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Amen. Amen. Lamentations, chapter number one, this is a little small book that's tucked in here between a couple of the major prophecy books, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. And it's actually a poetic book. It's placed here, though, because of the fact that it's written by Jeremiah and the subject matter has to do with what we just read about in Jeremiah, but it's actually a poem. So if you notice in Lamentations, chapter number one, there are 22 verses, and each of these 22 verses has three statements to it for a total of 66 statements. And then if you look at chapter two, it also has 22 verses. If you look at chapter three, it has 66 verses, but they're shorter verses. So it's basically a similar length to the first two chapters. Then when you go to chapter four, we're back to 22 verses with just a little bit different rhythm to it than the first two. And then chapter five has 22 short little verses. Now obviously this is no coincidence, you know, when you see this and these numbers are this way. Well, let me explain to you why that is. It's because there are 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet. If you look up Psalm 119 in your Bible, it's broken into those 22 sections of eight verses each. So it says aleph, and then it has the first eight verses, bet, gimel, dalet, hay, et cetera. And it goes through the different letters. So in the original Hebrew, this is an acrostic poem. And what that means is when you make a poem where each line starts with a certain letter. So basically when you're in chapter one, chapter one starts with an aleph, excuse me, verse one starts with an aleph, verse two starts with bet, verse three starts with gimel, and so forth. So each of these starts with that letter. Then when you get to chapter two, it's the same thing. Verse one starts with aleph, verse two starts with bet. Then when you get to chapter three, the reason it has 66 verses, even though it's the same number of statements, is because it goes aleph, aleph, aleph, bet, bet, bet, gimel, gimel, gimel, dalet, dalet, dalet. So basically it goes through the 22 letters three times each is how it's laid out. And then in chapter four, again, verse one starts with aleph, verse two starts with bet, verse three starts with gimel. But then what's interesting is when you get to chapter five, the acrostic is just over. So there's no, because you'd assume, right, that chapter five is going to do the same thing. But chapter five doesn't do that at all. Chapter five just starts with whatever letter and just kind of loses that pattern. Here's the thing about poetry in the Bible. When we think about poetry in English, we think of it rhyming or we think of it as having a really distinct rhythm or meter to it. But the thing is that the poetic devices that we have in English are not the poetic devices that the Bible uses. And I did a whole sermon on this maybe about a year or two ago called Poetry in the Bible or the Poetry of the Bible or something like that. And what I was pointing out is that when you translate the poetry from the Bible into English, you don't lose anything. And I talked about in that sermon how it's not like it rhymed in the original and then you lose that in English. It didn't rhyme in the original. It doesn't rhyme in English or that it had a really good meter in the original. It doesn't really have a distinct meter any more so than it does in English. And what I said in that sermon was that the only thing that you lose poetically are these acrostics. But those don't really have anything to do with the meaning or the interpretation or anything like that. You don't have those acrostics. But in the original, you do. And I guessed that anyway. Even just as a teenager reading this, I kind of just guessed when I saw 22, 22, 66, I thought this must have something to do with the fact that there are 22 Hebrew letters in the alphabet. So anyway, that's how that works. That's why the book is laid out the way it is. So it's definitely a poetic book where it's following this strict format of starting with each letter, as we said. And then also how it has three statements per verse. And that's the pattern that we see with the poetry. Now what's the context of the Book of Lamentations? And I'm going to preach through the entire Book of Lamentations. Tonight I'm going to preach on chapter one. Next Sunday night I'll preach on chapter two and so forth. So this is going to be a little mini-series on Sunday nights on the Book of Lamentations. But what's it about? Well, if you remember when we went through Jeremiah a couple of years ago, the Book of Jeremiah is all about how Babylon is going to take over Judah. They're going to invade Judah, destroy the temple, take the people captive. And Jeremiah is constantly trying to warn them about that. And he's telling them that they need to get right with God. And he's preaching to them. And they're not listening to him. And they don't obey. Everything that God tells them to do, they end up not doing it. And of course at the end of the Book of Jeremiah, they end up going into captivity. The Babylonians come in and they brutally kill people and capture people, take them captive, destroy the city, destroy the temple. So Lamentations is a poem about the aftermath of that. So it's basically Jeremiah looking at what God has done and he's weeping about it. He's sad about it. He's mourning about it. So when you're reading Lamentations chapter one here, sometimes the perspective is from Jeremiah. You know, Jeremiah lamenting and weeping about what has happened to his beloved city of Jerusalem. And then sometimes the perspective is the city itself speaking and weeping and crying out to God. So you kind of go back and forth between a third person description of Jerusalem and a first person where Jerusalem itself is speaking and crying out to God. So that's the context here. We're talking about being destroyed by Babylon. So look at verse number one. The Bible reads, how does the city sit solitary that was full of people? How has she become as a widow, she that was great among the nations? And princess among the provinces, how has she become tributary? She weepeth sore in the night and her tears are on her cheeks. Among all her lovers, she hath none to comfort her. All her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they have become her enemies. So we see the city is being personified as a desolate woman. So the woman here that's being referred to is the city of Jerusalem basically being pictured as a woman. So it's basically a city that was once filled with people and economic activity and everybody's living their lives, marrying, giving in marriage, right, serving the Lord hopefully, and just working. And now it's just like a ghost town. It's just empty. It's just sitting solitary. So he compares this to a woman who's a widow. She's lost her husband. She's all alone now. She's by herself and she's basically just sitting there crying, weeping all by herself. And not only that, she doesn't have any friends. All of her friends have left and they're not there to comfort her. She's just by herself, sad. She's lost everything. So this is a powerful picture being painted of what Jerusalem is like. Now here's what's interesting. There's a very similar picture in Isaiah 47. Go back if you went to Isaiah 47, which is funny because Isaiah 47 is about Babylon. So Jeremiah is lamenting the destruction of Jerusalem and who's the one who destroyed Jerusalem? Babylon, right? So Babylon is the one who destroyed Jerusalem, but what goes around comes around. So there's also destruction that's going to be in store for Babylon. They're going to go through the same thing, of course, 70 years later. Look what the Bible says in Isaiah 47, verse 1. Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground. There is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for thou shalt no more be called tender and delicate. Take the millstones and grind meal. Uncover the locks. Make bare the leg. Uncover the thigh. Pass over the rivers. Thy nakedness shall be uncovered, yea, thy shame shall be seen. I will take vengeance, and I will not meet thee as a man. As for our Redeemer, the Lord of Hostesses' name, the Holy One of Israel, sit thou silent and get thee into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for thou shalt no more be called the Lady of Kingdoms. I was wroth with my people. I've polluted my inheritance and given them into thy hand. Thou didst show them no mercy. Upon the ancient hast thou very heavily laid thy yoke. And thou saidst, I shall be a lady forever. And we could go on and on. It's all good. But anyway, go back to the Lamentations that we see here, that God is basically saying to Babylon, you've done this to Jerusalem, now the same thing is going to happen to you. So we see that often a city in the Bible is judged by God, or a nation is judged by God for its wickedness, and the picture that's being painted is of a sad, sorrowing woman that has lost her husband, she's lost everything, she has no friends, she's mourning and weeping. So the Bible says in verse 1, how does the city sit solitary that was full of people? How has she become as a widow, she that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces, how has she become tributary? Tributary means you're paying taxes or tribute to someone else. So in the ancient world, when one country would take over another, they would basically put them under tribute, like okay, now you guys have to pay us taxes, you're under our yoke now, and you are our slave in that sense, you have to pay us. Now when we use the word tributary in 2020, usually we're talking about a small river that feeds into a larger river. So if you think about that image of a small river pouring into a larger river, that's a tributary. Think about that. It's giving its resource to the main river, right? It's giving its flow. So basically that's what it's like to be a tributary nation is you're giving your money, your resources, you're paying taxes to this conquering nation. And so he's saying, look, this nation was once great among the nations. This nation was once the princess among the provinces, and now she's become tributary. And you know what we learn right away in verse one here is that God can take a nation down a notch. When they rebel against God, when they're wicked in his sight, you know, he can take a nation that was once a great nation, a powerful nation, a dominant nation, and he can turn them into a subservient, desolate shadow of their former self. And that's what we see here in this passage. Look at verse two. She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks. Among all her lovers, she hath none to comfort her. All her friends have dealt treacherously with her. They are become her enemies. Let me explain something to you. When you're not right with God, when you're living a wicked life, typically the kind of friends that you end up having are not the right kind of friends, and they're not going to be friends that stick with you through the hard times, through thick and thin. Remember the story of the prodigal son? You know, the prodigal son goes out, and he wastes all his money on partying and riotous living, and when he hits rock bottom, and when there's a famine in the land, when the economy fails, no man gave unto him, the Bible says. Even though you know there were so many times when he said, hey, everybody, the drinks are on me. Hey, everybody, I'm buying. But then all of a sudden, when he's in need, it's crickets, right? Everybody's gone. Everybody's left him. Everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. God is love, okay? Love comes from God. Godless people are not loving people. Godly people are loving people, okay? And so when you're out living the sinful life, the kind of friends that you acquire, you might think that they care about you and love you, but when push comes to shove, they're going to do what's best for themselves, and that's the sad truth. You know, Judah had some friends here, except where are they now, right? The wicked friends have turned on her. They've dealt treacherously with her. They've become her enemies. They're probably the, you know, literally the nations around Judah, wicked sinful nations that they had allied with, and now that they're defeated by Babylon, those nations are like, we don't want anything to do with this, right? We're not going to help you. Verse 3, Judah has gone into captivity because of affliction and because of great servitude. She dwelleth among the heathen. She findeth no rest. All her persecutors overtook her between the straits. The ways of Zion do mourn because none come to the solemn feast. So again, this is poetry, this is not literal. The ways are basically the roads, the paths leading into the city, right? Now obviously, these are inanimate objects. They're not actually alive, so they can't actually mourn. So when it says the ways mourn, this is just poetic. He's saying he's looking at the ways, he's looking at the roads or the paths into the city, and they look sad to him because no one is using them, right? The street is empty and therefore looks sad. The ways of Zion do mourn because none come to the solemn feast. You know, remember, three times in the year, they're supposed to come to Jerusalem. Three times a year, they come to the solemn feast. They come for the first fruits, they come for the Day of Atonement, they come for the Feast of Tabernacles, but these trips aren't happening. It's just a ghost town, it's empty, the ways mourn because none come to the solemn feast. All her gates are desolate. Her priests sigh. Her virgins are afflicted and she is in bitterness. Her adversaries are the chief. Her enemies prosper, for the Lord has afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions. Her children are gone into captivity before the enemy. So when we see a once great city destroyed, when we see a city wiped out, when we see a city that becomes a ghost town and a shadow of its former self, there's a reason why. It's because of the multitude of the transgressions. You can't just sin and disobey God and just completely ignore His word and have no consequences. There's always going to be a consequence for rebelling against the Lord. The Bible says, be not deceived, God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. God's not mocked. What does that mean, God's not mocked? It means that if a city or a nation or a group of people just thumb their nose at God and just don't even care what He says, God's not just going to sit there and just take that. God's not mocked. If you want to put God, if you want to put Him to shame and derision and mock Him and blaspheme Him, just be prepared to reap the whirlwind. Because God doesn't put up with that. God is not mocked. God's judgment does not always come swiftly. God will often hold back His judgment for the benefit of the godly people that are there. When we see the history of the nation of Judah leading up to this point, their fate was already sealed with the blood that Manasseh shed. Manasseh shed all this innocent blood. But then we have a guy like Josiah come along and bring revival, people are getting saved, the word of God is being preached. Then God basically held back the judgment for a while to allow that spiritual revival to take place. Then once the spiritual revival is over, He had basically just put the punishment on pause. So then as soon as that revival is over, as soon as the big soul winning campaigns are over, as soon as all the great preaching is over, Josiah is gone and the next guy is not as cool, unpause and then it all just continues to go forward. And God said He will not pardon the innocent blood that Manasseh shed. So the judgment had to come eventually. It can just sometimes be slowed down or put on pause if we do great works for God, if we can accomplish things for God that make it worth His while to keep us up and running. And that's what happened in the nation of Judah. So it says here that it's because of the multitude of her transgressions that they're going into captivity. We know what those transgressions are from the book of Jeremiah. It had to do with shedding innocent blood. It had to do with robbery, oppression, adulteries, just all the sins that you can think of. But especially innocent blood is especially disgusting in the eyes of God. God will not pardon innocent blood, babies that are murdered, and all the bloodshed that's done upon the earth is not something that God just looks the other way at. Verse number six, from the daughter of Zion, all her beauty is departed. Her princes are become like hearts that find no pasture and they are gone without strength before the pursuer. Now a heart is an animal in the Bible that's known for its speed. Over and over again when the Bible talks about a row or a heart like in Song of Solomon, it says, Awake, my beloved, and be thou as a row or a young heart upon the mountains of Bethar. It's talking about basically making his feet like hinds feet, running quickly, leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills. So when the Bible says her princes are become like hearts, he's saying, man, I've never seen anybody run so fast because they're fleeing the city. They're getting out of there. And he's like, man, this guy's running like a deer. I mean, these guys are fast, right? This guy is like a heart. They are like a heart that finds no pasture, like, oh, man, I got to go, no stopping. And it says they're gone without strength before the pursuer. They can't face the pursuer. Pursuer means they're being chased and they are running away. They turn tail and run. Verse seven, Jerusalem remembered in the days of her affliction and of her miseries all her pleasant things that she had in the days of old when her people fell into the hand of the enemy and none did help her. The adversary saw her and did mock at her Sabbath. So in this time of great suffering and grief and loss, they're thinking back to when they had it good. They're thinking back to the nice things that they once had and the good times, sort of like in Luke chapter 16 when the rich man is burning in hell and Abraham says, hey, remember how you received all those good things in your life? But now you're tormented. And so that's a sad place to be. As Christians, we go through some suffering now in this life. We go through what the Bible calls a light affliction. We go through trials and tribulations in our life. But what we have to look forward to is eternal glory. I'd rather choose now to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season. I'd rather have the affliction of the Christian life now and then eternal glory than the pleasures of sin for a season now and then just punishment and suffering that goes on and on and on. Now if you're saved, obviously you're going to go to heaven no matter what. But you know what? It's a long life to live until then, right? And as a Christian, you can really ruin your life and go through a lot of suffering on this earth before you get there. Who wants to get to heaven and lose all the rewards? The Bible says that Jesus is coming and his reward is with him, to give every man according as his work shall be. And so it's not worth it to live a sinful life now and have pleasure for a moment that leads to pain for a lifetime. And many Christians have made foolish mistakes and committed sins that they continued to suffer for for decades to come, and it isn't worth it. So the Bible says here, she remembered the pleasant things in the old days. Verse 8, Jerusalem hath grievously sinned, therefore she's removed. All that honored her despise her because they've seen her nakedness. Yea, she sigheth and turneth backward. Oh, and by the way, ladies, showing your nakedness publicly does not make people respect you more, it makes them respect you less. That's what the Bible says, does it not? It says that honored her in the past despise her now because they have seen her nakedness. That's what the Bible says. And let me explain something to you. If you actually go out dressed like a godly lady in modest clothing, you will be treated with more respect than if you go out there scantily clad. It's true. If you want to be respected, ladies, then dress in a way that's respectable, and you'll get more respect. I guarantee you'll be treated better in business. My wife dresses like a lady, and everywhere she goes, people always treat her respectfully. She goes into businesses, and she's treated with great deference and respect going into businesses. I think part of it is that they look at the way that she's dressed, and they look at her as a respectable lady, and so they treat her with honor. If she came in in a sweat suit, I don't think she'd be treated the same way. And if she came in in short shorts and halter top and all these, you know what, basically you're cheapening yourself when you dress that way publicly. When you go out like that and you say, oh, well, you know, this is going to get me attention. Yeah, but it's going to get you the wrong kind of attention from the wrong kind of people. The right kind of people are going to respect you when you respect yourself and dress modestly and not just show your nakedness to the world and you just walk around half naked. That actually causes people to respect you less. Oh, I'm sure plenty of men will be happy to ogle at you and lust after you in their heart, but they don't actually respect you as a person. And so the Bible says in verse number eight, Jerusalem has grievously sinned, therefore she's removed all that honored her, despised her because they've seen her nakedness. Yea, she scythed and turneth backwards. Her filthiness is in her skirts. She remembereth not her last end. Therefore she came down wonderfully. Wonderfully means basically it was just a wonder, it was amazing to watch the downfall, to watch such a powerful nation crash and burn, to watch a great city become such a desolation. She came down wonderfully, why? Because she remembereth not her last end. You know, you think of the biblical phrase, what will you do in the end thereof? Folks, we need to think of the end of the life that we live, the end of the decisions we make. The end thereof are the ways of death. What will you do in the end thereof? What's the end of that road? You better take a look at the road that you're going down in life and ask yourself not, hey, how do I like this road? Ask yourself what's at the end of the road? Where am I heading? What's the destination? She remembereth not the end thereof and that's why she came down wonderfully. And this isn't the good kind of wonderful. You don't want to come down wonderfully. You don't want to just have a wonderful free fall from glory to desolation. All right. That's a bad kind of wonderful. She had no comforter. Oh, Lord, behold my affliction, for the enemy hath magnified himself. The adversary hath spread out his hand upon all her pleasant things, for she hath seen that the heathen entered into her sanctuary, whom thou didst command, that they should not enter into thy congregation. All her people sigh, they seek bread, they've given their pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul. See, oh Lord, consider for I am become vile. Now notice what he says there in verse 10. This is part of the punishment, part of the desolation, part of the bad news is that the heathen have come into the sanctuary. Do you see that? Whom God commanded that they should not enter into the congregation. Now look, the congregation is designed for the saved, not the heathen. Now the Bible does talk about an unsaved person coming into your assembly in 1 Corinthians 14, hearing the preaching and being convinced of all and being reproved of all and testifying that God's in you of a truth and so forth. So yeah, hey, we'll welcome the visitor, you know, we'll welcome the heathen visitor to come in and unsaved people will visit our church or want to visit our church. People who don't even claim to believe in Christ ask, hey, can I visit the church? We have sometimes students from the local college here who are in religion classes and they come here on an assignment or they come here for extra credit or they come here for whatever research project that they're doing and they're not even claiming to be a Christian. And you know, obviously they're welcome to stop in and visit, but you know what we're talking about here is just a total infiltration of God's house by unsaved people. You know, something's wrong when half the church isn't saved. Something's wrong when 100 people in the church aren't saved. Something's wrong when unsaved people are in positions of authority, positions of leadership in the church. That is a judgment. God commanded don't let these people in, don't let the bad guys in. Church is supposed to be an oasis. Church is supposed to be a place of reprieve from this world. It's a called out assembly of born again baptized believers. It's not just, hey, let's see how many people we can put in a building listening to preaching. That's not the goal. It's not like how many people can we put in a building and preach to? That's not church. Church is supposed to be a distinct group of people. It's supposed to be people that are saved and baptized and that want to learn the Bible. And again, not saying that visitors aren't welcome to come through, but that's not what the church is made up of. It's not made up of heathen. It's made up of believers. And so we don't gear our services toward the unsaved. But see, the philosophy in a lot of churches is to be what's called seeker sensitive and basically the church is geared toward the world, geared toward the heathen. And the idea is instead of going out and doing soul winning, going out and preaching the gospel, the idea is, oh, just bring all the unsaved people in and that's how they'll get saved by bringing them into the church. And this is not what God commands for evangelism because he actually says to go into the highways and hedges and compel them to come in that my house may be filled. Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Go ye therefore and teach all nations. Have your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. Why is it always go? Why is it always the feet? Because we don't bring them to us or wait for them to come to us. We go to them. We take the gospel to them. That's what soul winning is. That's what evangelism is. So a lot of churches though have this idea of, hey, let's just bring in the masses of the heathen and then they start gearing their music toward heathens. They start gearing the message toward heathens and they just want to bring it. And then what do they end up with? They end up with a church filled with heathens. They end up with a church filled with unsaved people. And then what's the point at that point? And a lot of people say, well, you know, the church is not a museum. The church is a hospital and all this, right? And they try to basically just say that ergo, let's bring in all the unsaved people and let's just have a gap. Folks, that is so unbiblical. First of all, can you give me chapter and verse where it says church is a hospital? What verse is that? What chapter is that? Where are you getting that doctrine? Church is not a museum. What chapter is that? You say, well, you know, they that behold me not a physician, I'm not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. You know what that is? That's Jesus going out and getting people saved. That's a doctor that makes a house call. So when Jesus said they that behold me not a physician but they that are sick, I'm not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. That's a doctor that's making a house call. He's not running a hospital of just, hey, let's just bring all the unsaved people into the church. Let's have a church that's 50% unsaved. That's an unhealthy church. That's a wrong church. That's not a biblical church. The Bible teaches what the church is, what it's supposed to be, what the body of Christ is, what those members are and it's not just a gathering of heathens that we preach to. Now, look, I'm all for going out there and preaching to a gathering of heathens. You know, that's why I like to preach in schools. I like to preach at the community college here. I like to preach anywhere I can get the chance. But when it comes to the church, the church is a place for believers to assemble and worship. And what does the Bible say? I mean, the Bible says in the church that in Ephesians 4 that the reason that we have pastors and teachers is for the perfecting of the saints, for the edifying of the body of Christ. Okay. It's to build up God's people. That's why my sermons aren't geared toward unsaved people. That's why you'll notice on Sunday morning I'm not just giving the plan of salvation every Sunday morning and then having an altar call for people to come forward and get saved. Some people have come to our church and gotten upset and said, you didn't even preach the gospel. You didn't even give the plan of salvation. You didn't even give an invitation for sinners to be saved. And I'm like, that's because 99% of the people here are already saved before they get here. So I mean, who wants to hear the gospel three times a week when you're already saved? Now if you do like hearing the gospel over and over again, let's go soul winning. And you know, you can tag along with me and hear the gospel as many times as you want. But when it comes to Sunday morning, Sunday night and Wednesday night, we've got a whole Bible to preach here. We've got the book of ... Look, did God give us the book of Lamentations so we could ignore it because it's just so small, tucked between Jeremiah and Ezekiel, we don't even find it? Is that why we have this? Or do we have this for our edification? For our instruction in righteousness? For our correction? You say, why do we need a book like Lamentations? Is this what we need right now? Hey, we need to understand that it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. We need to understand God's wrath, God's punishment. We need to understand that those who walk in pride, He's able to abase. And this doesn't just go for a nation, it doesn't just go for a city, it goes for the individual. You can walk around strutting around as well, and He can make you solitary. He can make you desolate. He can make you sitting in the dirt by yourself and forsaken of everyone. He can take down whoever He wants. This is a book of the Bible that will teach you the fear of the Lord. When you read the book of Lamentations, you should fear God. The Bible says in verse number 10, the adversary has spread out his hand upon all her pleasant things. All the nice things that you cherish, just the enemy just has his hands all over. Just imagine someone going through your house and just everything that's the most precious to you. He's just like, oh cool, I'll take that. Yep, yep, I'll take that too, just taking everything. The heathen entered into her sanctuary, whom thou didst command that they should not enter into thy congregation. All her people sigh, they seek bread, they've given their pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul. See, oh Lord, and consider, for I am become vile. They've given their pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul. Here's what the Bible's saying, there's so little food on the shelves. There's so little food in the city. There's so much famine that basically they're having to give all their pleasant things just to get something to eat. They're taking very precious items, maybe jewelry or anything else valuable and just exchanging it for food because they're that hungry and you can't eat your jewelry. You can't eat your works of art that are hanging in your house. All the pleasant things, all the nice things, all the precious things, they've given it for meat just to relieve their soul just because their stomach is aching with hunger. See, oh Lord, and consider, for I am become vile. Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow which is done unto me. Wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger. From above hath he sent fire into my bones and it prevailth against them. He had spread a net from my feet, he had turned me back. He hath made me desolate and faint all the day. The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand. They are wreathed and come up upon my neck. He hath made my strength to fall. The Lord hath delivered me into their hands from whom I am not able to rise up. The result of sin is bondage over and over again in the Bible and that's what we see here when we talk about the yoke bound by his hand, wreathed, come up upon his neck, right? We're talking about basically being enslaved, being put into bondage. And when you sin, you lose freedom. What did the Bible say? You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. Whosoever therefore committed sin is the servant of sin. The son makes you free. If we live a Christian life, if we are godly, if we follow the commandments, we will have liberty. We will walk at liberty. We will have freedom. Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. When a nation turns away from God's commandments, they go into bondage. What does bondage mean? It means that they don't have freedom. They don't have liberty. So you say, oh, we're losing our rights. There's a reason why people lose their rights. Well, we elected the wrong person. Well, we weren't vigilant enough. We didn't adhere strongly enough to the Constitution. I saw a quote the other day that said the Constitution is that sacred, and I'm probably going to mess it up a little bit, but the Constitution is that sacred document that keeps the government from doing all the horrible things that it does. Let that sink in for a second. The Constitution is that sacred document that stops the government from doing all the things that the government does, meaning that it doesn't really stop them from doing it because they're doing it, because they don't follow it anyway. So you say, oh, that's why we're going into bondage, because we got away from the Constitution. That's why we're going into bondage, because we elected the wrong political party. We put the wrong guy in office. Oh, I know why we're going into bondage. We weren't vigilant enough of our rights. Folks, that's not why you go into bondage. Now, humanly speaking, earthly speaking, yeah, you could say, okay, yeah, those are the actual reasons of how this plays out, but what's the real reason? Those are just the branches. Those are just the leaves. What's the trunk? What's the root? What actually causes us to lose our rights in America? Sin. Why? Because every time, just read the Bible, just keep turning the page, Old Testament, Old Testament story after story after story. You disobey God. You go into bondage. Read the book of Judges. You disobey God. Go into bondage. Get right with God. Now you have freedom. Disobey God. Go into bondage, right? Oh, we got right with God. We've got a godly leader. We've got a judge now. Oh, we're free again. Oh, next generation forgets the Lord, goes back into bondage, loses their rights, pays more taxes. Oh, we got right with God. Now we're not a tributary anymore. We're not paying these exorbitant taxes anymore. Now we're free again. Folks, that's the Bible. That's the Old Testament in a nutshell. You disobey God. You lose freedom. You obey God. You have liberty. This is what the Bible teaches. So here's what we do to guard our liberty more than anything else. We need churches to preach against sin. If churches get up and preach against sin and thunder against sin and people get right with God, we have freedom. Then we'll live in a free country. Well, how's that going to work politically, economically? I don't see how that's going to play out in the real world. Folks, because God is in heaven, he has all power. And any time God wants to, he can just snap his fingers and just send some virus that will just make you lose some rights or whatever he wants to do. Am I right? God could just snap his fingers right now and the virus would all just die everywhere and everyone would just be well again. Not a single case would be added because God would just cause it to just mutate into something that just dies. Folks, let me tell you something. God can do all things. God can cause one leader to be lifted up. What does Daniel tell us? He lifts up one. He puts down another. He rules in the affairs of the children of men. He sets up over at the basis of men. We've seen that in this primary. So here's the thing. We see basically that God can bless our country or he can curse our country. He can send a pestilence or he can not send a pestilence. He can send blessings. He can send the rain or he can cause a drought and a famine. He can send locusts. Folks, God is really the one who ultimately holds our destiny in his hand. It's not the ballot box. It is God that holds our destiny in his hand. If we make God happy, we prosper. If we make God happy, he blesses us. If we obey the Lord, we walk at liberty because we keep his precepts. If we disobey him, disregard him, we go into bondage. It's exactly like the book of Judges, folks. Why do we have the book of Judges? It's just to tell us, hey, this happened thousands of years ago. Can you believe it? Cool story. That's not what it's about. You know what it is? The Bible says all these things are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come. The book of Judges is for us to understand a pattern that's going to happen in our lives and in our country and in our generation. There is nothing new under the sun. And that pattern from Judges, folks, that's the same thing that's going to happen today. It's the same exact thing. So bondage, the yoke, wreathed around the neck, this is what happens when you ignore God. See, here's the thing. You can either follow God's rules, oh, so restrictive. Oh, you think God's rules are restrictive? Let's put you in North Korea and then we'll see if God's rules are restrictive. Let's go to a Godless place. How about China? Places that reject God, and obviously there are, of course, a remnant of believers even in North Korea, even in China, everywhere, there is a remnant. But in general, Godless countries, they don't want to be under God's laws because God's so restrictive. Hey, they get put under something a lot more restrictive than God. This book, I mean, all of God's rules are in this book. If it's not in this book, it's not a rule as far as God's concerned. Fear God and keep his commandments, that's the whole duty of man. Don't ever let somebody tell you that you have to do something that's not in this book. This is the rule book. I wonder if the city of Tempe can put their rules in a book this size. I wonder if the federal US government could put their rules in a book this size. I wonder if North Korea could put their rules in a book this size. And I guarantee you that even if they could, God's rules would give you way more freedom and liberty than what man does. So don't, you know what, you can either, just choose. Choose whom you're going to serve. Say, I'm not going to serve anybody. Oh, yes you will. God didn't say, choose whom you'll serve or just serve nobody. That's not the option. You choose whom you're going to serve, you either serve God or you end up serving the devil. You end up serving God or you end up serving sin. You serve God or you serve corruption. But you can't just say, well I'm just going to be my own man, I'm just going to do my own thing. You will end up serving someone, I guarantee you. So you might as well serve the Lord, get all the blessings and joy associated with that rather than saying, oh, I'm going to do my own thing. And then next thing you know, you got the yoke around your neck, right? The Bible says in verse number 15, the Lord had trodden underfoot all my mighty men in the midst of me. Folks, don't miss this vivid poetry here. The Lord had trodden, just imagine the mighty men, just imagine stepping on them. Have you ever stepped on someone before? You know when you're a kid, you step on your siblings sometimes and don't step on your siblings. That's a bad thing to do. But you know, stepping on someone is pretty humiliating for that person, isn't it? Have you ever seen what dogs do where they just walk up and just put their paw on another dog just to show it like I own you? Or sometimes they'll try to put their paw on you and then I walk up and I just put my foot on them. Okay, I'm the boss, all right? But hey, can you imagine the picture? Mighty men, great warriors, the greatest military, you know, the military men, God just steps on them. He's just stomping on them, walking on them. And you say, well, I don't think he's really stomping them. Well, let's keep reading. He has called an assembly against me to crush my young men. I think he's stepping down pretty hard, folks. This isn't one of those massages where they kind of like stand on your back a little bit. Who knows what I'm talking about with the, yeah. No, you don't want this massage. This will crush the young men. The Lord has trodden, again, the past tense of tread or step, trodden the virgin, the daughter of Judah, as in a wine press. So imagine stepping on grapes and the juice smashes out and gushes out. He's saying, that's how God is stepping on us. You don't want God to step on you. For these things I weep, mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water, because the comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me. My children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed. Zion spreadeth forth her hands, there's none to comfort her. The Lord hath commanded concerning Jacob that his adversaries should be round about him. Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them, meaning basically unclean. The Lord is righteous, for I've rebelled against his commandment. And look, that ought to be the attitude. The Lord is righteous, for I've rebelled against his commandment. See that ownership of responsibility? Why would God allow this to happen? I can't believe God would let this happen. What kind of a God would do this? Folks, that's spoken like a wicked person. You know what we ought to say is, you know what, the Lord's righteous, because we're wicked. We've done this wickedness. It's been ungodly. Folks, can anybody actually make an argument that our country's been righteous? That our country's been godly? I'm talking about lately. In recent years, can you really make the case that our country is a force for good and righteousness in this world? As we export Hollywood, export pornography, export atheism, export agnosticism, right? Are we really, we're exporting the sodomite agenda big time. I mean, even the Trump administration has repeatedly said, hey, we want to make sure that we make this legal everywhere. Hey, 79 countries where it's illegal, we've got to make this legal everywhere. You know, Trump has the first member of a U.S. cabinet, the first cabinet member of a U.S. president that's an open sodomite, is right now in the Trump administration, right now. Also, the first openly sodomite ambassador. They sent a sodomite ambassador to Germany from the United States. This is what our country has come to represent. Can we really get mad at God if something bad happens and say, how could you do this, God? Folks, is it God's fault that our nation has embraced sodomy? Is it God's fault that the pulpits in America have been virtually silent on what the Bible actually says about the sodomites? Is it God's fault that we allowed as a so-called Christian nation to just become just this mass murderer of babies through 3,000 abortions a day under the watch of a so-called Christian nation? I mean, supposedly the majority of our country is Christian, supposedly. The majority of our country claims the name of Christ, but yet we have institutionalized murder of babies, even funded by the federal government, funding Planned Parenthood all the time, whether it's a Republican or a Democrat in office, that goes on. And so we see that God is righteous. I rebelled against his commandment. Here I pray you all people, and behold my sorrow, my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity. I called for my lovers, but they deceived me. My priests and my elders gave up the ghosts in the city while they sought their meat to relieve their souls. The priests and the elders, these are the wise people, right? The priests, the elders, these are the people who have wisdom, knowledgeable. They should be providing counsel, wisdom, leadership, advice, knowledge, experience, right? The priests and the elders, they starved to death. That's what the Bible is saying. The Bible says that the priests and the elders gave up the ghosts in the city, meaning they died, while they sought their meat to relieve their souls. They starved to death. Really people here starving to death in this passage. That's not a fun way to die. Verse 20, behold, oh Lord, for I'm in distress. My bowels are troubled. My heart is turned within me, for I've grievously rebelled abroad. The sword bereaveth at home. There is as death. Say, well, you're not dead yet. Yeah, but it's as death, right? The suffering is like death, even though they're not dead. They've heard that I sigh. There is none to comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my trouble. They're glad that thou has done it. They're glad this happened. You know, my enemies are watching me crash and burn and they love it. They're enjoying it. They're rejoicing. Obviously, there were a lot of people who rejoiced at the fall of Judah, rejoiced the fall of Jerusalem. Thou wilt bring the day that thou has called and they shall be like unto me. He's saying, oh, well, they're going to get what's coming to them too, though. Let all their wickedness come before thee and do unto them as thou has done unto me for all my transgressions, for my sighs are many and my heart is faint. So look, other countries are looking at the destruction of Judah and Jerusalem and they're rejoicing. They like it. But of course, Jeremiah knows they're going to get what's coming to them too. Even Babylon itself, from what we read in Isaiah Chapter 47, is going to get what's coming to them as well. You see, there are all manner of nations and countries in this world and the vast majority of them are godless. Now, there are many places that are godlier than others, but there are a lot of bad places out there, a lot of wicked nations, and a lot of heathen. And you say, well, you know, at least we're better than them. I mean, at least we're not as bad as France, you know? At least we're not as, you know, at least we don't think, you know, two-thirds of people think adultery is okay. It's just fine. There's nothing morally wrong with it like they do in France, right? Or, hey, at least we're not like Japan, you know, because, I mean, what do they have, 1% Christianity there or something? Less than 1%, yeah. I mean, hey, hey, at least we're not like Japan where we're marrying an anime character in a hologram. Hey, I mean, hey, at least we're not like the Czech Republic, you know, leading Europe for being atheistic. You know, hey, at least we don't have the level of perversion and sodomy that they have over in Thailand. You know, hey, at least we're not like... But folks, God's not grading on a curve. Unto whom much is given, of him shall much be required. Say, well, Judah probably was better than, you know, Moab or, you know, Edom or, I mean, I mean, hey, are we really as bad as, you know, the Hittites or, you know, different nations throughout their history? Folks, that's not the point. You can always find somebody that's worse. But you know what? When God blesses a nation, when a nation has the Word of God preached, when a nation has as many churches as ours does and as much preaching as ours, I mean, almost everybody in our country could probably quote John 3.16. Almost every adult in America could probably quote or, I mean, a very high percentage could quote John 3.16. Everybody's heard it. I mean, look, we've got a Baptist church on every corner here, folks. Okay? We have been blessed as a nation and so God expects to reap the fruit from all that preaching and all that teaching of God's Word. He doesn't expect the Hollywood, the sodomites, the abortion, all the perversion, all the wickedness. Folks, he's not going to put up with it. And so he punishes. And that's what we see in the book of Lamentations. Now, you know, what's the moral of the story? The moral, what do we learn from Lamentations chapter 1? You know, we see that God means business. God's no joke. God punishes. But you know what? We ought not get mad at God when he punishes. If God sends something bad, if something bad happens, we can't get mad about it because we just say, you know what? This is what you get. When you live the way that we live, when our country is the way it is, this is what's coming to our country. Now, look, it doesn't mean that it's not sad. I mean, Jeremiah's got tears running down his face. He's known as the weeping prophet. And he's got the tears streaming down his cheeks as he sees bad things happening. It's not that he just, you know, isn't affected by it. He said, my eye affected my heart. And he sees, obviously, look, I haven't really been around a lot of death in my life. But I don't want to be around a lot of death in my life. I'm glad that I haven't been around a lot of death in my life. People who have jobs like a paramedic, God bless the paramedics because that's a hard job. And you know, a lot of them get burned out on that. They'll do that for years and then eventually they just can't take it anymore because it's just all the death. Why? That stuff affects you to see that. I mean, you know, if you could actually just see people, you know, if you actually saw it, I'm saying, not just hearing about it, but if you actually saw people, like let's say you saw some horrible car accident and you saw people suffering and dying, I mean, obviously that would affect you if you're a normal person unless you're some kind of psychopath or something that just has no feelings, right? If you saw someone wounded or dying or very ill, you know, you're going to have sympathy and you're going to hurt with them, right? Your eye is going to affect your heart, the tears are going to run down. If you're a normal person, you know, you're going to be affected by those things. So obviously the Bible's not saying here that, you know, hey, we have no feelings, burn, baby, burn. But you know what? What we need to acknowledge is that whatever God does to our nation, we have it coming. That's clear. I don't think anyone would argue with that who's actually a serious student of the Bible or a serious Christian. I don't think anybody would argue and say, no, I think, you know, America is just right smack dab in the center of God's will, not even close. Now that being said, though, there are many individuals that are right smack dab in the middle of God's will. Folks, you don't have to go with the flow, you don't have to go with the crowd. And so here's the thing. You say, Pastor Anderson, you're preaching doom and gloom. You know what? I'm preaching doom and gloom, I'm someone else. Because none of this applies to you and me as long as we love the Lord, amen? I mean, look, do you think God's mad at us if we're reading our Bibles, praying, fearing Him, worshiping Him, winning souls to Christ? Do you think He's up there mad at us? You know, I could be like Joyce Meyer right now and say, God is not mad at you, all right? Except I'm going to put a big qualifier on that. God is not mad at you if you're serving Christ. If you love the Lord, God's not mad at you. Now if you're Baxlin, if you're in rebellion against God right now, if you're at, if you're heart is hard within you right now and you're bitter right now and you're going to go do your own thing and I'm sick of my parents telling me what to do, you know, I'm sick of my marriage, I'm going to leave my wife, leave my husband, you know, I'm sick of the church and I'm sick of listening to the preaching, I want to go live my own life, do my own thing, I'm looking at the worldly people and I want to be like them. I want to enjoy what they're enjoying. Look, if that's you, then be very afraid. Be afraid because God means business and unto whom much is given, of him shall much be required. I'm not here to preach doom upon you, friend, because you know what? You're here on a Sunday night, you're serious about things of God or else you wouldn't be here except maybe a few people that could have been dragged here by someone else. But the vast majority of people here have chosen to be here, want to be here, and you're serious about the things of God, you know, you're here, anybody who comes to church Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night is serious about the things of God. If they're coming that often, you know, so I'm not here to preach doom upon you if you love the Lord, all things work together for good to them to love God. So even in the midst, and here's the thing about Jeremiah, you know, Jeremiah, he was a godly man. Jeremiah is not in trouble with God. Sometimes he's putting himself in the position of the city, speaking first person as the city, saying, oh, I've sinned, I've done all this. You know, he personally wasn't the problem, he was the good guy. And if we study the book of Jeremiah, we see how Jeremiah ended up, you know how Jeremiah ended up when everybody else is going into bondage, when everybody else is going into slavery, when the princes have become like hearts and they're running as fast as they can, and the Babylonians catch them anyway, poke their eyes out, punish them, all the different things that happened. You know what happened with Jeremiah, Nebuchadnezzar Adan, the captain of Nebuchadnezzar's host, takes him aside, takes the handcuffs off him, and says, hey, here's some money, you want to live here, you can live here, you want to live in Babylon, you can live in Babylon, You know what, you're free. Do what you want to do. Because Jeremiah submitted himself to God's rules, God liberated him from man's oppression, and he was free. The whole rest of his country is going into bondage, he had total freedom, he even has a little money in his pocket. Right? That's why he's even able to write this poem. Because he's there. I mean, he's free, he can do what he, he's got liberty. Folks, you can be a Jeremiah today. You don't have to go into captivity. You don't have to be doomed. You can be blessed by God. And you know what, when God was pouring out his plagues on the land of Egypt, the children of Israel lived in Goshen. And you remember how just stuff just didn't happen in Goshen? You know, it's like, oh, there's a plague, it's dark everywhere, but then in Goshen, what are you guys talking about? It was totally light in Goshen, right? And in Goshen, where the children of Israel dwelt, they were immune from a lot of the plagues, they were immune from a lot of the plagues that God poured out. And you know what, that goes to show us that we can be blessed even in times of affliction. Now look, I'm not saying, hey, if you're right with God, you're going to have total immunity to coronavirus. That's not what I'm saying. Because we see that a lot of the plagues did affect them. Now some of the plagues didn't affect them, and some of the plagues did affect all areas. So it's a mixed bag. Why? Because God sometimes allows us to go through the tribulation. Let's go back to our Jeremiah example. Was Jeremiah immune from everything that happened? No. Jeremiah had to skip food for days. He was starving in a prison where no food was being delivered. How would you like that? Jeremiah was put in basically the pit of an outhouse, the latrine pit, the dung pit. He was imprisoned there. So I mean, he went through some gnarly stuff in the book of Jeremiah. I'm not, look, Job went through gnarly stuff, Jeremiah went through gnarly stuff. Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but out of them all the Lord delivers them. And so we see that the latter end of Jeremiah was blessed. I think any one of us would love to be Jeremiah. I don't think any of us is going to get close to the rewards that Jeremiah got. I mean, look, Jeremiah wrote 57 chapters in the Bible. I mean, he's a major prophet. In fact, that's what he's called, the major prophet. And so I'm not saying it's going to always be a picnic or a walk in the park, but what I'm saying is choose your destiny. If you rebel against the Lord, you rebel against your parents, you rebel against preaching, you rebel against what the Bible says, you know what's going to happen to you? You're doomed. And if you want to know what it's like to be doomed, read the book of Lamentations. They'll describe it for you in great detail what it's like when God wipes you out. Or you can choose and say, you know what, I'm not going to rebel against the Lord. I'm going to submit myself to the Lord. I'm going to soften up my heart. I'm going to get on my knees and say, I'll go where you want me to go. I'll do what you want me to do. Just tell me what to do, Lord, right? Open the Bible, open now mine eyes, Lord, and that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law. And then you know what? The end of that road is going to be peace. Mark the perfect man, the Bible says, the end of that man is peace. The end of Job was blessed. The end of Jeremiah was blessed. You want to end up in blessings, follow Christ. You want to end up in Lamentations chapter number one, then you know what, rebel against the Lord. Those are the choices that we have today. And you know what? You say, well, but our country is all going that way. But you know what? We don't have to go that way. Let our country go that way. But you know what? Let us be like a shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Everybody else is bowing down. We're not. Everybody's going down a certain path. We're that righteous remnant, right? Let's stay that righteous remnant and be blessed like the righteous remnant. Let's bow our heads in our word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for this chapter, Lord, and I pray that you would just open our eyes and help us to understand this difficult book of Lamentations, Lord. It can be a little bit of a hard book. And so we just pray that you just open our understanding, open our eyes, help us to learn and apply these things. And Lord, just bless our church. Thank you for everyone who's here, Lord, and thank you for everyone who's not here. I know many people are tuning in online, which is totally okay because of the situation, Lord. We know that this is an emergency situation. If the ox or the ass falls in the ditch on the Sabbath day, we pull it out, Lord. And so bless those that are at home, Lord, and tuned in and worshiping you from home because of the things that are going on, Lord. And we just pray that you would just bless our church, bless your people, Lord, and give us wisdom, strength, and help us to do right this week, Lord. Because no matter what happens, as long as we do right, I know that we'll be blessed, and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.