:57] Our afflictions are many. Our sorrows are many. Our woes are memory. But God are many. But God is able to pull us out of each and every one of them multiple times over.

[13:09] I praise God that his mercy and his compassion will be just as plentiful tomorrow as it is today. And it is just as plentiful today as it was yesterday.

[13:20] My God is a God of compassion. He is a God of mercy. He is a God of help. He is a God of security. He is a God of assurance. This is the God that Jeremiah was talking about here in this writing that we're reading this morning.

[13:36] Verse 21, he says, This I recall to my mind, therefore, I have hope. What is the this? That's what he's getting ready to explain here. This I recall to my mind.

[13:48] This I bring back to my mind. He's already talked about remembering things starting at verse 19. Remembering the bitterness and remembering the affliction and remembering the misery.

[13:59] He's already talked about remembering that. So when he says this I recall to my mind here in verse 21, this I recall to my mind, therefore, have I hope. Folks, again, it should greatly increase our hope in God because of the times that he has delivered us in the past.

[14:20] He says, This I recall to my mind, therefore, have I hope. What does it recall to my mind? He begins in verse 22. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because his compassions fell nigh.

[14:33] It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, folks, because his compassions fell nigh. His compassion reveals the mercy of Almighty God.

[14:44] It is because of his mercy toward mankind. It is because of his mercy towards his creation. His mercy knowing that we are but dust, knowing that we are finite, knowing that we are imperfect.

[14:58] It is God's mercy. It is because of his mercy that we are not consumed. It has nothing to do with us deserving it. It has nothing to do with us working for God's mercy.

[15:10] It has nothing to do with us begging for the mercy of God. It is the simple fact and attribute of the mercy of God that we are not consumed.

[15:20] In short, it is because of God that we are not consumed. It is because of God that we sit here as saved individuals. It is because of God that he sought us out.

[15:31] He is the one that convicted us of our sin. He is the one that saved our soul and he is the one that will take us home one day after a while. This is the mercy and the compassion of Almighty God.

[15:45] Hallelujah. I am glad that he is compassionate. Could you imagine? Could you imagine if God, the creator of this universe, wasn't compassionate? Could you imagine if he wasn't merciful?

[15:58] Could you imagine your state right now? Imagine, again, go back to verse 19 and look at what he was talking about, the afflictions. And the misery.

[16:09] If we didn't have a compassionate God, we would be stuck in those forever and forever and forever. If not for the compassion of God, if not for the mercy of God, and if not for the fact that his compassion, it goes on forever again.

[16:26] I said just a little while ago that the mercy of God, that the mercy of God will be just as plentiful tomorrow as it is today. And his compassion is no different. He will still be as compassionate tomorrow as he is today.

[16:40] Folks, the attributes of God are eternal because God himself is eternal. The Bible describes him as the ancient of days. The Bible describes him as the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega, the first and the last.

[16:53] These are the things that describe God in the Bible to show that he has ever been, he ever is, and he ever will be. Hallelujah. Jesus Christ said, I am he that was dead and that lives and was dead and behold, I'm alive forevermore.

[17:10] Amen. And hold the keys of hell and of death. Jesus Christ is co-equal and co-eternal with God, the father. He always has been always will be. And the God, the spirit has been right there with them.

[17:22] They have always existed. There has never been a point in time ever. No matter how far back you go or how far into the future that you might go, God has been, God is, and God always will be.

[17:37] And his mercy and his compassion will be right there with him. This is the God that I like to describe. This is the God that I like to tell people about. And this is the God that people like to hear about.

[17:50] But the God that they don't want to hear about is the same God. The God that is angry. The God that is full of fury. The God that is full of vengeance. God says, vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.

[18:01] I will recompense is what he says in the book of Deuteronomy. And this is reiterated in the New Testament and the book of Hebrews. He says, vengeance is mine. Folks, the whole reason that Jerusalem was raised the way that it was, the whole reason that the Babylonian army was allowed to come in and destroy Jerusalem and destroy the temple and dilute the wares thereof is because of the disobedience of the children of God.

[18:28] And this shows that God does have an angry side. And this is the side that people don't want to hear about. But it's the same God. Revelation 19 describes Jesus Christ as one that does judge and make war.

[18:43] People don't like to think about that aspect of Jesus Christ. But folks, that's how the Bible describes him. He's the same Jesus that was born of a virgin in the little town of Bethlehem.

[18:55] He's the same Jesus that lived all the way up through his adolescence. He lived a perfect sinless life. When he began to be about the age of 30 years old, his ministry began according to the third chapter of the gospel of Luke.

[19:07] And he went all the way through his ministry, healing people, helping people, preaching the gospel to people. And he had his followers that came along with him and he sent them out to preach the same good news that although man be sinner, God is a wonderful, mighty and marvelous and able and willing Savior.

[19:26] These things have not changed. He is still all of these things. And God has always been a Savior. God has always been willing. And God has always had it in his plan, always had it in his plan that there would be a Redeemer.

[19:42] And that Redeemer would be the only begotten Son of the Father, Jesus Christ. The first time we see this Redeemer mentioned in Scripture is in the very first book of the Bible in the third chapter, Genesis 3, and 15, where God promises that there will be a seed of the woman and the serpent would bruise the seed's heel, but that that seed would crush the head of the serpent.

[20:04] That's the first picture of the Redeemer that we have in Scripture. And we find him in and out all throughout the Old Testament. We find him in the New Testament. We find him incarnated in the New Testament.

[20:16] And we find him all the way at the end in the book of Revelation where there are scores of people. There are thousands upon thousands and ten thousand Thompson thousands and thousands of thousands of people that are worshiping God for the redemption that they have in the Lamb, Jesus Christ.

[20:35] And this is why we have hope. This is why we have the hope that Jeremiah spoke of here or speaks of here in the book of Lamentations. This I recall to my mind.

[20:46] Therefore have I hope it is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because His compassions fell not. Folks, the mercy of God was displayed in the ultimate fashion on a cross at Calvary when His Son hung there and bled and died.

[21:04] When His Son suffered the death that you and I should have suffered. He took the nails that you and I should have taken. He bled the way that you and I should have bled.

[21:15] He took the mockering. He took the beating. He took the shame. He took the guilt. He took the being spit upon. He took all of these things in your stead and in my stead.

[21:27] This is compassion. And this is mercy. And people will look at that cross and they'll look at the Savior on that cross. They'll say, where is the compassion and where is the mercy of God?

[21:38] This is His own Son that is hanging there on this cross. The compassion was shown to you and the compassion was shown to me. And yet the Bible says that it teaches that Jesus Christ, He endured the cross and He suffered the things of the cross for the joy that was set before Him.

[21:54] The joy that was set before Jesus Christ was to do the Father's will. And the Father's will was that the Son come and suffer and bleed and die to reconcile fallen man back to Himself.

[22:08] If that's not compassion and mercy, I don't know what is. Hallelujah for the Lamb of God. Hallelujah for the perfect plan of redemption that we have in Christ Jesus.

[22:19] Verse 23, They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. What's new every morning? The mercies and the compassions of God.

[22:31] The writer here says they are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. And I'll say it again for the third time. His compassion and His mercy will be just as fresh tomorrow as it is today.

[22:45] His compassion and mercy is very real today. Regardless of what we're facing in our own lives. Regardless of whether it's sin, whether it's affliction, whether it's sickness, whether it's regardless of what it is.

[22:58] If it's relationship issues, if it's financial issues, regardless of what those are, God's compassions and mercies are new every morning. And He is faithful.

[23:10] He has always been faithful. And He ever will be faithful. This is why we have hope. Because of the faithfulness of God. Because of His compassion. And because of His mercy.

[23:22] This is why we have hope. Hope serves many things that people put their hope in in this world. Some of them put it in their bank account. Some of them put it in their status. They put it in their clout.

[23:32] They put it in their job. They put it in their families. Wives will put it in husbands. Husbands will put it in wives. Parents will put it in their children. Grandparents will put it in their grandchildren. Aunts and uncles will put it in nieces and nephews.

[23:44] But folks, these are temporal hopes. I will not always be here for my wife to have hope in. And she may not always be here for me to have my hope in her. But God has ever been.

[23:55] And God ever will be. And the hope that I have in Him is eternal. Hallelujah. Put your hope and your trust and your faith. Put every bit of it in God.

[24:06] Because He's the only one that's worthy of it. He's the only one that's worthy of our hope. He's the only one that's worthy of our praise. He's the only one that's worthy to be praised.

[24:20] And to have our hope in. Almighty God is worthy of this. Why? Because His compassions, His mercies, they're new every morning. Every morning.

[24:31] God's not going to wake up tomorrow and say, you know what? I was compassionate enough yesterday. And folks, it doesn't matter how many times I go to God today seeking mercy and seeking compassion.

[24:43] It doesn't matter if I go every minute or every hour of this day. When I wake up tomorrow, God will not be finished. God will not be tired of hearing me ask for more mercy and seeing me seek more compassion from Him.

[24:59] Folks, it is an inexhaustive supply of compassion and mercy that He has. And it is fresh and new every morning. And God is ever faithful to supply it to His people.

[25:11] Hallelujah! We should all be rejoicing. I heard Dewey Williams say one time years ago, that's enough to make a backslidden Presbyterian shout. And that's how I feel right now.

[25:24] Folks, we should rejoice that our God is the way that He is. Yes, He's a God of wrath. Yes, He's a God of vengeance. Yes, He's a God of fury.

[25:35] And yes, He gets angry. The book of Exodus says that His very name is jealous. But hallelujah for the compassion and the mercy in that same God. The same God that redeemed me will keep me to the end.

[25:50] The same grace that He saved me with. The same grace that He gave me is going to take me home one of these days. It is by grace that we are saved.

[26:01] It's by grace that we will make it home one of these days after a little while. He goes on to say in verse 24, The Lord is my portion, saith my soul, therefore will I hope in Him.

[26:15] The Lord is my portion. He's saying, The Lord is everything that I need. What do we think of when we think of portions as far as the biblical accounts go?

[26:28] The first thing I think of when I think of a portion is the portion of land that was given to the Israelites. When they were getting ready to move into the promised land and the land was divided up into portions.

[26:41] Benjamin, you'll have this portion. Reuben, you'll have this portion. This one will have that portion and that one will have this portion. And then you get to the Levites who did not have a portion.

[26:54] They didn't get land. God says, I will be your portion. Why didn't they get land? That's a whole other sermon in and of itself. But they didn't get land because they were going to be the workers.

[27:07] They were going to be the ones that were burning incense. They're the ones that were making intercession between the Israelites and God. They're the ones that were making the sacrifices. They're the ones that took care of the tabernacle and later on, the temple.

[27:19] They're the ones that did this. They didn't have time to go out and farm land. They didn't have time to go out and get a job. They didn't have time for any of these things. But God gave them the greatest portion and a greater portion than any of the other tribes when He said, I will be your portion.

[27:35] And this writer here says, praise God, the Lord is my portion. The Lord is my portion. The Lord will give me everything that I need.

[27:47] If I need land, the Lord will give me land. If I need food, the Lord will give me food. If I need breath, the Lord will supply that. Folks, I promise you, if you are a born-again child of God and you are still here on this earth, the Lord is not finished with you and He will supply your every need according to His riches and glory as He sees fit to sustain you that you can go on in whatever calling that the God has put upon your life.

[28:18] The writer says, the Lord is my portion. And I happily stand here and tell you today that the Lord is my portion. He's all I need. He's all that any of us need.

[28:28] And He's all that we ever will need. You might say, I need, but we need money because we've got bills. The Lord will supply that money to pay those bills. The Lord has supplied the house that you accrue the electricity bills and the water bills and the cable bills and whatever other bills that you have.

[28:46] Has He not? He'll supply you with the money you need to pay those bills if that indeed be His will. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul. This comes from deep within.

[28:57] This isn't just a fleeting thought of the writer here. He says, the Lord is my portion, saith my soul. Coming from deep within the writer here.

[29:07] coming from His heart. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul, not saith my mind, not saith my brain. Folks, that could be here in one second and gone the next. He says, His soul, saith the Lord, is my portion.

[29:22] He says, therefore, will I hope in Him. Folks, we have nothing else that we can hope in. Yet the world, not just the lost world, but much of the Christian world as well.

[29:34] They put their hope in so many other things. They put their hope in tradition. They put their hope in denomination. They put their hope in this and in that. When their hope needs to be in God and God alone.

[29:49] He's the only place that our hope needs to be in. And He'll sort out all these other messes that are out there. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul.

[29:59] Therefore, will I hope in Him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for Him. To the soul that seeketh Him, it is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.

[30:11] Again, verse 25, the Lord is good unto them that wait for Him. To the soul that seeketh Him. Folks, God is not only good to those that wait for Him.

[30:23] And who is it that waits for God? Folks, only His children are capable of doing that. Only His children are capable of seeking Him. You see, you see throughout the Scriptures, throughout the Old Testament especially, God's saying, seek me, seek me, seek me.

[30:41] You see it several times in the book of Amos. You see it many other times throughout the Old Testament. God's saying, seek me. We're all familiar with the Scripture. It says, they that seek me early shall find me.

[30:54] But folks, it is impossible. It is impossible for a lost individual that does not know God to truly seek Him. How do I know that?

[31:04] Because the Scripture plainly tells us that. It says, there are none that seeketh after God. There is none that seeketh after righteousness. No, not one.

[31:14] The only one that is capable of seeking God are those that already belong to Him. That's the only ones. And folks, we should seek God daily.

[31:27] We should seek God through prayer. We should seek God in His Word. We should seek God in everything that we do. Every word that we say. Every action that we take. Every step that we take.

[31:37] Should be to the glory of God the Father. For the redemption that we have in Jesus Christ the Son. The Lord is good unto them that wait for Him.

[31:48] To the soul that seeketh Him. He is good unto those that wait for Him. And to the soul that seeks Him. And again, I'll reiterate, the only people that can seek Him and the only people excuse me, the only people that can truly wait for God are those that already belong to Him.

[32:10] It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.

[32:24] Folks, it is good that we should hope for the salvation of the Lord. And folks, every one of us, if we're sitting here born again this morning, every one of us are waiting on the culmination of the salvation of Almighty God.

[32:37] We've already been saved. God has already washed us clean with the blood of Jesus Christ. He has already consecrated and sanctified us unto His service and placed us into His family.

[32:50] But our salvation is not yet complete. But it will be one of these days. Hallelujah. Paul writes about it to the church at Thessalonica. We see it written about in the book of Revelation.

[33:02] We see it written about in several other places in the Scripture. Paul even says when he's writing to the church at Rome in Romans 8, he says, I'm an heir to God and a joint heir with Jesus Christ.

[33:14] Paul realized that he hadn't quite inherited it at all yet because the culmination had not yet come. But folks, it will! And this is the hope that we have.

[33:25] Paul wrote to Titus that it was a blessed hope. What's a blessed hope? When Jesus Christ claims His church. When Jesus Christ comes and claims His bride and takes it out of here, however that might be, that He does it.

[33:40] When this happens, folks, when this happens, our salvation will be complete. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the Lord. Ain't it a pain to quietly wait sometimes?

[33:53] I've said several times, preaching at several different places and teaching adult Sunday school classes at different places, our ability to wait lacks greatly as a people, as individuals, as a church, as members of a corporate setting.

[34:15] Our ability to wait lacks greatly. And I blame much of that on the microwave oven and on fast food restaurants because we have gotten so accustomed to just going to the freezer and getting something out, popping it in the microwave for three minutes and voila, it's done.

[34:33] Or we go to the drive-thru and we order our food and 60 seconds after we've given them our money, we go to the next window, bam, we've got our food. And this has spoiled Christian people.

[34:45] Folks, God does not work like that. God will work out everything in your life and in my life according to His time and according to His compassion and according to His mercy. Even if we don't understand it, even if we don't get it, we can't comprehend it, it still will work out the way that God wants it to and when He wants it to.

[35:06] That's why it's good if we both hope and quietly wait upon the Lord. A good example I can give you out of Scripture of someone not quietly waiting was Elijah the prophet.

[35:20] You're reading the book of 1 Kings. Elijah and the prophets of Baal. All of us should be familiar with that account. The prophets of Baal. There was basically a challenge that came up and said if your God is God then we'll serve Him.

[35:34] If my God is God then we should serve Him. And the sacrifices were made. The things were laid out. The water was poured around the altar. And all these other things.

[35:45] The prophets of Baal come out and they screamed and spit and hollered and slobbered and cut their sails. And no answer from their God. But when Elijah called upon the God of Israel when He called upon the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob the fire came down from heaven and it left up not only the sacrifice but it left up all the water that was around there.

[36:06] Elijah took the prophets of Baal down to the brook and He slew them all. Folks, this was a mighty and powerful moment in the life of Elijah. And the very next thing we read about is Ahab running back to tell Jezebel everything that he had witnessed.

[36:22] And Jezebel threatens the life of Elijah and Elijah goes running off. We find him laying underneath a juniper tree feeling sorry for himself. But an angel came and ministered to Elijah.

[36:35] And where did Elijah go? It says the angel woke him up told him to eat and drink woke him up again told him to eat and drink again says he went in that strength 40 days and 40 nights to where?

[36:47] To Mount Horeb which is also Mount Sinai. You can read about that in Exodus chapter 3 Exodus chapter 19 Deuteronomy chapter 4 Horeb and Sinai are the same place.

[36:59] But it says Elijah went to Horeb and where did he go? He went to a cave. And there was an earthquake that came there was wind that came there was a fire that came all this all this tumultuousness was going on right outside the way but God was not in any of that.

[37:16] Elijah was not waiting patiently was he? He was wanting to hear from God. Why did he go to Horeb? Why did he go to Sinai? Because he was familiar with the Old Testament scriptures.

[37:27] He was familiar with the Torah the Pentateuch that talked about how the lightnings of God were over top of this mountain how the top of the mountain burned with fire how that God talked to Moses as a man would talk to his friend face to face.

[37:41] He knew about all these things and that's what he was seeking he was not quietly waiting on the Lord. Where did Elijah find God? He wasn't in the fire he wasn't in the wind he wasn't in the storms he wasn't in the earthquake he was in that still small voice that's where Elijah found God and that's where God spoke to Elijah.

[38:03] Folks it doesn't matter what tumult is going on in your life it doesn't matter it doesn't matter what turmoil may be may be rolling in your life it doesn't matter what you've suffered God is able to comfort you and God is able to heal you God is able to pick you up and to carry you just a little ways more before he sets you back down God is able to do these things this is why it's good that we should hope and patiently wait upon the Lord because everything that God does for his people is good everything that God does period is good people will look at the Bible and they'll say they'll say well what about the victims of the flood folks that was good God is incapable of doing evil it's not that he won't do evil it's that he cannot do evil a perfectly righteous and holy and sinless God cannot commit sin which is that much more reason that our hope should be in him and that we should patiently wait on him it is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord folks we hope in the salvation we hope in in the completion of our salvation

[39:21] God has already worked out salvation for us he worked it out 2,000 years ago on a hill called Golgotha when a man named Jesus Christ the only begotten son of the father hung and bled and died on Calvary's hill he suffered greatly for your sake and for mine he suffered the cross for your sake and for mine he took your punishment he took the wrath of God upon himself that you and I would never know what the wrath of God feels like hallelujah this is the God that the writer here was putting his hope in the God of mercy the God of compassion the God whose faithfulness does not fail and this is the same God that I encourage you today to put your faith and your hope and your trust in the God of the writer of lamentations here that's my message to you all this morning I hope it was an encouragement to you I appreciate your attention God bless you all