Here’s the (approximate!) text of my twin short sermons at The Good Shepherd, Lee on 30 June 2024. Or you can listen here to the Lament and the Hope.
Lamentations 3.22-33 & Mark 5.21-end
1. Learning to Lament
If asked you what is your favourite book of the Bible, my guess is that no one, or hardly anyone, would choose Lamentations. It’s not a great name, it’s very small and easy to miss, it’s in the OT which we tend to read less, and it’s not a great story (like Jonah or Ruth or Esther) – not a lot going for it!
But I hope we can find some value in it – it is, after all, one of the writings we believe that God has given to us, that show us something of how to live in God’s world God’s way – even if we have to work at it a bit.
The book of Lamentations arises from a place of loss. Its opening line is, “How deserted lies the city, once so full of people!” It’s likely that the five poems which form the book of Lamentations weep over – indeed lament – the loss of the city of Jerusalem to invading forces. But whether or not it can be pinned down to a certain time and event, it is clear that the poet, or poets, are dealing with a devastating loss.
But the book has, in the middle of its middle chapter, a famous declaration of hope in the steadfast love of the Lord, that we just had read to us:
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed
[Or – The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,]
for his compassions never fail;
they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, ‘The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for [hope in] him.’ (3.22-24)
It helps, I think, to see this book as a whole, and to see its structure, so let’s have a quick look. If you open your Bible you can see that there are five chapters – five separate but related poems. What we can’t see in the English translation is that they are acrostic poems – the verses begin with different letters of the Hebrew alphabet. The Hebrew alphabet has 22 letters, so you can see that chapters 1 and 2 each have 22 verses. The third chapter – the centre of the book – soups this up, and you can see has 66 verses – 22 groups of 3. And here the poet really goes to town, and each of the three verses in each group begins with the same letter – like verses 1-3 all starting with ‘A’, verses 4-6 all starting with ‘B’, etc… This chapter has that great declaration of hope right at its centre – the centre of the centre, as it were – and then chapter 4 reverts to a similar format to the first two chapters. Chapter 5 also has 22 verses, but here the acrostic structure breaks down, and it seems like the poet breaks down as well, as he (probably ‘he’) finishes on a note of despair, which we’ll come back to.
So, in the midst of the writer’s poetic reflection, concerning disaster which has come upon the people of God, the poet calls to mind that declaration about the steadfast love of the Lord, and declares that it gives hope. The poet continues, describing hope in a God who is good, and recognising the need to ‘wait quietly’ or hope for God’s salvation. The poet expresses confidence that the Lord will not reject for ever, and that the Lord does not willingly afflict or grieve anyone.
But, of course, as we’ve started to see, it’s considerably more complicated than that. It’s been a long-standing view that this declaration of hope in the love of God stands as “the monumental centre of the book”. Bu this view is challenged as we see the voice of hope being eclipsed and the trailing off of the book in the disheartened voices (and breakdown of the acrostic structures) in the final two chapters of the book. There is no “swift resolution [or] easy dismissal of the enormous sense of abandonment and injustice expressed in these poems.” (O’Connor, 2007, pp. 1017, 1046)
I wonder what your experiences of loss have been.
If I say ‘I lost my father in November 2018’ you know that I mean that’s when he died. But in many ways I lost my father months and years before that as he succumbed to the effects of dementia. And, I was reflecting the other day, in some ways I’ve found him again since then as I’ve been more free to remember the man he was before his illness. So, sometimes, it’s not simple.
What else can loss mean?
A friend of ours became ill with ME when we were at university about 35 years ago, and she has had ME ever since. She has written about loss – not just loss of things she had, but also loss of what she never had – things she had expected while growing up – a husband, children, a career, making music – and the sometimes-crushing disappointment of that experience.
So loss can be the result of negative experiences, but I wonder too whether it can be an unintended result of positive choices.
Jane and I chose to become foster carers and we do not regret that choice. However, we sometimes reflect on how our lives are different from some of our peers. We have lost – it’s part of the choice we made – the experiences that others now have, whose children are now adults.
What does loss mean for you?
Something that is close to our hearts is the experience of children in care. And at the heart of the experience of many, if not all, children who are in the care of local authorities is loss. Loss of connection with birth family to start with, but also many others along the way. Children and young people who move from one home to another lose contact with people who share their memories of early life. They might lose contact with that special teacher at school, the neighbourhood children they played with, or special belongings or places that were part of their lives.
Caring for such children is, in some ways, all about hope. This hope is grounded in something better now, offering the prospect of a better future outcome for the children than could have been expected in their original family situation. Such is the hope, anyway, of the ‘system’ – the social workers, judges, teachers – that places a child in a foster family. But, of course, it’s considerably more complicated than that.
In the book of Lamentations, hope does not triumph – we could say that it is merely one point of view. There are passages that express trauma, rage, hope, and tired dismay. No single voice, no particular viewpoint silences the others. Instead, multiple speakers try to find expression…. Isn’t that true to our experience of loss?
Trauma, rage, … and tired dismay; these are common attitudes among children in foster care. However traumatic a child’s birth family situation has been, being taken into care is another trauma in their life.
Sometimes this leads to rage: “You’re not my mum/dad! This isn’t my home!”
Sometimes this leads to tired dismay: “Why do I have to live here? Why can’t I live with mummy?” or even “Why do I even have to live?”
Sometimes, in the midst of it all, there is some hope when a child recognises how their life has changed, or that they have opportunities they did not before, but even this can be a mixed emotion if it involves thinking negatively about their birth family.
In the midst of his loss, the poet of Lamentations calls God’s great and steadfast love to mind, and it gives the poet hope. He is aware that ultimately, the Lord is not a God of wrath but of mercy. As we’ve seen, this voice of hope is one among many, and is in danger of being overwhelmed, but I think this is key: not only is the Lord ultimately a God of mercy, but also the poet is aware of that fact. This combination is what brings him hope.
Let’s just quickly go back to that strange ending to the book. The very last verses of chapter 5 are these:
You, Lord, reign for ever;
your throne endures from generation to generation
Why do you always forget us?
Why do you forsake us so long?
Restore us to yourself, Lord, that we may return;
renew our days as of old
unless you have utterly rejected us
and are angry with us beyond measure.
The translation of this ending is much discussed, and one writer identifies seven options for translating this verse before observing (with great scholarly understatement) that “whichever option interpreters choose, it is probably right to understand the ending of Lamentations as less than positive.”
And yet, as I’ve thought about it, the end of the book does not feel like the end of the matter; it asks a question of God, seeking an answer. I see several parallels with the experience and expression of a traumatised child in care – maybe you can see parallels with your experience.
Firstly, the low self-worth in the poet’s belief that he should be utterly rejected and deserves anger beyond measure is reflected in the similar low self-esteem often seen in traumatised children in care.
Second, the hopeful flicker of recognition that God is good and whose love is steadfast and everlasting, even though the writer is undeserving of it reflects, I hope, the experience of a child in care as they experience consistent love and care from their carer(s).
Third, there is a reality in the desire to connect with that steadfast love, through all the self-sabotage, that is expressed even in those closing words, which hang in the air (with perhaps a raised eyebrow) and invite a response from the faithful source of love and comfort.
The tension between these beliefs and emotions is expressed and explored in the poetry of Lamentations, and reflects our experiences of loss. We’re going to explore that further with our Gospel reading, but before that we’re going to sing a hymn reflecting on that great love, mercy and faithfulness which is new every morning.
2. Reaching out in hope
This passage in Mark 5 is a wonderfully told narrative of two encounters with Jesus by people in situations which in some ways were similar, and in other ways are quite different.
It’s another one of Mark’s stories where he’s put one occurrence inside another – a Markan sandwich as Jo McCrone talked about the other week. This particular narrative appears in all of Matthew, Mark and Luke, but Mark gives us the most detail – his account is 23 verses, Luke has 17 verses, while Matthew squishes it down to 9! My mum says that she always finds it frustrating to read – Jairus has just got Jesus to come along to see his daughter – his only daughter Luke tells us – when he gets into this other conversation with someone in the crowd. “What’s happening to Jairus’ daughter?” we want to know – delay could be disastrous!
And when Mark does this, we’re supposed to see the two things together – how are they connected? How do they help us understand the other? Perhaps it’s not so easy to see here as in other places in Mark, but I think there are clearly things that chime.
12 years – as far as we know, Jairus’ daughter has been healthy for 12 years and this is a sudden and critical illness that she now has, which requires urgent attention from Jesus.
The woman who touches Jesus’ cloak isn’t named in the text, which is a shame, but let’s call her Hannah. Hannah has been ill for all of those same 12 years, and during that time she has spent all her resources on trying to get well, suffered at the hands of doctors (who should have been making her well) and ended up worse than she started.
12 years – of life for one and suffering for the other, and now they both need a touch from Jesus.
Touch – Jairus’s request is for Jesus to come and put his hands on his daughter so that she will be healed and live, and when Jesus does eventually reach her, he took her by the hand to set her on her feet.
Hannah comes through the crowd where many people are pressing on Jesus and jostling him, but for Mark the key thing is that she touches his robe. Everything leading up to that is background information to help us understand the significance (it’s like it’s one long sentence… deep breath):
A woman, being in a twelve-year blood flow and who suffered much from many doctors and exhausted everything she had and gained nothing but coming rather into worse shape, hearing about Jesus, coming behind in the crowd, touched his robe.
And immediately she was well, and Jesus knew that something had happened, and we read the conversation Jesus and Hannah had.
And loss… Jairus’ daughter lost her life. Jairus and his wife were losing and then lost their daughter. Hannah had lost twelve years of health and community life. She would have been shunned by her neighbours, quite likely also by her husband – she had not lived the life she thought she might – opportunities had passed her by.
But she had hope. Maybe she knew the psalms; we can assume that Jairus did in his capacity as a synagogue leader. Perhaps they both knew psalm 77: I cried out to God for help; I cried out to God to hear me. When I was in distress, I sought the Lord; at night I stretched out untiring hands.
We see Hannah here, in Mark 5, stretching out her hands, touching Jesus, and having her hopes for healing fulfilled – hurrah! She was full of hope and faith, even in the midst of her loss, and the power of Jesus changed her life! And that’s what Mark is designing his gospel to do – to show us Jesus and how he brings the revolutionary Kingdom of God.
But what if we’d met Hannah a year earlier? She would have been: a woman, being in an eleven-year blood flow, who suffered much from many doctors and exhausted everything she had and gained nothing but coming rather into worse shape.
What can we say to her now about loss and hope and the love of God? I find this hard to answer – I don’t share a corresponding situation of despair and loss and crying out to God but seemingly getting no answer. Maybe you do – maybe this is your experience – crying out to God in the night-time asking, with some more of Psalm 77, “Will the Lord reject for ever? Will he never show his favour again? Has his unfailing love vanished for ever? Has God forgotten to be merciful?”
If this is you, I am sorry that I cannot speak to you out of my experience. But we can turn together to the example of God’s people – the psalmist who wrote psalm 77 goes on to turn his mind to what he knows God has done in the past: I will remember the deeds of the Lord; I will consider all your works, Your ways God, are holy. What god is as great as our God? …and so it continues – look it up, meditate on it.
And to the example of Lamentations – that completely real crying out to God and saying everything that’s on your heart – that mixture of trauma, rage, hope, quiet dismay – God can take it. God wants to take it.
And the experience of the poet of Lamentations is that, through all the pain, through the loss, through the not-understanding-where-God-is, he discovers that, “Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed”.
I believe that was the woman, Hannah’s experience. Yes, in that moment at the end of twelve years she reached out and touched Jesus’ cloak. But for twelve long years all she had was lament and hope and a deep-seated knowing that the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, and because of that she was not consumed. I think she was oriented towards God – certainly the poet and the psalmist were – reaching out, even when God seemed unreachable, hoping for the day when they would touch, and in the meantime knowing the God of steadfast love.
Lamentations doesn’t answer the question of why we don’t seem to see God intervening to deal with our pain and loss all the time – that’s a really difficult question to answer to our emotional satisfaction. But maybe Lamentations, and the first eleven years, eleven months and twenty-nine days of Hannah’s illness (when she did not know what would happen at twelve years), help us see how we can cling on to God even while living with loss.
My prayer is that would be our experience too. Whether that’s in a crisis moment of loss such as Jairus and his wife were experiencing, or a long-term loss like Hannah here was living, my prayer is that we would know the God of great love, whose compassions never fail, and who is ever faithful.