CCC Livestream - The Gospel Shaped Family - Lamentations 3:1-33
Live Worship Gathering: 8.16.2026
Preaching: Jason Purdy
I invite you to turn with me to the book of Lamentations chapter 3.
We will look at verses 1-33 today.
We are walking through some key passages on marriage, on singleness, on parenting, and on children, as well as some passages addressing key issues that we all deal with in family life - both in our biological families and in our church family.
My prayer is that God would continue to make us and shape us by His grace and through His gospel into a godly church family that is made up of godly gospel shaped families.
Throughout the past couple of sermons, we have dealt with problematic emotions that can negatively influence family life.
We have looked at the heart of anxiety and the heart of anger, and today, we are going to consider the heart of depression.
I shared a few weeks ago that when Robin and I were young in our marriage and had our first two children and were straight out of school, we pursued a call to international missions.
But through that process I had my first panic attack that lead to some chronic anxiety.
Yet, we continued to seek the Lord and keep walking forward in our calling, but a few months into our endeavor, my anxiety gave way to a dark season of depression.
I lost all sense of hope.
I lost all sense of joy and happiness.
I lost all sense of purpose and meaning.
And I desired my life to end.
You see, we say from the pulpit that the church is for sinners and sufferers, but for some of us church is the last place we feel comfortable sharing our real sins and sufferings, but that should not be.
After my season of anxiety and depression, when I started sharing my story, I wasn’t sure how other people in the church would take it.
But, I can assure you I was met with love, grace, and compassion
I cannot tell you how many ministry opportunities God has given me as person after person over the years now have come to me and said, thank you for sharing your story.
I experience something similar. Can we talk?
You see, the very gospel that we preach tells us that we are sinners and sufferers.
We are weak and needy.
We are fragile and easily broken down.
And we do not trust in ourselves or our own abilities, and we do not trust in making an image of having it all together, but we trust in Jesus who is the only one who has succeeded where we have all failed.
The book of Lamentations, written by the prophet Jeremiah, reads like the personal journal of Jeremiah the prophet, who lived through and experienced one of the darkest moments in all of Old Testament history.
You see, the Old Testament is all about the one true God creating a people for his own possession, and making a covenant relationship of love and grace with his people even in the midst of all their sin and rebellion.
The promise begins in Genesis 3 where God promises to send the seed of woman, a man to crush Satan and sin in our place.
He then calls out Abraham as God’s chosen family to be a light to the nations.
God gives them His law to teach His people how to live, and He promises blessing for obedience and cursing for disobedience.
He preserves the line of the promised seed through to King David, and promises that one from David’s line would finally come and be the eternal king over His chosen people forever.
Yet, by the time of Jeremiah, the promised seed has still not come, the kings of God’s people have led the people into generations of disobedience and rebellion.
The last good king Judah ever had died when Jeremiah was young.
And now, God has brought the full weight of cursing and destruction on his people as the mighty Babylon has come and destroyed Jerusalem, destroyed God’s temple, and carried God’s people off into captivity.
And all the while, here was Jeremiah the prophet of God, and His only message from God the people is, “You deserve this punishment because of your sins and rebellion.”
Jeremiah was hated and despised by His own people.
He had seen men, women, and children murdered, taken into captivity.
He had witnessed God’s temple, the place of God’s presence with His people be utterly devastated and destroyed.
And now he writes of his own personal pain, yet as God’s prophet, his pain also represents the pain of the nation.
Would you follow along as I read God’s word through Jeremiah?
Lamentations 3:1–20 ESV
1 I am the man who has seen affliction
under the rod of his wrath;
2 he has driven and brought me
into darkness without any light;
3 surely against me he turns his hand
again and again the whole day long.
4 He has made my flesh and my skin waste away;
he has broken my bones;
5 he has besieged and enveloped me
with bitterness and tribulation;
6 he has made me dwell in darkness
like the dead of long ago.
7 He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;
he has made my chains heavy;
8 though I call and cry for help,
he shuts out my prayer;
9 he has blocked my ways with blocks of stones;
he has made my paths crooked.
10 He is a bear lying in wait for me,
a lion in hiding;
11 he turned aside my steps and tore me to pieces;
he has made me desolate;
12 he bent his bow and set me
as a target for his arrow.
13 He drove into my kidneys
the arrows of his quiver;
14 I have become the laughingstock of all my people,
the object of their taunts all day long.
15 He has filled me with bitterness;
he has sated me with wormwood.
16 He has made my teeth grind on gravel,
and made me cower in ashes;
17 my soul is bereft of peace;
I have forgotten what happiness is;
18 so I say, “My endurance has perished;
so has my hope from the Lord.”
19 Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
the wormwood and the gall!
20 My soul continually remembers it
and is bowed down within me.
1. Depression Makes It Seem Like God Is The Enemy
Have you ever felt like God was your enemy?
Who is it that Jeremiah says has brought him to this place?
Who is it that has broken, enveloped, and besieged him and brought him to this place of darkness?
He’s talking about God.
You see, it does no good to tell yourself that God has no hand in the worst of your sufferings and pain.
We are tempted to believe that we have to shield God from any involvement in our sufferings and pains in order to preserve His love, preserve His goodness, and preserve his character.
Whether it be preserving those things in our minds or preserving those things in the mind of someone else,
But listen, we as creatures take no role in preserving the character of the Creator God of the universe in any way.
God is who God is no matter where you find yourself.
He is sovereignly involved in every aspect of this universe and every aspect of your life, even the worst and most painful parts, so you can both be honest about where you are at and what you are experiencing and you can bring all that truth and honesty to God just like Jeremiah is doing here.
Jeremiah is experiencing affliction under the rod of God’s wrath.
He is in darkness without any light.
God’s hand is against him.
God has made his flesh and skin fall away and broken his bones.
God has trapped him in bitterness and tribulation.
God has made his chains heavy.
Though I call and cry for help, he shuts out my prayer!
Have you ever felt like your prayers weren’t getting past the ceiling?
You try to read the Bible, but you feel absolutely nothing?
God has made his paths crooked.
God is a bear and a lion ready to pounce and tear me to pieces.
God is the hunter, and Jeremiah is the target for his arrow.
Have you ever felt like maybe you are just cursed and doomed for destruction?
And that you are the target of God’s wrath?
You can call it depression, despair, a dark night of the soul.
It’s characterized by feelings of doom, despair, lack of motivation, feelings of unending sadness, shame, and loss.
Verse 14: I have become a laughingstock to all people.
They taunt me all day long.
I’m filled with bitterness.
My teeth grind on gravel.
My soul is bereft of peace, and I have forgotten what happiness is.
My endurance has perished. So has my hope from the Lord.
Have you ever had such a prolonged season of grief, loss, despair, and depression that you would say, “I have forgotten what happiness even feels liked?”
It’s like my soul is so parched and I can’t seem to drink of the living water.
If you have experienced this kind of depression and despair, I want you to consider that God chose to put these 20 verses in the Bible.
And God choosing to put words like this in the Bible communicates to us that God knows how you feel, and God wants you to know that He knows how you feel.
He is the God that sees and hears and knows and experienced all these things through his son and his time on earth.
Not only does God know and understand. God knows what He is doing.
God knew that this exile was going to cleanse his people from so many rebels and sinners.
And God knew that he was going to preserve the faithful remnant and finally bring them back to the land.
And God knew that he would ultimately work all things out for the good to those who love him and are called according to his purpose.
Yet, sometimes in the midst of intense pain, despair, and struggle, we don’t first need theological reasoning and all of our questions answered.
Most times, in the midst of depression, we first need a God who understands what we are going through and sits with us in it,
And all the theological explanations can come later.
That is what God is doing in these first 20 verses. He is understanding and sitting with us in the pain.
Maybe you are here today, and you just need to hear God tell you that it is okay to cry out to him with what you are truly feeling and experiencing.
God, I’m hurting, I’m confused, I don’t know what you’re doing.
I don’t feel like you hear me.
I don’t feel like you see me.
My mind, heart, and situation are in a bad place and I can’t see them getting any better.
God, where are you?
You see,
Proverbs 4:23 ESV
23 Keep your heart with all vigilance,
for from it flow the springs of life.
Sometimes, in order to keep your heart with all vigilance, and to see springs of life flow from your heart and life once again,
You first have to pour out to God all the hurt and pain and mess that you’ve been holding inside.
Maybe you do that by writing in a journal, or finding a place of solitude and literally crying out to God, maybe literally yelling and screaming out, or maybe you do it with a trusted friend.
Depression can make it seem like God is the enemy, so be honest with Him and be honest with others.
Sometimes we are tempted to think that the only kinds of prayers we can pray are super polished prayers only using super nice words.
But that is not the case.
God is more than able to handle your honesty. He sees, He hears, He feels, He understands.
Verse 21 is one of the most stunning transitions in all of the Bible.
Lamentations 3:21–23 ESV
21 But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
23 they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
2. In The Midst Of Depression, Call To Mind The Character Of God Toward You
So many times, you have no ability to change your situation.
Sometimes you can’t change how you feel.
You can’t just snap your fingers and make things right.
You can’t get away from the sickness, the weakness, or the loss.
You can’t reconcile the difficult relationship on your own.
But the one thing you can do is make a decision about what you will call to mind.
What are you going to set your mind on?
Verse 21 says Jeremiah set his mind on something that gave him hope even in the midst of terrible despair.
And what He set his mind on was the nature and character of God.
In some of the most wonderful verses about God found anywhere in Scripture, Jeremiah tells us what He set his mind on.
Verse 22: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
The original word translated “steadfast love” is a word used in the Old Testament to describe God’s loyal covenant making love.
And God’s loyal steadfast covenant making love is not a feeling that He can fall into and fall out of.
God’s loyal steadfast covenant making love is based not in feeling, but in promises from God that are sealed with blood.
Covenant love is unconditional at its very core.
It cannot be broken by any action, thought, or change of situation.
Think about the covenant language we use at weddings: for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer.
Covenant love not only says, “I do”, but also, “I will continue no matter what even when you cannot hold up your end of the agreement.”
But do not think that steadfast love is all obligation and no passion.
The passion comes in the next phrase: his mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning.
The original word for compassion is a word that points to the bowels of a man and the womb of a woman.
It’s like that feeling a man gets in his stomach when He sees his child treated unjustly.
It is like the tender caring love of a mother toward her baby.
No matter how much sleep she loses or diapers she has to change, her heart is for her child and would do anything for her.
That describes the mercies of God toward His people that never come to an end.
They are new every morning.
In the midst of grief and depression, we can be tempted to believe that we are cursed of God, and that God in his anger is rightfully punishing us for our sins and failures,
But the truth is, if you are in Christ, He has taken the full curse of your sin and the punishment of your sin onto himself, so there is no curse or punishment left for you.
So, you are not being cursed and punished.
If you are being disciplined, it is for your good and it is from a tender loving Father who knows and understands and will provide the grace to sustain you.
You see, the depression and darkness that Jeremiah and the people of Judah experienced when they were conquered, destroyed, and taken into exile by their enemy, Babylon, points us to a greater suffering, a greater despair, a greater conquering, and a greater exile that came through God sending His only son to earth to die in the place of sinners.
It was Jesus Christ on the cross who ultimately suffered all the affliction of the wrath of God due our sin.
It was Jesus who was driven into darkness without any light as darkness covered the land as he hung on the tree.
It was Jesus who experienced His Father turn his face away and turn his hand against Him as he became sin for us.
It was Jesus whose flesh and skin wasted away.
It was Jesus whose prayers were shut out as He cried out “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”
It was Jesus whose steps were made crooked and who was torn to pieces.
It was Jesus who was the target of the soldiers spear as it pierced his heart.
It was Jesus who became a laughingstock to the crowd and an object of their taunts.
It was Jesus whose mouth was so dry that it was as if his teeth ground on gravel when he cried out, “I thirst!”
It was Jesus who experienced no peace and whose soul was bowed when He cried, “It is finished” and gave up his spirit.
He did all this to conquer our sin and death, so that we could be exiled from the domain of darkness and brought into the kingdom of the beloved son Jesus.
So that God’s steadfast love will continue forever and his mercies are new every morning and nothing, not even your sins, your shames, or your despair, can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
In depression, we imagine that God is fed up with our sins and is at the end of His mercies.
The truth is, God has conquered all of our sins and His mercies are completely new every morning.
Always fresh, always available, yes your sins, they are many, but His mercy is more!
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
God’s faithfulness speaks to His reliability, consistency, and the reality that he never changes.
The word has the same root as the word “Amen” that we say to end a prayer and to establish a word, to let it be so, God’s faithfulness is as sure as Jesus’ final words on the cross: “It is finished.”
So, in the midst of depression, set your mind on the character of God toward you in the gospel.
Set your mind on the steadfast love that never ceases, his mercies that are new every morning, and his eternal faithfulness to you, all displayed in Jesus’ death and resurrection.
Set your mind on the fact that because of the hope of the resurrection, your suffering has a definite end date, and God will be faithful to bring that day about.
If you are here today, and you do not know Jesus, despair is what you should be feeling.
You see, apart from Christ, you are under the curse of your own sin and you will experience the coming wrath of God, and God is gracious to keep you in despair until you repent of your sin and trust in Jesus to be forgiven and freed for eternity.
So, trust in Christ now!
Jeremiah goes on:
Lamentations 3:24–33 ESV
24 “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“therefore I will hope in him.”
25 The Lord is good to those who wait for him,
to the soul who seeks him.
26 It is good that one should wait quietly
for the salvation of the Lord.
27 It is good for a man that he bear
the yoke in his youth.
28 Let him sit alone in silence
when it is laid on him;
29 let him put his mouth in the dust—
there may yet be hope;
30 let him give his cheek to the one who strikes,
and let him be filled with insults.
31 For the Lord will not
cast off forever,
32 for, though he cause grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
33 for he does not afflict from his heart
or grieve the children of men.
3. In The Midst Of Depression, Quiet Your Soul To Learn God’s Lessons
I have found so far in life with Christ that just about the time God grows me to a certain level of peace and trust in Him in a certain area of life, a new realm of life seems to go haywire and I am yet again starting the journey to learn to trust Him in some new way.
You see, as God grows us, He removes from us certain things in our lives that we trust in so that we can grow in our trust of God alone.
And listen, sometimes when He removes certain things it is painful and heart wrenching.
But it leads us more into the reality of verse 24.
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.”
Now, when mom makes a pie, every kid know what the word portion means. It is the part of the pie that they get.
So, the question is: as a follower of Jesus, what is the portion of my life? What is the part that I get?
And the answer is that you get God.
Believing the gospel does not guarantee that your portion will be a happy marriage, or perfectly behaved children, or lots of money in the bank account, or a promise of no grief, loss, or hardship, or safety, security, and comfort at every turn.
The gospel does not guarantee any of those things.
The gospel guarantees one thing, here is your portion in this life: you get God.
You get loving, forgiven, reconciled, Holy Spirit wrought relationship with God and the hope of eternal life.
And throughout your life, God grows you more and more to the point where you can say: “God is all I have! But He is all I need!”
Verse 25: The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.
Have you ever experienced what is called the quietness of the soul?
It’s the experienced of having a peace that surpasses understanding even in the midst of a terrible storm.
It is the surrendering your soul to God and receiving even the worst of life’s experiences as from His sovereign hand, and having a heart of surrender and hands that are open toward him.
Have you ever been in a season of suffering in your marriage or parenting or loss or whatever it is that just seemed to demand silence to leave room for God to work?
Listen, we can surrender our souls in this way, and we can stop fighting against all the horrible going on, and we can wait quietly for his salvation and continue to seek Him because we know that sorrow may last for the night, but joy comes with the morning.
His mercies never come to an end. The are new when? Every morning. You may be in a season of the night but in Christ, morning will come.
Verse 27: It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.
In other words, the earlier in life you can learn that God disciplines those He loves, and we will have to deal with trials, losses, and other things that tempt us toward despair throughout the entirety of life on this earth, the better off you will be, and the more able you will be to trust Him in the midst of it.
Verse 28-30 paint the picture all the more:
Let him sit alone in silence when it is laid on him; let him put his mouth in the dust - there may yet be hope; let him give his cheek to the one who strikes, and let him be filled with insults.
In the midst of despair, we feel like we have a case to make for why our lot in life is not fair!
But, quieting the soul to silence before God and learning his lessons is the path for us in Christ - for the Lord is our portion and sorrow will not last forever.
Consider the example of your Lord Jesus who amazed Pilate by remaining silent while arrested, beaten, and accused unjustly of crimes he did not commit.
Consider how profoundly this example effected Peter who wrote of Jesus:
1 Peter 2:22–23 ESV
22 He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. 23 When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.
In the midst of depression, quiet your soul and entrust your soul to God who judges justly and whose mercies never end.
Surrender won’t necessarily take the pain away, but it will stop compounding the misery of fighting against it.
Verse 31: For the Lord will not cast off forever, but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love; for he does not afflict from his heart or grieve the children of men.
Although Jerusalem was in shambles, the temple destroyed, and the people exiled, all hope was not lost.
God’s promise all the way back in Deuteronomy was that though you will be exiled, a remnant will return,
Yet, he causes grief, but it is ultimately for our good!
Any grief and loss is going to finally lead to ultimate good based on God’s great compassion and the abundance of his steadfast covenant loyal love.
The last phrase is confusing, because we have seen that God will afflict and allow grief, so how can he say now that God does not do those things?
The key words in the phrase are the words: from the heart.
You see, God’s natural bent toward his people is not toward affliction and grief but toward steadfast love and compassion.
He may grieve and afflict in seasons for our good, but it is always from a heart posture filled with steadfast love and compassion.
Its like when the doctor asks a parent to help hold their little child down when he is giving him a shot,
You as the parent feel like your child is looking at you like, “Daddy, mommy, how could you? Save me? Don’t let the scary doctor do this!”
But you know you are not putting them through this to ultimately hurt or torture them, you are putting them through this because you know it leads to the greatest good in the end.
I can honestly say that while I would have never chosen my struggle and my sins that led to anxiety and depression that caused us to have to leave the mission field early, and all the hardship, confusion, and pain that went along with it,
I am confident that God has used it to break things in me that needed to be broken, and to build things in me that needed to be built.
It has led me to worship, and trust, and accept limitations and weaknesses in myself and others, and show understanding and compassion, and prepare me to pastor in ways God alone could choose to prepare me.
You see, your suffering and pain do have an expiration date, and although there are many good things that God is accomplishing through it that you may never understand on this side of heaven, you can trust in His steadfast love and faithfulness toward you.
Your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ has gone to the depths of despair, depression, and suffering apart from the presence of God in order that you may have the promise that He will never leave nor forsake you. No matter what.
So, if you are here today and you are feeling the despair and weight of your sin, and you know you have never trusted your soul to Jesus to save you from sin, heed God’s word that it is good for a man or woman to learn their lesson now, and turn and surrender to Jesus than to wait and continue under the wrath of God that will surely come.
And if you are here today, and you are facing a season of depression, I want you to hear me say that your life is a gift to God and others, you matter, you are loved to the point of Jesus shedding His blood, He hurts with you, He weeps with you, in His mercies, His stomach turns over your grief and despair.
And He has determined an expiration date on your pain, so set your mind on the character of God toward you.
Quiet your soul and learn God’s lessons.
And do not suffer alone.
God has given us the church not to impress one another, but to walk with one another through the greatest challenges and difficulties of this life until we all see Jesus face to face.
Let’s pray.
(Elder at couch)
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