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While We Wait - Waiting Through Tears

  • Writer: Paul Downie
    Paul Downie
  • 2 days ago
  • 23 min read

Lamentations 3:24-27 NIV 

[24] I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” [25] The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; [26] it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. [27] It is good for a man to bear the yoke while he is young. 

What I am about to share in this study may seem highly inappropriate for some people. 


I make no apologies for that. 


Allow me to explain. 


Just outside Dunure in Ayrshire there is a road known colloquially as the ‘Electric Brae’. It’s so named because of an optical illusion that locals incorrectly attributed to mysterious electric forces. If you drive your car up the A719, stop on the layby, put your car in neutral and remove the handbrake, your car will roll backwards down the hill, but the landscape creates an optical illusion that convinces you that you are rolling uphill. 


You may wonder why I am starting a study on verses in the single most depressing book in the Bible by talking about a bizarre optical illusion. 


Just like a driver on Electric Brae, this passage can confuse and discombobulate us. There can be little doubt that it’s context is bad – as bad as it ever got for the ancient Jews. What we see here is a lament written, many believe, by the prophet Jeremiah memorialising the extremely violent sacking of Jerusalem by the Babylonians and the exiling of its entire intelligentsia. What you are reading about in this book is not a bad case of the blues, but an attempt to brutally and systematically destroy a nation. 


And let me tell you: Jeremiah does not hold back. Not one bit. 


Lamentations 1:11, 18-19 NIV 

[11] All her people groan as they search for bread; they barter their treasures for food to keep themselves alive. “Look, Lord, and consider, for I am despised.” 
[18] “The Lord is righteous, yet I rebelled against his command. Listen, all you peoples; look on my suffering. My young men and young women have gone into exile. [19] “I called to my allies but they betrayed me. My priests and my elders perished in the city while they searched for food to keep themselves alive. 

Lamentations 2:11-12, 19-22 NIV 

[11] My eyes fail from weeping, I am in torment within; my heart is poured out on the ground because my people are destroyed, because children and infants faint in the streets of the city. [12] They say to their mothers, “Where is bread and wine?” as they faint like the wounded in the streets of the city, as their lives ebb away in their mothers’ arms. 
[19] Arise, cry out in the night, as the watches of the night begin; pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord. Lift up your hands to him for the lives of your children, who faint from hunger at every street corner. [20] “Look, Lord, and consider: Whom have you ever treated like this? Should women eat their offspring, the children they have cared for? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord? [21] “Young and old lie together in the dust of the streets; my young men and young women have fallen by the sword. You have slain them in the day of your anger; you have slaughtered them without pity. [22] “As you summon to a feast day, so you summoned against me terrors on every side. In the day of the Lord’s anger no one escaped or survived; those I cared for and reared my enemy has destroyed.” 

Lamentations 4:4, 9-10 NIV 

[4] Because of thirst the infant’s tongue sticks to the roof of its mouth; the children beg for bread, but no one gives it to them. 
[9] Those killed by the sword are better off than those who die of famine; racked with hunger, they waste away for lack of food from the field. [10] With their own hands compassionate women have cooked their own children, who became their food when my people were destroyed. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.4.4-10.NIV)


Lamentations 5:11-14 NIV 

[11] Women have been violated in Zion, and virgins in the towns of Judah. [12] Princes have been hung up by their hands; elders are shown no respect. [13] Young men toil at the millstones; boys stagger under loads of wood. [14] The elders are gone from the city gate; the young men have stopped their music. 

These are desolate, horrid, shocking verses – graphic in the extreme. You rarely hear them preached on in the pulpit, and not without reason. 


Yet I want to ask you a question: 


Does any of that seem good to you? 


Of course not! Right? It’s the most obvious thing in the world! These verses send shivers down our spine. They make us want to vomit. They describe a situation so utterly horrible that we could never imagine it. 


But look again at Lamentations 3:24-27.


Jeremiah says something in these verses that seems scandalously inappropriate. It’s often drowned out by the beautiful words before it, but these verses ought to make us stand up and pay rapt attention. Jeremiah takes something so utterly beyond comprehension in its evil and yet he says that there is good there. Not just once, but three times. 


His suffering exceeds ours by an almost impossibly large factor. Yet he says that there is some good in it. 


How? And why? 


That is what we will look at in this study. 


Before we proceed, I feel that it’s necessary to clear up a possible misunderstanding. Jeremiah says that three things are good, but one thing he does not say is good is the suffering that he and his fellow Jews have experienced. 


How could he? It was bad. There is no doubt about that. Anyone who believes that any suffering is good in and of itself is clearly very deluded, and even more so when we’re talking about suffering in this scale.  


So how can we get a proper perspective on this? Like a vehicle on the Electric Brae, how can we see through the illusion to see what is really going on? 


Job might help us. As he was struck by suffering, and his wife told him to curse God and die, his rebuke of her contains this: 


Job 2:10 NIV 

[10] He replied, “You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” In all this, Job did not sin in what he said. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/job.2.10.NIV)


The word translated as ‘trouble’ can be translated as something morally wrong, but also, as is appropriate here, as adversity or trial or hardship. The verse states that Job did not sin in what he said. Had he accused God of wrongdoing, he would have sinned. 


So what we see here is that God is good, but He can use suffering to achieve His good purpose. 


We see echoes of this in the New Testament: 


Romans 8:28 NIV 

[28] And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/rom.8.28.NIV)


‘In all things’. The phrase doesn’t just mean that in the main, in the average, if you balance them out, then God is working for our good. No, it means that in each and every thing, God is working for our good, whether we perceive them as good or bad.  


Admittedly, that is a very hard concept to take in when you are under the cruel cosh of suffering. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that suffering is good. By its nature, suffering is bad and waiting for God to relieve your suffering is a bad situation.  You will not see any argument against that in this study. 


However, we cannot avoid the first thing that Jeremiah said was good in his lament, and that is this: God is good. 

 

God is good 

Lamentations 3:25 NIV 

[25] The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.3.25.NIV)


Sometimes good people have to do things that look bad to achieve a good purpose. 


Now, let me clarify that. What I don’t mean is that good people can do bad things to fulfil a good purpose. The Bible is absolutely clear on that. There is categorically no room for realpolitik or the end justifying the means. The Ten Commandments do not contain a get out clause. The Bible does not entertain the concept of a relative or flexible morality. Wrong is wrong. End of argument. 


But even though bad things happen, that does not make God bad.  


Let me explain. 


There are two books where suffering is described at length: in Lamentations and Job. 

Both are absolutely clear on who the authors believe is behind the suffering. As much as this might jar our neat theologies and philosophies, this is the Word of God, so we have to accept it: 


Lamentations 1:5, 12, 14-15 NIV 

[5] Her foes have become her masters; her enemies are at ease. The Lord has brought her grief because of her many sins. Her children have gone into exile, captive before the foe. 
[12] “Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look around and see. Is any suffering like my suffering that was inflicted on me, that the Lord brought on me in the day of his fierce anger? 
[14] “My sins have been bound into a yoke; by his hands they were woven together. They have been hung on my neck, and the Lord has sapped my strength. He has given me into the hands of those I cannot withstand. [15] “The Lord has rejected all the warriors in my midst; he has summoned an army against me to crush my young men. In his winepress the Lord has trampled Virgin Daughter Judah. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.1.5-15.NIV)


Lamentations 2:1-8 NIV 

[1] How the Lord has covered Daughter Zion with the cloud of his anger! He has hurled down the splendor of Israel from heaven to earth; he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger. [2] Without pity the Lord has swallowed up all the dwellings of Jacob; in his wrath he has torn down the strongholds of Daughter Judah. He has brought her kingdom and its princes down to the ground in dishonor. [3] In fierce anger he has cut off every horn of Israel. He has withdrawn his right hand at the approach of the enemy. He has burned in Jacob like a flaming fire that consumes everything around it. [4] Like an enemy he has strung his bow; his right hand is ready. Like a foe he has slain all who were pleasing to the eye; he has poured out his wrath like fire on the tent of Daughter Zion. [5] The Lord is like an enemy; he has swallowed up Israel. He has swallowed up all her palaces and destroyed her strongholds. He has multiplied mourning and lamentation for Daughter Judah. [6] He has laid waste his dwelling like a garden; he has destroyed his place of meeting. The Lord has made Zion forget her appointed festivals and her Sabbaths; in his fierce anger he has spurned both king and priest. [7] The Lord has rejected his altar and abandoned his sanctuary. He has given the walls of her palaces into the hands of the enemy; they have raised a shout in the house of the Lord as on the day of an appointed festival. [8] The Lord determined to tear down the wall around Daughter Zion. He stretched out a measuring line and did not withhold his hand from destroying. He made ramparts and walls lament; together they wasted away. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.2.1-8.NIV)


Lamentations 3:38 NIV 

[38] Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come? 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.3.38.NIV)


Job 6:4 NIV 

[4] The arrows of the Almighty are in me, my spirit drinks in their poison; God’s terrors are marshaled against me. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/job.6.4.NIV)


Job 9:33-34 NIV 

[33] If only there were someone to mediate between us, someone to bring us together, [34] someone to remove God’s rod from me, so that his terror would frighten me no more. 

Both books place God as Sovereign and therefore behind their authors’ suffering.  


Yet neither questions the goodness of God. 


In Lamentations, the cause of the suffering was clearly and unequivocally generations of unrepentant sin by Judah in particular. Jeremiah even states it plainly: 


Lamentations 1:5 NIV 

[5] Her foes have become her masters; her enemies are at ease. The Lord has brought her grief because of her many sins. Her children have gone into exile, captive before the foe. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.1.5.NIV)


Lamentations 4:12-13 NIV 

[12] The kings of the earth did not believe, nor did any of the peoples of the world, that enemies and foes could enter the gates of Jerusalem. [13] But it happened because of the sins of her prophets and the iniquities of her priests, who shed within her the blood of the righteous. 

So the logic here is that their situation was bad, but God is good, because they had been bad and were receiving the just punishment for their sins. 


Let’s not kid ourselves: this happens nowadays. In our universe of cause and effect, sin has consequences: smokers can get lung cancer, heavy drinkers can get liver issues, the promiscuous queue up at STD clinics. We know of these and many, many more. 


As Paul told the Galatians: 


Galatians 6:7-8 NIV 

[7] Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. [8] Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/gal.6.7-8.NIV)


And we understand it. We really do. 


When this happens, God is good. 


But Job’s situation is entirely different. Job did not suffer because of anything wrong he had done. His friends might have questioned his integrity, but God did not.  


In fact, Job received no explanation at all for the suffering he endured.  


This is often the situation where we find ourselves. We have endured health or employment or financial or relational issues, and we simply cannot see what we did wrong.  


What the book of Job tells us is these situations is that when this happens, God is still good.


What Romans 8:28 tells us, is that even in these circumstances, God is still working for our good. 


James adds this: 


James 1:2-4 NIV 

[2] Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, [3] because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. [4] Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/jas.1.2-4.NIV)


And Peter this: 

1 Peter 1:6-7 NIV 

[6] In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. [7] These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/1pe.1.6-7.NIV)


If we let go of the goodness of God and become mired in bitter railing against Him at the utter unfairness of it all, we kill off our last fragment of hope that all of our suffering will one day be worth it and be rewarded. The cost we pay in terms of our inner strength and resilience is very high.  


This is why, in the face of suffering and pain and a long wait for God to intervene, we must have faith in God: 


Hebrews 11:1, 6 NIV 

[1] Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.  
[6] And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/heb.11.1-6.NIV)


Without faith in God’s goodness, we are utterly lost in despair. 


So we see that God is still good. We understand that. But the next point seems to be very hard to hear, that is The Wait is Good. 

 

The Wait is Good 

Lamentations 3:26 NIV 

[26] it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.3.26.NIV)


Many years ago, we were waiting for a budget flight from Cebu airport in the Philippines. Our flight was delayed by two hours. The flight from the gate next to us, to Seoul, South Korea, was delayed by three hours. In a gesture that belied their status as a budget airline, their carrier took their orders and sent someone round to a local fast food restaurant to feed these poor people. I have never seen another airline do that for anyone else. 


I have also not seen another airline allow their crew to sit with delayed passengers in the gate. I nodded to one crewman and asked what was happening with the other flight. He told me. So I asked him what we would receive for our delay. 


He explained that after three hours, they had a policy of sending out for fast food. 


I joked with him: ‘What do you do after four hours? Do you spit roast a pig?’ 


Some waits are a lot more pleasant than others. 


I don’t doubt that, having seen their home city decimated by the Babylonians, having watched as any significant building – including the Temple – was burned and  having heard the screams of the people the invaders brutalised, waiting for salvation would be beyond tough. It would also be beyond anything that any of us have ever or should ever experience. 


This was tough. Really, really tough. 


Yet Jeremiah said it was good. 


Not only that, but Jeremiah said that it was good to wait quietly. 


Can you imagine that? Quietly? 


How many of us could wait quietly in a situation like that? 


Not many, I would suggest. 


But look how the psalmists use this word: 


Psalms 37:7 NIV 

[7] Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; do not fret when people succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/psa.37.7.NIV)


Psalms 131:1-3 NIV 

[1] My heart is not proud, Lord, my eyes are not haughty; I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me. [2] But I have calmed and quieted myself, I am like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child I am content. [3] Israel, put your hope in the Lord both now and forevermore. 

Do you see it? The Lord has ridden out to punish Judah for her many sins. The punishment they were receiving came from the God they had abandoned. They could have little argument against it. They could not complain. 


Their own undoing was their own doing. 


And even when we have consequences seemingly without cause, we have to ask ourselves what good complaining does. Does it change our situation? 


Not for the better. Only for the worst. 


When the Israelites were on their forty year sojourn through the desert, their complaints were legendary. Yet Paul took this as a warning: 


1 Corinthians 10:10-12 NIV 

[10] And do not grumble, as some of them did—and were killed by the destroying angel. [11] These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come. [12] So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!  

I know we have the right to free speech. And I know our situations are often impossibly hard. But at times like those we need to ask ourselves what we can do to help ourselves. 


1 Corinthians 10:23 NIV 

[23] “I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but not everything is constructive.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/1co.10.23.NIV)


Complaining is not one of them. It will never be one of them.  


Even when our suffering seems to be so unjust. 


Because it is good to wait quietly. It is the right thing to do. 


Because waiting can actually be good for us. 


I realise that this might seem utterly incongruous. After all, as we have seen in an earlier study, waiting on God is a clear statement that things are out of our control; that we are weak, needy and vulnerable. 


Yet this is a good position to be in. 


Why? 


The Beattitudes mention two groups of people who are waiting on God. Look what Jesus said about them: 


Matthew 5:3-6

[3]  “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 
[6]  Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/mat.5.3-6.NIV)


And as we saw earlier in Lamentations: 


Lamentations 3:25 NIV 

[25] The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.3.25.NIV)


Those who wait on God find that God supplies their needs, both while they wait and what they are looking for. And when God comes through for them, their faith is strengthened because they realise how good God is to those who wait on Him. Waiting on God becomes a virtuous circle that increases our faith and our trust in Him. 


So yes, when we wait on God, our situation can be pretty bad – Jeremiah's was awful. But it is good to wait quietly on God and to realise that the wait will be good for us. 


So we have seen so far that two things are good in the midst of severe suffering: the God who is Sovereign during out suffering, and the wait for this God to end our suffering. 


The third thing we see is good is something very controversial, which many of us may even see as slightly disturbing: The Yoke Is Good. 

 

The Yoke is Good

Lamentations 3:27 NIV 

[27] It is good for a man to bear the yoke while he is young. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/lam.3.27.NIV)


In Washington DC, there are a number of Smithsonian museums. All of them are highly educational. 


One of these museums is the museum of Black American History.  


Now, as a white Caucasian Brit who was born in a city that still bears the legacy of its past in the slave trade, I am going to say the completely obvious: the slave trade was and is utterly wrong. It doesn’t matter who imposed it or still imposes it – whether it was by African and Arab tribes, industrialised by greedy white-run businesses or by modern slave drivers – it is absolutely wrong all of the time to deprive people of their liberty and exploit them for profit. And it will never be right. 


A yoke was a wooden contraption used to hold oxen together. A plough was attached to it when the ground was being broken up to sow seed. While it was used on beasts of burden, sometimes those ‘beasts of burden’ were people. It was often used to incapacitate prisoners or to make them work as slaves. 


When Jeremiah refers to young people ‘bearing the yoke’ here, he could literally be talking about becoming slaves of the Babylonians: no-one should be in any doubt whatsoever that this actually happened.  


Now, Jeremiah was not a young man when he wrote Lamentations. It’s believed that he was likely 60-65 years old. But he was not anti-youth. There are reasons why he wrote these challenging words: 


Lamentations 3:28-33 NIV 

[28] Let him sit alone in silence, for the Lord has laid it on him. [29] Let him bury his face in the dust— there may yet be hope. [30] Let him offer his cheek to one who would strike him, and let him be filled with disgrace. [31] For no one is cast off by the Lord forever. [32] Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love. [33] For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone. 

I want you to carefully notice the three reasons why Jeremiah says that this yoke is specifically good when placed on the unwilling necks of captured youth. 


Firstly, God placed it. That is crucially important. If God is good, and He places a yoke on our necks, then the yoke must be for His good purposes. 


Secondly, God owns it. Look at these famous verses that Jesus spoke: 


Matthew 11:28-30 NIV 

[28]  “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. [29] Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. [30] For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” 

Now, the young people in Jeremiah’s day would likely not have seen things this way. And who could blame them? It’s entirely possible that many of them could have orphaned by the Babylonian invasion. Many had been reduced to absolute poverty. They would be living in fear of their occupiers.  


No-one would ever want to live like that. 


Yet Jesus talks of His yoke being easy and His burden light. 


How can that be? 


We have to understand that the adjective used to describe this yoke was used to describe one that was custom-built for the beast that bore it – it was the right size, comfortable and did not chafe. This was important as animals could be wearing that yoke for hours at a time and bearing heavy loads. Jesus was telling His followers that the load they would bear was custom-made for them. 


But it was also light. We also saw this in the New Testament: 


2 Corinthians 4:16-17 NIV 

[16] Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. [17] For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  

This almost seems insulting. How can a burden this heavy ever be said to be light? 


We need to understand that Paul, who wrote these words, was actively persecuted. He knew what it meant to carry a heavy burden (2 Corinthians 11:24-29). Yet here he said that it was light! 


Let me tell you how: a heavy burden becomes light for you when someone else carries its weight.


The whole point of Jesus’ teaching is that we should lay down our burdens at His feet, leave them with Him, and pick up His lighter burdens instead. One of the reasons why the church exists is to help us carry our heavy burdens (Galatians 6:2). 


Could our yoke be hard and our burdens heavy because we are trying to carry them alone, when they were never designed to be carried that way, and neither were we designed to carry them? 


Thirdly, God will raise it. That is, their suffering will come to an end. 


Now, here’s where youth in Jeremiah’s day had the edge. Jeremiah made this prophecy about how long the Jewish Exile would last: 


Jeremiah 29:10 NIV 

[10] This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/jer.29.10.NIV)


And this prophecy was fulfilled: 


2 Chronicles 36:21 NIV 

[21] The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time of its desolation it rested, until the seventy years were completed in fulfillment of the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/2ch.36.21.NIV)


The reason why Jeremiah said it was good for the youth in particular to bear the yoke of their disgrace was that there was hope that these people would see the end of the Exile and the return back to Jerusalem. And do you know what? Some of them actually did! We read this in Ezra, as the foundations of the new Temple had been laid: 


Ezra 3:12-13 NIV 

[12] But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy. [13] No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away. 

Do you understand what this means? There was hope for these young people as they bore the yoke of suffering, because older men like Jeremiah would die without ever seeing Jerusalem again, but these young people would see salvation come. They would see the Lord restore Jerusalem once again. 


So yes, this yoke was bad, and it was heavy, and it was difficult. That was absolutely true. 


But if they gave it to God, trusted Him to help them with it and put their hope in Him to life it, then their yoke would be easy and their burden light. 


And the growth in their faith could turn a bad yoke good. 

 

Conclusion  

Lamentations 3:24-33 NIV 

[24] I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” [25] The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; [26] it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. [27] It is good for a man to bear the yoke while he is young. [28] Let him sit alone in silence, for the Lord has laid it on him. [29] Let him bury his face in the dust— there may yet be hope. [30] Let him offer his cheek to one who would strike him, and let him be filled with disgrace. [31] For no one is cast off by the Lord forever. [32] Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love. [33] For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone. 

There are some books in the Bible that are easy to read.  


Lamentations is not one of them. 


There are other books in the Bible that spell out the history of what happened when the Jews were exiled. Lamentations does not. Lamentations is poetry. It concentrates on the brutal emotional impact of what happened. 


That is why it’s such a difficult book. It’s also why, other than a few verses, you barely hear this book preached on.  


There are men and women, high up in the Arctic Circle in Norway, who spend their days using robots to mine iron ore from deep beneath the ground. There are others in Mongolia, in the middle of the desert, five hundred and fifty miles from the capital Ulaan Baatar, mining for copper. Still others in Indonesia, deep in the jungles of Papua, mining for gold. 


Yet here, right on the surface, we see a shiny object that will help us through the darkest of nights: 


Hope. 


Hope that will guide us through out worst suffering. 


And our longest and toughest of waiting.


In days gone past, sailors navigated vast oceans using a sextant and the sun by day and the North Star by night. Loose sight of them in a cloudy or foggy day and they were lost. 


These three good things in times of trouble are our North Star. Lose sight of them, and our wait for God to rescue and save us becomes interminable, if not impossible. 


Lose them and we lose ourselves. 


What are these three key truths? 


Firstly, God is good. God is always good, even if our circumstances are bad. Why? Because He can use bad circumstances for our good. 


Secondly, the wait is good. Waiting is an act of faith. It strengthens our faith. Especially when God shows up and saves us, which He will. 


Thirdly, the yoke is good. Right now, we might not be able to see it. Of course not. We’re so caught up on the every day scrap for survival that we miss it. But it is good. God gave it to us. After he talked about suffering in his letter to the church, James said this: 


James 1:16-17 NIV 

[16] Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. [17] Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.  

The yoke can become a ‘good and perfect gift’ if it forces us to throw ourselves on God and rely on Him. 


Now, I fully understand this all seems a lot. Perhaps it’s tough to take in, especially if you are in the thick of suffering right now and God has not shown up yet. But what we see here is absolutely true, and it can give us the hope to keep going. 


In 2001, I lost my father, my missionary career and my health within a short space of time. I had been close to my father and I had loved being a missionary a little too much. My sense of dignity and self-respect had been built on my title and the at least twice-weekly sermons I preached in local churches, as well as my leadership of short-term teams. So when I lost both, it hurt me deeply, and that is what took my health. 


I still believed that God was good, but it took me a long time to realise that what He had done was good, even if it hurt. I looked in it as being bad for the longest time. 


And then, after counselling and a lot of prayer and Bible study, I remember walking into woodland somewhere, standing on my own and praying, ‘God, I don’t understand what you did and I don’t understand why, but You are good. You love me. So somehow what has happened to me and my family must also be good, even if I can’t see how.’ 


That moment was a breakthrough for me. I realised that I didn’t even have to comprehend all that God had done in my life, or the reasons why. All I had to understand was that God knew what He was doing all along. 


And that is the hard part. I had faced so much before then since I was a young boy. I guess God wanted me to somehow come to terms with it all before moving me on. 


These days, people from the UK often go to Turkey for cosmetic surgery. Sometimes it works. Sometimes the surgeon does a bad job and places their lives on the line. 


I needed spiritual surgery. The Lord sent me to Romania to get it, and in the meantime, I hope, be a blessing to others. He then did some more in the Philippines, where I gained a new perspective on my life experiences that I could never have gained in Scotland. 


In all I have been through, I have proved completely and utterly that Jeremiah was completely right: 


Lamentations 3:25-26 NIV 

[25] The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; [26] it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. 

Because the Lord does not willingly afflict us and make us wait for Him to save us, but when He does, it’s only ever for our good. 


Prayer 

Lord Jesus, You know better than anyone how much I am hurting right now and how much I long for You to save me. Help me to gain a new perspective on my situation and to see that, even as I wait, there are good things I can cling to, the best of which is You. Amen. 


Questions for Contemplation 

  • How does your situation compare to Jeremiah’s as he wrote Lamentations? 

  • How could Jeremiah say that there was anything good in his situation? What did he say was good in it? 

  • Do you think he was correct? Why / why not? 

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