(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Man, Lamentations chapter number two, again, the Book of Lamentations is one of the poetic books of the Bible, and the way that this poem works, it's what's called an acrostic poem, and that's why each chapter has 22 verses in chapters one and two, and then chapter three has 66 verses. There are 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet, and so what it means to be an acrostic poem is that basically in English would be the first verse starts with an A, the second verse starts with a B, the third verse starts with a C, and so forth. Obviously in Hebrew, first verse starts with aleph, second verse starts with bet, et cetera, and good on the list. There are actually a few Psalms that are the same way, but in Lamentations chapter two, we have that same pattern, but there's a different rhythm. Each chapter has a totally different rhythm to it. In the first chapter, there was that really distinct rhythm of those three statements that were being made, and then when we get in chapter two, there's a different rhythm, but it's still that acrostic poem. Look at verse number one of chapter two. It says, How hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger, and cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel, and remembered not his footstool in the day of his anger? The first thing we see in this verse is the fact that Jerusalem has basically gone from as high as you can go all the way to the bottom. That's what God's getting across here when he says they're cast down from heaven unto the earth, and the Bible says that those that walk in pride, God is able to abase anyone, no matter how high and lofty they are, no matter how well they're doing, no matter how prosperous or successful, can be brought down by God at any time. You can exalt your throne all the way up into the heavens, but you can be brought down by God at any time, and this is talking about Jerusalem and the Jews being just brought down by Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian army. That's the context here in the Book of Lamentations. The children of Israel have gone into captivity in Babylon. Jerusalem's been destroyed. The temple's been destroyed, et cetera. Look at verse number two. The Lord has swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob and hath not pitied. He hath thrown down in his wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah. He hath brought them down to the ground. He hath polluted the kingdom and the princes thereof. Now what are the strongholds? A stronghold is basically like a fortress. So if you're defending yourself against an invading army, you're going to set up some kind of a fortress or a place where if you're under attack, you're all going to kind of go into that stronghold and it's easy to defend. You think of like the Alamo or something, right, as being a stronghold where people can hold out for a really long time against an invading enemy. We think of our very own Pastor Dave Berzins, who was a part of our church for so long before he became a pastor, and his church is called Stronghold Baptist Church. Basically it's a fortress. It's a place where the truth is defended. The church is the pillar and ground of the truth. And so a stronghold is going to be the last thing to fall. You know, when the enemy comes in and people are falling all around, towns are falling, they're surrendering, they're being defeated, the stronghold is like the last holdout or the Alamo if you would. And he's saying God has thrown down in his wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah. So even that place where it's the last stand, he threw it down. He polluted the kingdom and the princes thereof. Verse 3, he has cut off in his fierce anger all the horn of Israel. Now the horn basically represents being exalted. The Bible talks about David having his horn exalted, like the horn of a unicorn, he said. I shall be anointed with fresh oil in Psalm 92. And so the horn is the glory. If you think about an animal that has horns, if you were to take those horns off of it, it would look like a pretty sad creature at that point. Because the horn is the glory. And it's saying here that in God's fierce anger, he cut off the horn of Israel. That which they would glory in, that which is their prominent display is gone. He had drawn back his right hand from before the enemy and he burned against Jacob like a flaming fire which devoureth round about. He had bent his bow, and this is a key phrase here, like an enemy. God bent his bow like an enemy. Keep in mind we're talking about the Lord here. The Lord burned and threw down their strongholds and the Lord cut down their horn. And the Lord is the one who was as an enemy unto them. He stood with his right hand as an adversary. Now stop and think about this. Does God just always side with Israel all the time no matter what? Because a lot of people today in 2020 would teach us, hey you need to side with Israel no matter what. If you want God to bless you, you better be on Israel's side because he's going to bless those that bless them and curse those that curse them. Folks, that's a false doctrine. The bless them that bless you and curse them that curse you promise was made to Abraham and his seed. Well guess what? The modern day nation of Israel is not the seed of Abraham. And God's message to them is think not to say within yourselves we have Abraham to our father. Because if you were the children of Abraham, you would do the works of Abraham. We see that the seed is Christ. The Bible says in Galatians 3 that the promises were made to Abraham and to his seed. Not seeds plural, but one seed which is Christ. And if you're in Christ, then you're Abraham's seed and you're heirs according to the promise. So basically if God can be an adversary to Israel, God can be as an enemy unto them according to Lamentations chapter 2. He's in opposition to them. He's as an adversary. He's as an enemy. Then the idea that we are supposed to always be sided with Israel no matter what is not a biblical doctrine. And that's in the Old Testament, let alone in the New Testament, when there is no Jew or Gentile and God does not even regard the nation of Israel because now it's a spiritual nation that he's interested in which is made up of all believers, red, yellow, black, and white. So it says he was like an enemy. He was as an adversary. Verse 4, he slew all that were pleasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion. Everybody who was good looking, right, young, healthy, strong, they've been killed. They've been wiped out. And it says that he, in verse number 4, poured out his fury like fire. Verse 5, the Lord was as an enemy. He had swallowed up Israel. He had swallowed up all her palaces. He had destroyed his strongholds and had increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation. And he had violently taken away his tabernacle as if it were of a garden. He had destroyed his places of the assembly. The Lord had caused the solemn feasts and Sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion and had despised in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest. And then look at verse 7, it says the Lord had cast off his altar. Notice how many times it says the word his here. You see that, how that happens over and over again where it talked about how in verse 5 he destroyed his strongholds and in verse 6 he violently took away his tabernacle. He destroyed his places of assembly. All of these his, his, his. Verse 7, the Lord had cast off his altar. He had abhorred his sanctuary. What's the Bible saying here? Look, just because of the fact that your God's chosen people in the Old Testament like the nation of Israel were doesn't mean that God can't have indignation and bring great punishment upon people that are called by his name. The church that's called by his name. The church that claims the name of Jesus Christ is not immune from judgment when they get out of line. When they get away from the Lord. The nation who says in God we trust and we're founded on Christian principle, hey if they get away from the Lord they're not immune from being punished. No pun intended. But the Bible says in verse 7 the Lord had cast off his altar, he had abhorred his sanctuary, he had given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces. He's basically just handing them to the enemy on a silver platter. Here you go Nebuchadnezzar, here you go Babylon. These people are doomed. They have made a noise in the house of the Lord as in the day of a solemn feast. The Lord had purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion. He had stretched out a line. He had not withdrawn his hand from destroying. Therefore he made the rampart and the wall to lament they languished together. So again he's talking about the wall, this came up in chapter 1, the wall, the gates, the strongholds, the ramparts. And he's kind of poetically giving them human attributes by saying he caused the rampart and the wall to lament. Like the wall is sad. Obviously that's not literal. And then when he says they languished together, you know, you just think of someone just slumping down in despair and just collapsing in despair. And that's the image of basically the walls of Jerusalem coming down just looking so pathetic and sad after God has caused them to be destroyed. And obviously the wall is very important to an ancient city. That's their main defense. Without a wall, it's just open season to whatever invading army to just come in and have their way with them. Look at verse number 9. Her gates are sunk into the ground. He had destroyed and broken her bars. Now when you look at this, you've got to realize the actual perpetrator of this destruction is the Babylonian army. It's actually Nebuchadnezzar. But yet over and over again, who gets credit for actually doing the destroying in Lamentations chapter 2? It's the Lord broke it down. The Lord destroyed it. The Lord burned it. The Lord wiped it out. And you know what? When bad things happen, the Bible says in Amos chapter 3, is there an evil in the city and the Lord had not done it? Why? Because of the fact that God in his wrath will punish people and sometimes he'll use human instrumentation to bring that punishment. And look, I believe that when there's a virus coming through and harming people and people are sick and dying, that's not a blessing from God when that virus comes through. And when the economy starts to tank and when businesses are shutting down and failing, that's not a blessing from God. That's not good. And think about how good things were going coming into 2020. Record low unemployment. I mean the economy is thriving. The economy is booming. Everything is going great. I mean 2020 was looking like it was going to be a great year for the United States of America. But you know what? God had other plans. Because God is not pleased with his sanctuary in this country. He's looking down at the Christian churches and by and large, he's not pleased with what they're doing. And look, folks, when we go out soul winning, we run into a lot of people that are saved. I mean look, if I go out soul winning for an hour in Phoenix, I pretty much run into somebody who saved at least one every single time in that hour. At least one that's already saved. I mean there are a lot of people out there that are saved, but the sad thing is the vast majority of God's people in this country are very backslidden. And because God's people by and large in this country are very backslidden and not putting God first, not seeking first the kingdom of God, then basically you have the Lord's enemies, the reprobates, the sodomites, the atheists and so forth. The Lord's enemies are basically just running roughshod over everybody and just pushing their agenda, promoting their agenda. And our country has gotten more and more sinful. It's gotten more and more irreligious. It's gotten more and more blasphemous. And Christianity has gotten cold in this country in so many ways. And so 2020, we're going into this year, everything's going to be great. And then God says, no, it's not going to be great because here, let me just slap you with this virus. And look, the facts are that people are getting very sick. People are dying. And the economy is tanked. And a lot of people's plans are falling through. I mean, people had vacations planned that are falling through, business plans that are falling through, churches had stuff planned that fell through. I mean, just thing after thing after thing, whether it's economic, whether it's the health aspect of it, you can't look at this any other way than this is something bad that happened. It's not a blessing, it's a curse. And it's pretty obvious what's going on when we look at the spiritual state of our nation and see that the spiritual state of our nation is in the toilet. And then I'm like, huh, I wonder if this is a punishment from God or if we're just really righteous and God's just testing us and trying us. Folks, no one thinks that this country is right with God. I don't think they do. I don't think any serious student of the Bible thinks that our country is right with God when they're looking at Planned Parenthood and they're looking at the sodomites marching up and down the streets and they look at the kind of stuff that's all over the TV and the radio and everything like that. So look, it's pretty obvious what's going on when you got a sinful nation and then you got something really bad happening just out of nowhere, unexpected. Of course, everybody now is saying it's all predicted and planned, but it's funny, I don't remember people warning me about this six months ago. I don't remember people warning me about this three months ago. This came out of nowhere and you say, well, you know, this isn't an act of God. This was done by man. This was done by wicked people. Okay. So I guess Nebuchadnezzar wasn't an act of God either because it was done by man because it was done by wicked people. You know, the Babylonians came in and they ripped up the women with child and they came in and they killed the old man and they killed the young man and they killed the virgin daughters and they killed everything that looked good to them and they just wiped it out and destroyed it, but that's not the judgment of God. No, that was done by man. Hold on a second. Who allowed man to come in and wipe out Judah? Who brought that Babylonian army because you know what, there were plenty of other times in scripture where some army, whether it was the Assyrians or Babylon or whoever, where they besieged Jerusalem, they surrounded Jerusalem and they were saying, hey, you can't win. And what did God do? God destroyed that army and they did win. What about when Hezekiah is praying to the Lord and begging God for help and God fights against his enemies for him because he's seeking the Lord. So look, it doesn't matter whether it's a direct act of God or whether it's an indirect act of God where he uses some laboratory messing up or they're tampering and trying to play God with viruses and they accidentally release something, whatever it is, God's behind it. Folks, it doesn't matter any way you slice it, it's an act of God. Whether it's wicked people that did it or whether it's just God up in heaven just snapped his fingers and said, you know, you're getting a little too cocky, America, you're getting a little too proud and arrogant and you think you're so great and you think you don't need me at all. Well, here, let me just snap my fingers and just mutate that coronavirus into a new one that's called COVID-19 and then we're going to see how smug you are in April. And it doesn't matter whether he did that directly or whether he did it indirectly, it doesn't change anything for me. The way I'm looking at it is, hey, we need to humble ourselves because this is God taking us down from our lofty arrogance and bringing us down. And we better take a lesson, lest a worse thing come upon us. You say, I don't know how it could get much worse. Well, you know what, if you're actually paying attention to Lamentations chapter 2, you'll see it could get a lot worse. Let's keep going. The Bible says in verse number 9, her gates are sunk into the ground, he had destroyed and broken her bars, her king and her princes are among the Gentiles, the law is no more, her prophets also find no vision from the Lord. You know what? If you don't listen to God, then don't be surprised if God stops talking to you. That's what we see in this passage because they're like, whoa, where's the law? I can't find my Bible. Hey, you didn't read your Bible when you had it and now it's gone. You could have been reading Genesis and Exodus and Leviticus and following it, you wouldn't even be in captivity right now, but now you're in captivity because you ignored the law of God and now all of a sudden you want to find the book of the law? Well guess what? It's gone. You don't have it anymore. Oh man, what do the prophets have to say? Hey, you didn't listen to Jeremiah the prophet. Jeremiah told you and Jeremiah told you and he told you, he told you, you didn't listen. Now all of a sudden the prophets are like, sorry, I don't have a message. What's God saying? Nothing. He's got nothing for you. What are we supposed to do? I don't know. Figure it out. You should have listened back when God was talking to you. Now all of a sudden, you know what it reminds me of? What about all the people, a lot of people are lamenting the fact that churches are temporarily closed down during this pandemic and they're temporarily closed down to help slow down the spread of this virus and they're lamenting that, but you know what? A lot of people didn't even go to church before this even happened. A lot of people were staying home before this even happened, you know? And the thing about that is that, you know, as a nation, less and less people have been going to church. Now obviously the people in our church, they're here, so they've been faithful, so this wouldn't apply to them. But you know, what about all the people in Phoenix, Arizona that listen to my sermon every week? They've been on live stream only for years, you know, they've already been on, you know, they were getting ready for coronavirus years ago, but they've been sheltering in place every Sunday morning for the last five years listening to my sermons and not actually showing up and darkening the door of the church. And so look, yeah, okay, we're in a city with 4.3 million people. And yeah, we have usually about 360 people show up on Sunday mornings and there are other good churches in this area, there are other soul-winning churches that have hundreds of people that show up, but what percentage of Phoenix, Arizona is really showing up to an actual church where the Word of God is actually being preached and it's actually a house of God where God would recognize that candlestick as being there? You know, a lot of people who have neglected church and now church is taken away from a lot of people. You know, and hopefully after this is all over, people will say, you know what, I value church more because absence makes the heart grow fonder and people will actually appreciate it more. You know, God can send a famine of hearing God's Word and then the Word of the Lord becomes precious to people again. You know, just like here, it's like, where's the law? Where's the preaching? All of a sudden they care about it now that it's gone, okay? And so, yeah, obviously those of us who've been faithful to church, hey, we're disappointed about the fact that church has to be canceled for a temporary period as part of getting through this challenge, getting through this pandemic that we're going through. But you know what though, hopefully all the other people out there whose butts have been at home all these years will actually wake up from this and say, you know what, I want to go to church now. Now I realize this is something that we should have been doing all along. Verse number 10, the elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon the ground and keep silence. They've cast up dust upon their heads. They've girded themselves with sackcloth. The virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground. Mine eyes do fail with tears. My bowels are troubled. My liver is poured upon the earth for the destruction of the daughter of my people because the children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of the city. Now what does it mean to swoon? You say, oh man, things are so bad. Folks, it could get worse. You know what, you say, well, you know, we shouldn't be spreading fear and panic. Hey, let me tell you something, you better get real scared of what God could bring next because this could be nothing. How do you know this isn't just the first wave and the second wave is going to make this seem like nothing, America? Wake up, America. How do we know what's coming? Hey, you know what, they, oh, you know, I had to use coffee filter for toilet paper. Hey, listen, it could get a lot worse than that because let me tell you something, here he said the children are swooning in the streets. You know what that means? They're going like this. You know why they're doing that? Because they didn't eat any food because they're starving to death. Nobody's starving to death right now in America. Not even close. Well, the grocery store shelves right, yeah, of your one favorite food is empty. One shelf where your special kind of bread is empty. There's another kind of bread right across the aisle, but you don't even know what suffering even is, folks, because if you think this is bad, folks, and people are like, I think this might be the tribulation. You know what, this is a joke compared to the tribulation. This is a joke. If you think this is the tribulation, then you don't understand the wrath of God at all because God's wrath would make this seem like a joke. Read the book of Revelation and you'll find out that what's coming is going to be a thousand times worse than this light affliction that we're going through right now. This is just a little warning shot that God's giving. This is just a little shot across the bow. I mean, God is slow to anger. God's merciful, but you know what? People need to take heed to the warning because it could get worse when the sucklings and the children are swooning in the streets of the city. Verse number 12, they say to their mothers, where's corn and wine? When they swooned as the wounded, right? So they're like somebody who's wounded like, oh, I've been wounded. You know, that's how they're doing it, but they're doing that because they didn't eat. You know, you ever just not eat and get kind of faint and lightheaded and you need to eat some food in order to get clarity again, to get energy. Sometimes if I get a little bit dehydrated or if I haven't eaten enough, I'll start actually seeing a little bit blurry. And I always remember that verse when Jonathan puts his staff in the honey and eats the honey off the end of his staff and it says his eyes were enlightened when he ate that honey, which obviously has a symbolic meaning of, you know, God's word is like honey and it opens our eyes to things. But the point is, you know, I can relate to that because sometimes when you get dehydrated or hypoglycemic and then you eat a little bit of honey or something, it's like, boom, now I can see clearly again, I'm feeling good again. These people are starving. They're begging their parents. How would you like your children to be begging you for food and you don't have anything? How would you like them just, mom, I'm hungry, dad, I'm hungry, and you have nothing to give them. I'm not saying you don't have the right flavor. I'm saying you have nothing to give them. That's a horrible feeling. What shall I take to witness for thee? Verse 13. What things shall I liken to thee, O daughter of Jerusalem? What shall I equal to thee that I may comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? For thy breach is great like the sea. Who can heal thee? Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for thee. He's saying you've been listening to a bunch of stupid preaching, vain things, empty, fluff. You've been listening to Joel Osteen. You've been listening to Rick Warren. You've been listening to all this junk that's filled with fluff. It's stupid. And they have not, and here's, you say, well, what's wrong with Joel Osteen? What's wrong with T.D. Jakes? What's wrong with Kenneth Copeland? I'll tell you what's wrong with them. Because it says right here, they've not discovered thine iniquity to turn away thy captivity. The word discover in the Bible is used a little differently than the way we use it. When the Bible used the word discover, it means uncover. So like when it talks about discovering nakedness, it's like uncovering someone's nakedness. It's not like, you know, Christopher Columbus discovering the new world. It's not the way it's used. It means uncover or expose. So these prophets that are just preaching this vain and foolish stuff, they did not uncover your iniquity, he said. They did not expose your sin to turn away thy captivity, but have seen for thee false burdens and causes of banishment. So basically, here's what he's saying. The preachers are not actually showing what the real problem is. They're not actually uncovering your sin and rebuking you for your sin. And look, Joel Osteen's not known for rebuking you for your sin. TV, televangelists, they're not going to rebuke you for your sin because they don't want you to get mad and change the channel when it starts hitting close to home. So they just want to puff you up and build you up. But he says they've seen for you these false burdens. Okay? A burden is something heavy that is placed upon someone or something, right? So if I were to put a burden on a mule, I'm basically like putting a pack on that mule to carry. So in the New Testament, Jesus talked about the Pharisees putting burdens on to people that they wouldn't touch with one of their fingers, but they're putting it on other people. The burden of the Lord is something that is found in scripture as a theme in some of the minor prophets, okay? What is that? It's basically this is what God is putting on you, all right? This is what he is putting on you. And they are seeing for you, these false preachers, a false burden, meaning basically they're not telling you what the real problem is because they're seeing for you false burdens and false causes of banishment. What's a cause of banishment? It's a reason why you're going into captivity. Banishment is what? Exile. This is called the Babylonian exile. So basically, the children of Israel are going into exile, why? I'll tell you why. Because of idolatry, murder, adultery, right? These are the type of things that Jeremiah is rebuking in the time leading up to this. So Jeremiah is giving them the true story. Hey, you got to get rid of the idolatry, you've shed innocent blood, you're worshiping other gods, you know, all the right things that Jeremiah is preaching. Basically, these false preachers are coming up with other things and saying, no, no, this is the problem. It's actually that you've been harming the environment too much. That's why God's mad. It's because you were too racist, that's why God's mad. You didn't promote social justice enough. You didn't advance women's rights enough. Folks, there's a whole movement now today in America known as the religious left. Basically, it's like politically left-wing people calling themselves Christian. So they're the socialists and the commies and they're basically for abortion and they're for homos and they're for feminism and yet they say that they follow Jesus Christ. Is that the stupidest thing you've ever heard in your life or is it just me? How can you be for abortion and homos and you claim to be following Christ? But yet you see these churches, right, with the rainbow flag and they're promoting all this left-wing commie stuff. It's the religious left. There's the religious right and then there's the religious left. No, there's the demonic left is what they are, okay, if they're going to sit there and be for abortion and sodomy and every other degenerate thing of the left. And they will come up with these false causes of banishment. Like for example, here's what they'll say when you try to point them to the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. They'll say, well, no, it was just the problem in Sodom was a lack of hospitality. They were not hospitable enough. They were, you know, that's what it was. That's not what the Bible teaches. The Bible clearly teaches that they gave themselves over to fornication and went after strange flesh. That's what the book of Jude says was the problem. And even in the scripture that they're using as a proof text because they're going to Ezekiel chapter 16 about how they didn't strengthen the hands of the poor and needy, but then it says, and they committed abomination before me, therefore I took them away. So why were they banished ultimately for the abomination that they committed? They gave themselves over to fornication and go after strange flesh. Yet you have these weirdo preachers today in the so-called religious left getting up and saying, well, no, the real reason was they just didn't practice hospitality and they weren't just redistributing their wealth enough. They weren't communists enough. Folks, it's out there and it's not a small thing, folks. It's all over the place. It's taking over in the Southern Baptist Convention. It's already taken over a bunch of other Presbyterian denominations, Lutheran denominations, Episcopalian denominations. You have all these people out there with preachers getting up and claiming to represent the Lord Jesus Christ and his word, and what are they doing? They're giving a bunch of false burdens. They're putting some burden on you just for being white or something, putting a burden on you just for being straight and whatever, and saying, oh, that's the cause of banishment. You weren't liberal enough. That's stupid, folks. And look, let me just make it clear where I stand on race. I believe all races are equal in the sight of God. I don't even like the word race. I don't even think it's really a thing. When the Bible talks about race, it's just telling you to run the race. It's not about what color your skin is. I don't think the color of your skin matters any more than the color of your eyes, okay, or the color of your hair. It's meaningless to me. All of one blood, red and yellow, black and white, they're precious in his sight. But you know what? I'm not going to sit here and feel guilty about being a white person or something and get into this thing of like, oh, shame on us for not just elevating every other race or something. Folks, that's not the problem. That's not the problem in America today. You know what? The problem in America today is that we're not following Jesus Christ. That's the problem. And you know what? If everybody would start following Jesus Christ, we wouldn't even have any race problem anyway because look, folks, who do we have the most in common with? Our brothers and sisters in Christ. We don't care what color they are. You know what brings people together is God's house because it's the house of prayer for all nations. And so red, yellow, black and white come together in fellowship in one house, in one place of worship. But today, you've got the social justice warriors today, even behind the pulpit, so-called religious left. They just want to get up and guilt you about being a white person, guilt you about how you weren't nice enough to sodomites or something, guilt you about how you didn't give enough of your money to the government or whatever to take care of the poor and all this socialist junk. Folks, it's lies. The problem is that you're drunk. The problem is that you're a fornicator. The problem is that you're committing adultery. The problem is that you're not reading and following the word of God with your family. That's the problem. But they want to come up with all these other things. They got their own morality that's separate from the Bible and they decide what a good person is. No, the Bible decides what it means to be a good person and we need to follow God's commandments. The Bible says in verse number 15, all that pass by clap their hands at thee. They hiss and wag their head at the, I mean, they just walk by and they're just shaking their head like, you know, just hissing, wagging the head, clapping their hand. Is this the city that men call the perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth? All thine enemies have opened their mouth against thee. They hiss and gnash the teeth. They say, we've swallowed her up. Certainly this is the day that we've looked for. We've found, we've seen it. The Lord had done that which he had devised. He had fulfilled his word that he had commanded in the days of old. He had thrown down and had not pitied and he had caused thine enemy to rejoice over thee. He had set up the horn of thine adversaries. Their heart cried unto the Lord, O wall of the daughter of Zion. Let tears run down like a river day and night. Give thyself no rest. Let not the apple of thine eye cease. Arise, cry out in the night. In the beginning of the watches, pour out thine heart like water before the face of the Lord. Lift up thy hands toward him for the life of thy young children that faint for hunger in the top of every street. You can see how things can get a lot worse. Behold, O Lord, and consider to whom thou hast done this. And then watch the chilling next words of verse 20. Shall the women eat their fruit and children of a span long? Shall women eat their fruit and children of a span? Their fruit, it's talking about the fruit of the womb, it's talking about the fruit of their bodies, it's talking about their babies. And he says of a span long, now a span is the distance. If you go like, you know, hang loose, baby, and you go like this and you go from your thumb to the end of your little finger, it's about nine inches long. That is a span. Now if you've heard the birth announcements around here, which come quite frequently, sometimes more than one per week, because we have a fruitful church here, when you hear the birth announcements, I don't remember hearing about one that was nine inches long, do you? What's the length that keeps coming up over and over again? 20 inches, 20 inches, 21 inches, 21 inches, 20 inches, 20 inches, right? You hear about that over and over again. Well if you look up the different sizes in the womb, when you're about 19 weeks along pregnant, 19 to 20 weeks, gestation is going to be around the time that that baby's going to be about nine inches long. So this isn't even a newborn baby. This is a premature baby. This is basically a woman having a miscarriage, halfway into her pregnancy, and then eating it. Okay? Now why would she have a miscarriage? Probably because she's starving. And so her body is saying, look, I can't support you and this pregnancy, something's got to give. And so that's going to induce, wouldn't that induce a miscarriage? I mean if you're just starving, you're not eating anything. So then basically that's inducing a miscarriage. And you know what? God said in the book of Leviticus, he said, look, if you disobey my commandments, if you're going to be stealing and lying and murdering and committing adultery and worshiping idols and worshiping devils, he said, you know what? I'm going to bring some curses on you that you can't even believe. And he said, you know what? You're going to eat your sons and daughters. That's what you're going to do. It's going to be that bad. And we see examples of that in scripture. We see examples of it in the book of 2 Kings where basically you have the woman who said, hey, you know, we made an agreement here. We ate my son yesterday. We're supposed to eat your son today. And now you're trying to keep your son alive. Hey, you need to honor your end of the deal. I mean, what kind of a horrific picture is that? Oh, I had to wait in line at the grocery store. You should have seen the line at Trader Joe's. You should have seen the Costco parking lot. They still don't have toilet paper in the brand I like. Folks, how hungry does a person have to get before they start eating human flesh? You'd have to be pretty stinking hungry. OK, and you know, you think of stories about the Donner party. Think of the stories about the rugby team that was in the Andes. And you think about these stories where they resorted to that. And let me tell you something. They didn't just, it didn't happen the first day, folks. They're just like, all right, people, here we are. Let's go. Let's not skip a meal here. Folks, that's the last resort. And if you read about those stories, you'll find that a lot of people even refused to participate in it. Even when they were starving, a lot of people even refused and just still didn't touch it. I mean, a lot of the people that came through that Donner party ordeal never touched the stuff, OK? But even in the Donner party, where they had to resort to that, you know what they did? They labeled people's family members to make sure nobody's eating their own family member, OK? But here we have a scripture where not only are they eating a family member, but they're actually eating their child. This is a mother. Think about a mother's feelings toward her child. Folks, this is pretty much the most extreme situation that you could possibly imagine. I mean, if you just imagine, what is the worst possible situation that anyone could find themself in, you'd pretty much say, is basically this woman in Lamentations Chapter 2, who basically is eating her child that's a span long. And you know what? Folks, you say, I can't believe you didn't even talk about that. How dare you bring up something so morbid? Well, last time I checked, this is the word of God, and you better shut up and listen and take heed. And I can't believe that. Well, I can't believe how people can just ignore and scoff at the creator of the universe, and then they get confused when bad things happen. Folks, you better tremble before the God of the Bible, because God can take you all the way from up in the clouds, and he can bring you down so hard that he'll take you to the depths that you can't even imagine. I mean, we're talking about the God that created hell, folks. He can bring you. You say, oh, I just feel like God's not blessing me. Folks, just be careful not to get all the way on God's bad side, folks. He can tear you up. I mean, look what the Bible says. Folks, I know we don't hear a lot of preaching out of Lamentations. I don't think a lot of sermons come out of Lamentations. I don't think I've done a whole lot of sermons out of Lamentations necessarily, except maybe chapter 4 and chapter 3 a little bit. But you know what? Let me tell you something. These scriptures, they're not being preached very often, but they're in the Bible, and they're written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come. This is profitable for instruction in righteousness. This is profitable for reproof. God gave us this book of Lamentations. And you know what? This ought to put the fear of God into you. If you have a spiritual bone in your body, this ought to put the fear of God into you. Shall the women eat their fruit and children of a span long? Shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord? The young and the old lie on the ground in the streets. My virgins and my young men are fallen by the sword. Thou has slain them in the day of thine anger. Thou has killed and not pitied. And again, the beginning of the poem, at the beginning of chapter 2, he said, you didn't pity. At the end of chapter 2, he says again, you didn't pity. He's reiterating that at the beginning and the end of this chapter, because each chapter is its own individual poem as broken out by the pattern that I explained. You know, a lot of times, you say, oh, the chapter divisions came later. And that's true. A lot of the chapter divisions did come later. But in this particular book, the chapter divisions are already there, because you have the poem broken down like that. And so there's bookends here of chapter 2, where he starts out and ends on saying, God didn't pity. Now look, God is very pitiful, the Bible says. God's full of pity. God's full of mercy. God's full of compassion. God's full of love. God is long suffering. God is slow to anger. God is of great mercy. God's a God of forgiveness and redemption. But let me tell you something. You cross a line, though. It's over. You cross that line, and it's over. God's pity stops at some point, and then you're doomed. So a lot of people, they abuse God's mercy. It's like God's being merciful. He's being patient. He's being long suffering. He's showing pity. And then they're just like, oh, I guess I can just keep doing whatever I want then. And then all of a sudden, God comes down like a ton of bricks, and it's too late. Folks, we've got to take heed. We've got to pay attention to the warnings before it gets that bad. He says, you have not pitied. Verse 22, thou hast called as in a solemn day my terrors round about. Now, here's the thing. The solemn days are holidays, the sacred, solemn, serious days, days of reflection. The solemn feasts, the Bible talks about. This is when they're gathering from all over the country, and they're going to Jerusalem three times a year for a solemn feast. He's saying, you have called. Call is like our word invite. If you call someone in the Bible, a lot of times you're inviting them to something. He says, you've called as in a solemn day my terrors round about. Basically, Jeremiah is saying here, God's basically like throwing a party where he invites everything that you're afraid of to come to the party. He's basically saying, you've called as in a solemn day. Like, all right, it's a holiday. Let's bring people from all over the place. It's your birthday. Let's have a big party, and we're going to bring all your friends and loved ones to gather together. It's Christmas. Time for a big family reunion. It's Easter. Let's all get together and have brunch or whatever. He's saying, you've called my terrors basically round about. Instead of being surrounded in a circle by people saying, happy birthday to you. Basically, God's bringing everything that you're afraid of, everything that you're scared of, everything that terrifies you, every terror, and saying, all right, everybody's invited. Famine, come on over. Bad economy, death, pain, suffering, sickness, death, come on. It's a party, and it's all for you because you have disobeyed the Lord. So that in the day of the Lord's anger, none escaped nor remained. Those that I have swaddled and brought up hath mine enemy consumed. And again, the reason it closes on that note is because that's the worst thing for any parent is to lose their child. And so the coup de grace at the end of this poem is the ones that I swaddled and brought up, the little baby that I rocked in my arms and diapered and loved and swaddled and took care of, the enemy has consumed them. The enemy has destroyed them. How would you like God to turn your life into your own personal horror movie that never ends? How would you like God to turn our nation or our city or our state into a nightmare? Because you know what? God has the power to do that. And we need to take heed unto God's word, and we need to take it seriously. And you know what? This thing that we're going through right now, obviously it's a challenging time. I'm not downplaying it. It's challenging. And in the next few weeks, the death toll is going to go through the roof. If you just look at the mathematics, it's super clear to anyone who's actually crunching the numbers that the death toll is going to skyrocket over the next few weeks. You're going to see a lot more people sick and in pain and going through things. Obviously, people are going through economical things right now because their job is slowing down or completely stopped, and they're not making any money. People are going out of business. Restaurants are going out of business. People are going through bad things. But let me tell you something. It can get way worse, way worse. So what we ought to do is not say, well, this ain't bad, and just keep on going business as usual because this isn't so bad. You know what we ought to be doing is taking these type of warnings that came directly from God seriously because this is from God, period. Anyone who argues with that, I don't even know what to say to you if you don't think that God is behind this. You think God, like God's just like, whoa, what's going on down there? Folks, you got a wicked nation, you got a virus, and you got all these problems and all the different things that are going on. It's from God. So what we ought to do is look at what's going on and say, you know what? It's time to look within. It's time to do some serious introspection of ourselves. And I don't care who you are. I don't care man, woman, boy, and girl. You need to do some introspection because you know what? You think you're immune to this? Hey, maybe you're immune to coronavirus, but you know what? You're not immune to God's wrath. OK. You say, well, I'm saved and God would never pour out his wrath on his own people. That would never happen. Really? Because I remember a scripture where the Lord's anger was kindled against Moses. Now truly, we have nothing to fear when it comes to hell because we have eternal life and we've been passed from death unto life and we shall not come into condemnation. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. But you know what? Nothing can make my kids stop being my kids. Nothing can make me stop loving my kids. But you know what? That doesn't mean that my wrath might not get kindled at my kids and that I might not punish them, right? But here's the thing. Nobody is immune from God's punishment. And let me tell you something. Unto whom much is given of him shall much be required. So you need to look within. Churches need to look within. Families need to look within. Our nation needs to look within. And you know what? Obviously, we need to be preaching the gospel at this time because we want people to get saved. And that's an important message all the time. I mean, that's a big thing all the time is that the unsaved person's greatest need is to get saved, right? I mean, that's really the only thing that matters to them. They need to get saved. But you know what? And you say, well, people are thinking about death right now, so they might get saved. But you know what? More than just getting people saved, what about literally just tens of millions of saved Christians in America that are totally backslidden? Think about how many people would get saved if they would actually get right with God. I mean, think about the literally tens of millions of saved Christians in America that are backslidden and not right with God. You know, that's probably a big reason why we're being punished right there. Because if my people, which are called by my name, God said, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land. So I'm obviously for getting people saved right now. And I praise God for every single soul that's saved every day. But let me say something else that needs to be done is that we need to also be thundering a message from our pulpits that says, repent, America, and Christians get right with God. Basically, we need to discover the iniquities, too. We need to preach the gospel to the lost. But what do we preach to the saved? Do we preach the gospel to the saved? They're already saved. You got tens of millions of people that are already saved in this country. What do we preach to them? You know what we need to preach to them? We need to rebuke them for indulging in the wickedness of 2020 America. And you know what? A lot of them have been spending a lot of time at the casino. And they've been spending a lot of time out at the bars. And they've been spending time with things that don't matter, just wasting time on worldly entertainments, and pleasures, and things. And they've made a god out of sports, or they've made a god out of entertainment, or movies. And let me tell you something. Maybe God is telling them, hey, you know what? You haven't really been going to my house. Well, you know what? Let me shut down the stuff that you like. Let me shut down the bar. Why don't you live? Let's see what the bar is live streaming. Can you live stream in the bar? No, but at least you can live stream in preaching. And you know what? Maybe people will actually wake up a little bit in this country to the fact that they've dishonored God. And you know what? You say, what do we do? What's the answer? What do we do? Folks, what can we do except to just follow God, and love God, and obey God, and preach the word of God? Because you know what? You say, what do I need to do? How are we going to stop the New World Order? Folks, the thing that's going to stop the devil is the word of God. Biblical preaching is the answer. What was the question? You know what I mean? Because biblical preaching is going to be the answer to our problems. People getting saved is the answer for them personally, individually, to get to heaven. But the answer for fixing our country is people getting right with God. And it starts with you, and it starts with me, and it starts with everybody getting right with God and preaching to other people to get right with God. And you know what? This whole crisis that we're going through, because you never want to let a crisis go to waste, isn't that what our politicians say? You know what? This crisis is wasted on you if all you're going to do is just be glued to a bunch of conspiracy videos or just be glued to mainstream media or just be glued to Netflix and catching up on your binge watching of this series. Folks, we ought to not let a crisis go to waste, quote unquote, by saying, you know what? I need to take this as a personal slap in the face from God Almighty. And our country should take this as a slap in the face from God Almighty, because you know what? If this is not a slap in the face from God, then you know what? That I shouldn't even be pastoring, because I have no idea what I'm talking about, about anything. Because let me tell you, so this is the most clear cut, obvious slap in the face from God that if it's not, then I have no business even preaching. If you're actually going to tell me that, oh, this has nothing to do with God, well then you know what? I don't know anything then, because everything I've read in the Bible, everything that I've studied, everything that I've preached, everything that I've experienced tells me that this is God warning us, period. Nothing could be clearer. Nothing could be clearer. You know, and I know there are people in the media getting offended right now, because certain preachers that are well known or something have said things like, hey, this is God punishing us. Ugh! You know what I say? I say you're an idiot if you don't think this is God punishing us. You're an idiot. Because if you think America's right with God, you're a complete idiot. And if you think that this kind of a virus happens without God having anything to do with it, you're crazy. I mean, do you think God's just not even involved? So there's just this world event that's rocking the world right now, and I don't care if you buy into all these wild-eyed theories about this. You know what? Even if you buy into the most wild-eyed theory, you must admit that this is still an act of God. Because even Babylon coming in and fighting against Jerusalem I don't see anything supernatural in that story. I mean, do you see anything supernatural in the Babylonian exile? Or is it just Nebuchadnezzar? He's got a big army, he comes in and defeats Jerusalem. Nothing supernatural there. But was it God doing it? Well, Lamentations chapter two said it was God doing it, God doing it, God doing it. You're gonna tell me this isn't God doing this? Even if you do believe, and you say, oh, it's a 5G tower or whatever. Well, you know what? Then God put up that 5G tower to punish you, except that that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life. But I'm saying, I don't care what kind of crazy stuff you believe, or if you believe the official version, either way, folks, it doesn't change the fact that God is punishing. Period. I don't, I mean, I can't even see how anyone could not grasp that. That this is bad things happening to us as a result of us doing bad things. We have done bad as a country, bad came back to us. I don't see how, unless you just don't believe in the morality of the Bible or something, and you just think that drunkenness and stealing and adultery and fornication are just fine or something. You just think it's fine to just not go to church, or you think it's just fine to just corrupt the Bible and just replace it with an NIV. And you know, I mean, look, you think God's up to heaven, he's seen all this stuff, he's not pleased. Okay, that's why we're in the place that we're in. But you know what, we as God's people, we don't have anything to worry about as long as we love God and that's what the Bible says. And you know, I think about this verse every single day over the last month, every single day, my theme verse is that we know that all things work together for good to them that love God. I mean, that's clear. So look, you say, man, this is a gloomy sermon. Yeah, it's only gloomy if you're not right with God. Then yeah, you oughta be very afraid, be scared to death. You oughta be panicking, you oughta go buy so much stinking toilet paper, you should fill an entire room of your house with toilet paper and go get in the fetal position if you're wicked because you know what, God's coming to get you and he's gonna rip through so many rolls of Charmin to get to you and he's gonna chew you up and spit you out. But let me tell you something, if you are right with God, then there's nothing to fear because all things work together for good to them that love God. You know what, that includes this, this right here that we're going through right now, this issue, it's gonna work together for good for Steven Anderson. I know that much is true because I know my own heart, I know that I love God. You know, I may not know that about every single person, but I know for sure of one person that loves God and his name's Steven Anderson and you know what, all things are gonna work together for good no matter what. And so here's the thing, if you're listening to me right now whether present here in the auditorium or whether you're tuned in by a live stream, if you're listening to me right now, you know whether you love God or not, don't you? You know right now in your own heart, maybe other people can't see what's going on in your heart, but you know right now whether you love God or not. And if you love God right now, then you know you're gonna be fine because all things are gonna work together for good for you. Doesn't mean you're not gonna suffer, but all things are gonna work together for good for you. But if you don't love God right now, if you know that you're backslidden and if you know that you just really don't even care about reading your Bible right now and you really just don't even care about winning souls to Christ or you just don't even really care about following the commandments and you just kinda just wanna just do what you wanna do. You're not even interested in thinking about God. You're not interested in his program, his agenda. If that's you and you're premeditating how you're gonna go out and steal and you're gonna go out and fornicate and you're gonna go out and get drunk and you're gonna take drugs and you're gonna look at pornography, you know what, if that's you right now, then you know what, you oughta be nervous. You oughta be afraid. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for this book, Lord, Lamentations, it's not a book that we think about very often necessarily. It's not a book that's preached very often. But Lord, it's oh so relevant. And so Lord, I pray that you just continue to speak to us from this book and that we would take heed unto it even though it's unpleasant, even though it's not a very wholesome book sometimes, Lord, help us to take it seriously and the implications in it seriously. And in Jesus' name we pray.