“The Lord is righteous, yet I rebelled against his command. Listen, all you peoples; look on my suffering. My young men and young women have gone into exile.”
When I was young, I was captivated by someone who had an injury, not in a poking fun kind of way, but in a curious way. My Uncle Pete had all of his fingers and toes, but half of one finger was missing. Whenever I was around him, my eyes were focused on that hand with the half finger. I also remember a young man who was badly burned growing up. He was a nice kid, but his whole face bore the scars of a horrible accident.
Sometimes we even find ourselves catching a glimpse of something horrific and tragic, and instantly turning away so we don’t have to look at the scene. This was the case for Judah. The carnage and waste that was left each time after the Babylonians took another group into exile was not pretty. In verse 18, the author of Lamentations, Jeremiah, drops a bomb and brings the whole scene to a reality we must face: “The Lord is righteous, yet I rebelled against His command.”
To those in the middle of the tragedy, he begs everyone to look at the suffering. In other words, take a good hard look at what this reality is, and don’t forget it. To those who have been radically transformed by God’s saving grace, this verse is etched in your bones. No one could ever convince you of anything else.
God is real, and He loves His people. Just like the song Amazing Grace says, “He saved a wretch like me.” My wife is one of those people who had such an encounter with the Holy Spirit, she will never, ever be convinced it was anything but the Holy Spirit. To these, the suffering and radical visitations only point to the one true God.
Now, a quick jump across the fence to the ones who believed God one day in church and were saved, yet have not had any radical suffering or visitation, 2 Corinthians 5:7 says, “For we walk by faith and not by sight.” This is a hard one to swallow, especially when you read Matthew 16:4: “A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah.” Jesus then left them and went away.
What was the sign of Jonah? Well, it started with ignoring the Lord. Then he was eaten by a large fish, stayed there for three days, and was vomited onto the very shore where the Lord told him to go, Nineveh. Don’t let your disobedience to the Lord blind your way to the Lord. If you find yourself looking for a sign in order to follow the Lord completely, you might be in for a rough time. Choose the Lord and walk by faith, not by sight.
Walking with the Lord is proactive, not reactive. We should be speaking the Word and its promises in a proactive sense, not from a reactive place. In other words, we should do what 1 Thessalonians 5:16–18 says:
“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
While engaged with the Lord in all circumstances, the Holy Spirit will guide us away from sin, and if we heed His direction, we can avoid a time where we have to recite verse 18 above.
Prayer: Father, sometimes we mess up. We are humans and live in a fallen world. While we don’t make excuses for our behavior, we can repent quickly and turn back to You. I pray that we are proactive in our walk with You, Lord. I pray that we walk in victory, speaking the Word of God and meditating on it day and night. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Let It Go 
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