Welcome back to the Daily Bible Podcast! We're so glad you've joined us. And now your hosts, Doctor Pastor PJ and Pastor Rod.

Hey everybody, we are back with you again and we are still in the book of Lamentations. But you know what? I do not lament. I do not lament that today marks 19 years of marriage to my wife. Unbelievable. Yeah. And consequently, you have prepared a song. You always with the song. Always with the song. You're preparing a 19 minute song, a 19 minute song that you have written specifically for Amanda. Yeah. Called appropriately. The 19 minutes song for a minute for Amanda. Wow. Yeah. It's a catchy title, but it's only gonna be for her. So I, I can't share. All right guys, don't listen to this next 19 minutes, just between Bastard Peach and Amanda. Okay. Tune out for the next 19 minutes. Go ahead. Yeah, man, I'm not listening. No, but happy anniversary. 19 years. We were talking about it the other day. I think if we went back we'd probably do our wedding differently. We'd make different decisions now as older adults and what we did and what we didn't do and what we thought was important at the time, but, all right. Yeah, man we I'm thankful for her man. Just, we both have great wives and I know Pastor Mark does, Lewis does as well. So we're blessed to have. Just great wives on our team and my wife is such a huge blessing to me. 19 of your favorite things about Amanda. Go, starting with number 19 and with number one. So 19 to number one. Yeah. 19. 19. Favorite things you, again, you are a master at putting people on the spot by the way. You could say I have 19 million. I could not narrow it down to 19. That's the problem is I can't come up with only 19. Yeah. Yeah. By the way, after our last episode, you immediately were on Amazon Googling large shot collars for big dogs. There's just some really good options here. Yeah, I still have it in front of me. This has four powerful modes with a nightlight. So if you go outside and you'd be, you can see where I am. It's got a threequarter mile range, which I'm not sure how far our houses are, but I think I might be able to make it work if I put an extender on it. And then if I sense in my spirit that you're sinning. In any way, just a quick little, oh man. If you didn't listen to yesterday's podcast, then you're confused. Go back and listen to it and you'll catch up. You don't need to. Lots of googly. Lots of go. Lots of googly. Hey I was at Community group the other night, community fellowship group for small people or something like that, and people were not. That's it. And people were not aware of where the term googly came from. I've gotta give credit where credit is due. That is a Jeff Mooch term, through and through. He's the one who initially said it's something about googly. And I just I caught it. I hung onto it, and I've never let it go ever since. So the word googly is not a real word, I don't think. Anyway. In fact, let me just, I don't think it is. I think it's, you're gonna Google googly. Googly is goog. There's googly eyes, right? Unfocused or rolling. That's the only definition they offer. So I guess unfocused. Unfocused. I guess that's that. But it says of the eyes, so it's an adjective of the eyes. Unfocused unfocused eyes. Okay, so maybe he's talking about our eyes. I don't know what our eyes look like when we do the podcast, but maybe he's referring to That. Could be. In any case, that is all Jeff Mo. Just wanted to give credit where credit is due. Good job, Jeff. Thanks for, and people are saying it now. It's like a, it's a common vernacular. It's out there in our church. I love the googly. In fact, that's the most, for the people that don't like it, they don't tell us. Thank you. Yeah. For those who do they say? Yeah, the googly is part of the fun. We were just listening to somebody in our office the other day say, Hey, when one of you is out town, I think Pastor Mark should fill in because then it, it keeps it up and it, you've got the banter back and forth that Google is still there. Yeah. I think the way she said it was like, you guys are awful when you're not together. I've heard that from so many people. Something like that. Yeah. And part of it, it's, it makes perfect sense 'cause the, we play different roles. Totally. And the roles work when there's two are better than one, as Ecclesiastes says. Yes. So it makes sense. And when we do it alone, it's harder to do the, to do both roles. Makes sense. It is a backhanded compliment still though. I mean it's Hey, you two are great together, maybe we should preach together. Wouldn't that be fun? A tag team? Yeah. Like tag in, tag out. Or we just stand next to each other and I'm looking at your notes and every time you say something I'm like, you know what? That's a good point. PPG, lemme just add or what if we both prepared sermons on the same text and preach them at the same time Live? Oh yeah. I like, I you, how about you just call me up? In the middle of your sermon and I just jump in. There we go. There we go. Because we're not, I guess we don't, we prepare, but in different ways I'm sure for the, for this. Yeah. We both read, obviously, but what we come up with and what we think would be helpful to talk about, that's free that's more free flowing. It's not very scripted for us. That's true. Yeah. Some, in fact, when Pastor Mark jumped in here the other day, he was like, do you guys discuss what you're gonna say before you hit record? Never. Nope. We just go for it. We know the Bible verse. That's what we, or the verse is we know the verses. Yeah. That's the extent of it. Most of the time, every now and then that we'll talk about something like, oh, this would be helpful to discuss. Yeah, we need to talk about these things or that thing. And certainly when you all throw in questions, that's helpful because it gives us. Some fodder to, to kick around before we get into the passage. Yeah. Less googly with the questions. Yeah. Anyways, again, happy anniversary, Amanda. We're having community group tonight to celebrate. Can't wait to hear that song, Amanda. You let me know when you hear it. 19 minutes. 19 minutes. 19 minutes. Alright, let's let's jump in limitations three, four, and fives. But if you were just gonna make it up on the spot, what would it sound like? I have no idea. I've got nothing. I've got nothing. I don't I'm not good under pressure. Sure you are not in that kind. You gotta start somewhere. And they would love to hear it. I don't think so. I don't think anybody would. I think nobody would. I don't. I don't agree with that. I'll let you off the hook this time, but next year for 20, you better come. Ready. All right, fine. Limitations three, four, and five limitations. Three. We think in limitations three of great as your faithfulness, right? That's where our minds go, because that's what we find here, the steadfast love. The Lord never ceases. Verse 22, his mercies never come to an end. They're new every morning, great as your faithfulness. In fact you may be singing the song right now that goes along with those lyrics and along with those words and yet they come in the midst of a chapter where. You wouldn't expect to hear great is your faithfulness. Remember the context here, Lamentations, we can't set, we can't remove verses 22 and 23 outta the context of the fact that Jeremiah is lamenting the fall of Jerusalem. And that's really what the first half of the book is about. He's re lamenting his own plight, his own affliction, that God's hand is against him, that he's brought him into darkness without any light. Verses verse three, there. He goes away and talks about the degradation of his body. Verse four or five, six, he's, his skin is wasting away. He's broken his bones, the language of what took place to the city. Jeremiah, the prophet, is saying, God has done that to me. God has besieged and enveloped me. He has walled me about verse seven, just like the Babylonians did. God has done this. He's made my chains heavy, just like they carried them away in captivity. Jeremiah said, that's how I feel when it comes to what God has done. He's a bearer. He's a lion. He goes on and on He, he says, look, my soul is bereft of peace. Verse 17, I have forgotten what happiness is. That's staggering. I've forgotten what it is to even feel happiness. So I say my endurance has perished and so has my hope from the Lord. That's the lead in to Great is your faithfulness. That's the why these verses are so much more powerful than what we give them even credit for. It's not as though we're just like, oh man, today was a hard day, but you know what? His mercies are new every morning. Great. Is your faithfulness. This is, I have no hope from an earthly perspective. I don't remember what happiness is like. But the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. Now that word steadfast love is I think in the Hebrew ed, which is his covenant love. So Jeremiah is anchoring his hope to the covenant relationship of God to his people, saying, God, you are not gonna forget your covenant. And I trust in that. And even though it doesn't feel good right now, my hope is gone. My happiness is gone. I'm gonna trust you. Your covenant love will remain intact. It's a great reminder. And if this book is written by. Jeremiah, he would've been a priest and so he would not have had a plot of land. But it is important in verse 24 where it says, the Lord is my portion, therefore I will hope in him. You think about the time that this is being said, Jerusalem has been destroyed. Everything has been raised. There literally is nothing else around them. The plot of land that was entrusted to them, given to them by God, they no longer have, so their physical material possessions would've been altogether. Destroyed. And so in a real sense, the Lord is my portion. This is all I've got. You are all I have left Lord, and therefore I will hope in you because I have nothing else. At the end of the day, when you're challenged to, if everything hits the fan and you have nothing else left, you're gonna be challenged to say, what am I hoping in? Am I hoping in the security of my 401k? Am I hoping in the security of my relationship to my friends, my family, those things can be taken away. The one thing. That you can guarantee will never depart and never lose its fidelity faithfulness. Its endurance is the Lord himself, which is why and is so foolish for us to put trust in anything else besides him. Not a bad thing to enjoy the things that he gives you as he does. But man, that's where the hope is. That's where the help is, that are you gonna talk about verse 33? Let's do that for he does not afflict from his heart. Talk about that. Yeah. A lot of times we can think that of God in the same way that maybe you think of somebody who is vindictive or impetuous or judging out of spite in hatred. And yet what we read about in verse 33 as Jeremiah's watching all this unfold, one of his comforts is, man God, you are still a God who loves your people. And yet this is the natural response. It's. It's not devoid of emotion, but in some ways it's like there's a cause and effect. If I step off of a building, then gravity is the effect that's going to take place. It's going to draw me to the ground. There, there's no if, ands, or buts about that God's. Gravity is his justice in response to sin, right? Justice has to be met, meted out for God to remain holy and just he has to judge. He has to punish sin. But it does not mean that he takes delight in that as he's doing that, he's not rubbing his hands together. He's not the cosmic, toddler up in the sky with the magnifying glasses, zap frying the ants of his people and cackling as he does so he does not afflict from his heart or grieve the children of man. In other words, God is not taking a sick delight in the judgment that he's pouring out upon the nation of Israel. This is not done out of spite, or hatred or petulance towards the people. This is done because God is holy and as a holy God, he must judge sin. Amen to that. And this is interesting because in our minds we, I think we can give ourselves enough credit to say it's possible for us to want two things that appear to be opposites At the same time, here we see two things that God desires, two aspects of his will, he desires a. To afflict them, to send them through adversity. And B, he also desires compassion. And so when it says here that he does not afflict from his heart, I think what Jeremiah is getting at is that this is not essential to God's nature. Wrath is not a divine attribute. We've talked about this before recently actually. And it's important to recognize that there's two schools of thought primarily. Some would say that this is an expression of God's divine divine nature. I think this verse would lead me to believe. That is not the case, that God's wrath is an expression of some other attribute that is more central and essential to who he is. And so this tells me when God exercises wrath, it's an expression of his justice or his holiness, but not something that he does from in himself. That is not something that exists in and of itself. Because God is a naturally wrathful being. It is a result of sin and the effects of the fall that God expresses his wrath, which by the way, you wrote a paper on this, I think it was your dissertation. This is one of the ways that God's glory is manifested, the full expression of His holiness. His glory is on display when he exercises his wrath. But. Not to be confused as being essential to his nature. Does that make sense? People Makes sense to me. If you get it, then surely they get it. Yeah. Hey, 39 and 40, we talked about this concept I think in yesterday's episode or maybe the day before, but our response to God's judgment and what we should do when we feel that the hand of God against us. He says in verse 39, why should a living man complain a man about the punishment of his sins? Verse 40, let us test and examine our ways and return to the Lord when we. Feel the hand of God in his discipline, his judgment against us. The right response is not to complain and to protest as though something un iJust is being done. But to say, okay, God, let me examine my heart. Let me see what it is that you are pursuing in my life. What might be out of whack? What do I need to repent from? What do I need to confess? What I, how do I need to return? And let's do just that. And so that's the right response versus 39 and 40 there to GA's judgment. Verse 55, he says, I called on your name, oh Lord, from the depths of the pit. I think this next section or this final section of chapter three is Jeremiah recalling the persecution that he experienced. If this is Jeremiah, and I think maybe this is another. Indication that it is. Because if you remember, Jeremiah was cast into the cistern and he was in the depths of the pit. That would be that cistern there and certainly the persecution that he experienced. It seems to be taken up here. You've redeemed my life. Others were trying to take his life, trying to persecute him to the point of death. And so you've heard their taunts, their plots against me. This is some of what we know as internal evidence when we look at a book as to identifying the author there. And so I think here we see that you, you mentioned I think yesterday as well, that the danger of having our census doled. To God's voice, to the truth of God. Verse 65 talks about that, right? You will give them dullness of heart as part of God's judgment against the people. That idea, that concept of dullness of heart, that our heart is not sensitive to God's judgment, not sensitive to God's conviction anymore, that's a terrifying thing and that's a one of the judgments that Jeremiah calls for against those that are persecuting him. Chapter four. Then we get into more on God's wrath in, in more of a focus on God's wrath here. And it's the destruction of Jerusalem is still the subject, the Holy Stones verse one lies scattered at the head of every street, the destruction of the temple there. Verse six, the chastisement of the daughter of my people has been greater than the punishment of Sodom, which was overthrown in a moment. No homes were, no hands were rung for her life. This jumped out to me this time, reading through this because Jeremiah is pointing to the prolonged suffering of the people during this, the siege, which was a 30 month siege, and then the ultimate destruction of the city you. Taken into effect. You mentioned the three deportations the other day in the podcast. This has been a long time that God has been pouring out his justice here, and I think that's what he means here, that the punishment of Sodom was not as bad as far as the suffering goes because it was over in a moment. Now, those that were judged. Went on to an eternity of judgment. But as far as the earthly suffering, it's different in that this one is stretched out for much longer. People didn't have the chance to wring their hands in grief over Sodom because it was just a flash and it was done. God poured out his justice rather than which Jerusalem, it's being drawn out longer and longer. Verse nine. Some of that suffering is described here. Happier were the victims of the sword than the victims of hunger. So the intense starvation, again, verse 10, describes some of the atrocities that took place there just out of human instinct, survival, instinct kicking in here, and what people were willing to do in order to survive the. The famine, the hunger there. Verse 11, the Lord gave full vent to his wrath and poured out his hot anger, and he kindled a fire in Zion and consumed its foundations. Yes and no, right? From an earthly perspective, we could say yes, he gave full vent to his wrath, but we know that from an eternal perspective, from the full force of God's wrath. It may have felt like that to the prophet as he's writing this, but there was more that wasn't poured out here in. In fact, that's why. Eternal damnation exists because there is an eternity. That it's being poured out that without being fully satisfied. And so I get what he's saying there, and yet that just makes us understand the wrath of God is so much bigger than we can even imagine. Yeah. Important to remember that as you read through this. This small book, you're reading poetry, which is why it's even formatted differently in most of our bibles. If you're using an ESV, there's lots of space between the lyrics because also what you can't see here is it's an acrostic. All of this is an acrostic. They're all a, b, c, D three, the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. So this is meant to be a funeral durge, as you brought up in the last podcast. It's a song that's meant to be sung and is meant to aid with memorization. That's often why they used things like that. Tools to help. To help you remember what you're saying. But that's an important point because in, in Hebrew poetry, just like in English poetry, we use exaggeration, we use alliteration to try to, or make it sound a certain way. And so you'll see some of that there. And that doesn't nullify or invalidate what we're reading. It just means that we need to take it for what it is. As poetry, it's a rhetorical rather a literature device to help us feel or think and understand in a certain way. So you do the same thing with Lamentations being people who believe the Bible for exactly what it says means that we take the Bible absolutely according to the kind of writing that it is. So we're not gonna take lamentations in the strict literal sense that we would a letter or historical document. Yeah. Yeah that's good. Yeah. The acrostic thing I had forgotten about that I remembered because that was when I was cross referencing in the other bibles that I was using the LSB actually puts 'em in there. I thought, oh, that's nice. That is nice. I like that. Don't let Lewis hear you talk about the l sb. I don't think he listens to the podcast anyway, so we're okay. It was his birthday yesterday. That's true. Yeah. He'll listen to yesterday's podcast. Yeah. Not today's, I find it interesting that Edem shows up again here. Again, I. Just reading through the minor prophets and now here and in Jeremiah the mites. And God was really specifically about the Edomites and their rebellion against him. And I think again, it goes back to Jacob and Esau. This is descendant to the family line that went against God and betrayed his people and everything else. The ADA might show up there again in the end. Chapter five. Then as I mentioned, I think yesterday in the outline of the podcast of the book is the prayers of the remnant. And so these are prayers that are acknowledging the plight. He says in verse three, we have become orphans, fatherless, like world, like widows, essentially here. And that's unique because God cares for those groups of people specifically and has revealed that he does. And so here. The prophet is saying that's where we are now, that we're there. We're like orphans. We're the fatherless. We're like the widows. And so the imp implication is, God, will you care for us? Verse 15, the joy of our hearts has ceased. Our dancing has been turned into mourning. The crown has fallen from our head. Woe to us for we have sin. And so there's an acknowledgement there of sin. This is not a pity party saying. Why are, why is this the way it is? We shouldn't be like this. There, there's recognition. We are guilty here. Our heart has become sick for these things. Our eyes have grown, dim. And so here is the conclusion of the book is not. Greatly optimistic, although it is in the sense that they're asking that God would act on their behalf. Why do you forget us forever? Verse 21, restore us to yourself, oh Lord, that we may be restored, renew our days as of old, unless you've utterly rejected us and you remain exceedingly angry with us. Which is interesting because we know that. He doesn't believe that because of, back in chapter three, what we read earlier, great is your faithfulness, your steadfast love. The covenant love will never cease. And so we know that the perspective was not that they believed that he was done with them. And so this is, I think, a prayer of hope as the book ends saying, we know you're not done with us, so Lord, please restore us as you see fit. Yeah, the book does end on a highlight, and I think that's ultimately the purpose of the book, to lament and to wail, to feel badly about what's taken place, but not to forsake or forget. The fact that the Lord is faithful. I noticed that one of the things that showcases God's judgment on his people is verse 12, no respect is shown to the elders small line. But I thought that's interesting because I think what that shows is that authority or good, helpful authority or even honor to a certain people group gets thrown out the window. When judgment is taking over a people, I think about Romans chapter one. The way that people treat one another and the dissolution of normal societal structures and features in this case, respect to elders. The fact that's going away and even hanging up princes by the hands would've been a way of shaming them, shaming those who were leaders and nobles, people that were meant to be respected and honored and revered again, like the elders. So I think that's interesting because I see a lot of that in our culture. I don't know that we're fully down the Romans one trail, but I see a lot of parallels between the way that God exercises his wrath against the people, particularly Jerusalem here, but also Romans chapter one for us, and how authority, good authority, good honor, gets tossed out. That's interesting to me. That is interesting. Yeah. Maybe it's worth kicking around on the next episode since we're running along on this one. Maybe it's worth kicking around on the next one. We, it seems that we're seeing a little bit of a, people are using all kinds of different terms, revival. Return reemergence of Christianity in our nation, especially amongst the youth. So maybe it's worth kicking around that concept and what that means for where we're at as a nation and what we should think about that, how we as a church should think about that. Should we buy in hook, line and sinker? Should we be cynics? Should we be somewhere in, in the middle there? How do we approach those things? Absolutely. You and Pastor Mark should talk about that. Wait. Let's pray and then we'll be done with this episode. God, we thank you for a book like Limitations that deals with real hurt and sorrow and pain. Lord we're grateful that your word does that, that your word does not sugarcoat things and portray a, an existence that should be all roses and daffodils and nothing wrong. We're grateful that, that you are a God who meets us in our sorrow. In our grief, and sometimes that's brought about by our own sin, as with the Book of Lamentations. And yet, you are a God whose faithfulness is great. Your covenant love, even your covenant love towards us as we are beneficiaries of the new covenant. In part, at least Lord is such a good reminder to us that you will not forsake us no matter what happens. There's no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. That's such a good thing. And yet we know that you are a God who pursues us, who disciplines us, who chastises us as a father does his sons, because you love us. So help us to be sensitive to that as well. So we thank you for this. We praise you for this. In Jesus name, amen. Amen. Keep reading your Bibles. Tuning again tomorrow for another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. Bye.

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Yeah. I would agree with everything that you said