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“Is
it hot enough for you?”
I am not sure when I first heard the
rhetorical question, but I would guess that it was in Texas about this
time of year. It may have been in 1980 when Tammy and I spent our
last penny to move our mobile home from Pasadena, Texas to Crowley,
Texas. Somewhere in the move the air conditioning got damaged. It
was eight months later when we finally had enough money to get it
repaired. From August 1980 until April 1981 we were without air
conditioning in a mobile home in Crowley, Texas. For those of you old
enough to remember 1980, that was the year that the Dallas-Fort Worth
metroplex had 69 days of temperatures reaching 100 degrees or higher.
The average high during that summer was 101.6. Was it hot enough for
us? It was way too hot.
I realize that that the weather
forecast is insignificant when the rest of life is in a blaze of
crisis. Just in this last week I have been asked to respond to a
young father who just got laid off from his job as a homebuilder and
to people grieving from the tragic loss of one of our vet students.
Sometimes it is way too hot and there seems to be no place for relief.
Such is the setting for the book of
Lamentations. The city of Jerusalem was under siege, the people were
doing unconscionable things just for survival, the prophets were
weeping, the people were wailing, there seemed to be no hope. The
prophet Jeremiah composed a poem, which even now is recited every
year. This Saturday at sunset is the Jewish Holiday,
Tisha b’Av.
It is the day that recalls the destruction of the Temple that occurred
in 586 BC and again in 70 AD. It also reminds the Jewish people of
other dreadful times, such as the expulsion from Spain in 1492. One
of the annual practices is to recite the acrostic poem that is
Lamentations. There are actually five poems, the five chapters of
Lamentations. The first verse of each chapter begins with the first
letter of the Hebrew alphabet and the last verse of each chapter
begins with the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The third chapter
actually is a bit more elaborate with 22 three verse stanzas. This
careful construction seems to have been done to foster memorization,
encouraging the readers to remember the crises of life and God’s
faithfulness that brings them through it.
The first half of the poem basically
says, “Look at me. I am pathetic, oppressed by my enemies like a dog
is oppressed by an abusive owner. I cower in the corner and pray that
I’ll be left alone. I’m afraid of life, bitter, and grieving. My
soul aches from my memory, because it was not always this way.”
Is it hot enough for you? Sometimes it is way too hot.
Then right in the midst of his
despair, hope began to emerge. Right in the middle of the most
gut-wrenching piece of scripture is an oasis of faith. Listen to this
jewel of grace found in Lamentations 3:21-26. Hear now the Word of
the Lord:
21But
this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: 22The
steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his
mercies never come to an end; 23they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness. 24“The Lord
is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” 25The
Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the
soul that seeks him. 26It is good that one should wait
quietly for the salvation of the Lord.
In this passage the
prophet found comfort and confidence in the constancy of God. Let us
pray.
Is it hot enough for you?
Yes. There have been many
times in life when it is way too hot. In those moments we are
encouraged to look beyond the current crisis. We are invited to…
Look at
God
This is what gave the prophet the
courage to carry on. He looked at God and proclaimed that as he
called those attributes to mind, there was hope. Look at the
confidence he placed in God. The steadfast love never ceases, mercy
never comes to an end. Every morning these qualities of love and
compassion are renewed and they are gifts to the child of God. “The
Lord is my portion,” he wrote. The key word in verses 22-24 is the
word translated, “steadfast love”. It is the Hebrew word hesed
and it refers to God’s bond with God’s people that simply refuses to
give up. It is the loving kindness that assures the believer that God
will never let go. That steadfast love and mercy never end. There is
not a time when God does not care for you and care about you.
Then the poet assured the reader that
these qualities are renewed every morning. I have no doubt that he
was recalling the sustaining miracle of the manna, where every morning
there was fresh manna. It was never stale and contained no
preservatives. This was the theme picked up by Jesus. When teaching
his disciples how to pray, he said, “Give us this day our daily
bread.” There is a constant freshness in this prayer. It reminds us
that while faith can remember our experiences with God and be
encouraged by those memories, the true sustenance is found in the
consistent experiences - they are new every morning.
I kind of miss the Krispy Kreme fad
that hit Texas and then left. Don’t get me wrong, I love Shipley’s
and other doughnut places around town, but there is something about
Krispy Kreme that I have not experienced anywhere else. It is the
“Hot Now” sign that is in front of every Krispy Kreme that I have ever
seen. Some of you know that sign. I could be driving down the road,
having just eaten lunch and if that sign is illuminated, the car
insists on pulling in for just one fresh, hot doughnut – now.
This is the promise of the prophet,
the manna, and the Lord’s Prayer. We don’t have to rely on what God
has done for us, though that would be enough, God is doing something
today. “They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness.”
Is it hot enough for you?
There will be times in life when it is way too hot. In those moments
I encourage you to look at God who promises a fresh portion of
steadfast love and mercy.
The poet went a step
further, however, realizing the importance of looking for God as well
as looking at God.
Look for
God
Verses 25-27 is the ninth stanza of
this acrostic poem. Each of the three verses begins with the Hebrew
word tov, which means good. “Good is the Lord to
those who eagerly wait for or crave him. Good is the one who
quietly waits for deliverance. Good is the young person who
seeks God.” There is the sense in this stanza where one in difficult
times is encouraged to look for God, wait for God, be confident that
God will come to one’s aid.
There is an Indian
prayer included in our hymnal on page 535 that gripped my soul the
first time I saw it. It is entitled, A Refuge amid Distraction
and it reads:
Like an ant on a
stick both ends of which are burning,
I go to and fro
without knowing what to do,
and in great despair.
Like the inescapable
shadow that follows me,
the dead
weight of sin haunts me.
Graciously look upon
me.
Thy love is my
refuge. Amen. |
This is the prayer of
one who is looking for God, one who is waiting for, yearning for God.
The other day I was in a store and I noticed a young child who had
lost track of his daddy. He was looking all over for him and the
longer he looked for him the more important his dad’s presence
became. The clerk at the store gently pointed to where the dad was.
There were no words necessary. The boy ran over to his daddy’s leg,
looked up at his comforting face, and smiled.
“The Lord is
good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him.”
This is our promise.
It was Thomas Chisholm’s promise.
Thomas Chisholm was born in 1866 in the humble town of Franklin,
Kentucky. He began teaching school in Franklin at the age of 16 and
would later become the editor for the local newspaper. His life was
transformed at 28 when a revival came to town and he gave his heart to
Christ. He became a Methodist minister in 1903, but his health
prevented him from being in full-time ministry for more than a year.
Still, he wrote about 1200 poems, over 800 of them were published,
including one from 1923. It began:
Great is Thy
faithfulness, O God my Father;
There is no shadow of
turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand
hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!
Chisholm was 75 years
old when he wrote, “My income
has not been large at any time due to impaired health in the earlier
years which has followed me on until now. Although I must not fail to
record here the unfailing faithfulness of a covenant-keeping God and
that He has given me many wonderful displays of His providing care,
for which I am filled with astonishing gratefulness.”
Summer and winter and
springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.
Is it hot enough for
you?
Sometimes it is way too hot. It is in those times that we would do
well to look at God and see the never-ending freshness of his grace.
We would do well to look for God waiting for the goodness that is
promised.
Pardon for sin and a
peace that endureth
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand
hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!
Amen. |
