The Simple Life

Jerusalem sinned grievously; therefore she became filthy; all who honored her despise her, for they have seen her nakedness; she herself groans and turns her face away. Her uncleanness was in her skirts; she took no thought of her future; therefore her fall is terrible; she has no comforter. "O Lord, behold my affliction, for the enemy has triumphed!" The enemy has stretched out his hands over all her precious things; for she has seen the nations enter her sanctuary, those whom you forbade to enter your congregation. All her people groan as they search for bread; they trade their treasures for food to revive their strength. "Look, O Lord, and see, for I am despised." Lamentations 1:8-11 (ESV)   Our sin keeps us from any good thing by fostering false expectations, hope, and security. When our expectations are obviously unfulfilled and our hope and security all come tumbling down, we experience something we were never meant to experience — total failure.   Sin may fee...

Jerusalem sinned grievously; therefore she became filthy; all who honored her despise her, for they have seen her nakedness; she herself groans and turns her face away. Her uncleanness was in her skirts; she took no thought of her future; therefore her fall is terrible; she has no comforter. "O Lord, behold my affliction, for the enemy has triumphed!" The enemy has stretched out his hands over all her precious things; for she has seen the nations enter her sanctuary, those whom you forbade to enter your congregation. All her people groan as they search for bread; they trade their treasures for food to revive their strength. "Look, O Lord, and see, for I am despised." Lamentations 1:8-11 (ESV)   "The emphatic word is 'therefore.’ It rings with sad and solemn cadence through the most mournful of all the books of the Bible. It is the epitaph of the nation to which once the conquest of the world was possible, but whose persistent resistance to the will of God s...

Jerusalem remembers in the days of her affliction and wandering all the precious things that were hers from days of old. When her people fell into the hand of the foe, and there was none to help her, her foes gloated over her; they mocked at her downfall. Lamentations 1:7 (ESV)   "What would the nightingale care if the toad despised her singing! She would still sing on, and leave the cold toad to his dank shadows. And what care I for the sneers of men who grovel upon earth? I will sing on in the ear and bosom of God." ( H. W. Beecher. )   Those who are confused often make fun of those who are clear-thinking. As misery loves company, the confused, too, love company. Those who think clearly are in grave danger if they continually look to the confused for affirmation. Confused people act confused, and do whatever they must to normalize their confusion, making chaos normal.   God is the source of peace and order, not confusion. We crave peace, security, and significance, all ...

From the daughter of Zion all her majesty has departed. Her princes have become like deer that find no pasture; they fled without strength before the pursuer. Lamentations 1:6 (ESV)   "We do our utmost to protect great buildings from fire and tempest, and yet all the time those buildings are liable to another peril not less severe—the subtle decay of the very framework of the structure itself. The tissue of the wood silently and mysteriously deteriorates, and calamity as dire as a conflagration is precipitated. The whole of the magnificent roofing of the church of St. Paul in Rome had to be taken out at enormous expense because of the dry rot. Scientific men, by microscopic and chemical methods, have investigated the causes of this premature decay, and after patient search they have discovered not only the fungi which destroy the wood tissue, but also the spore that acts as the seed of the fungus. So this obscure, malign vegetation goes on in the heart of the wood, destroying the ...

The roads to Zion mourn, for none come to the festival; all her gates are desolate; her priests groan; her virgins have been afflicted, and she herself suffers bitterly. Lamentations 1:4 (ESV)   "A pathetic picture indeed is this, that the feast is spread and no man comes to the banqueting table; every gate is open in token of welcome and hospitality, yet no wandering soul asks for admittance; …All this can God do even to His chosen place, and to altars on which He has written His name. Officialism is no guarantee of spiritual perpetuity. Pomp and ceremony, with all their mechanical and external decorations and attractions, are no pledge of the presence of the Spirit of the Living God. The sanctuary is nothing but for the Lord's presence. Eloquent preaching is but eloquent noise if the Spirit of the Lord be not in it, giving it intellectual value, spiritual dignity, and practical usefulness. Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord; because men have forgott...

She weeps bitterly in the night, with tears on her cheeks; among all her lovers she has none to comfort her; all her friends have dealt treacherously with her; they have become her enemies. Lamentations 1:2 (ESV)   "We do not know our friends until we are in some extremity. Fair-weather friends are not to be implicitly trusted. You cannot know a man until you have had occasion to test him by some practical sacrifice; until you have opposed a man you do not know what his temper is; until you have disappointed a man you cannot tell the extent of his good nature; until you have seen a man in trial you know nothing whatever of his grace or his virtue. Many persons shine the more brightly because of the surrounding darkness; they have no genius for conversation, they cannot display themselves in public, they are but poorly feathered and coloured, so that they have nothing to attract and gratify the attention of curiosity: but how full of life they are when their friends are in trouble,...