Wake Up with Hope

Lamentations 3:19-21 | September 20, 2020

Are you a snooze button person?

Just trying to keep the dream alive?

I was trying to help someone find a new alarm clock this week and came across some really interesting options. 

Did you know there is an alarm clock that’s a large blue siren like you would see on top of a police car?

Can you imagine waking up from a morning nightmare to a blue light flashing everywhere?

There’s another one that launches a little space rocket from the alarm clock that I guess is aimed at your face.  

Then there’s the floor mat alarm – the alarm won’t go off until you get up and put both feet on the mat.

But my favorite is called SnuzNluz – it has a system that connects to your bank account through WiFi and every time you hit the snooze button it makes a donation to an organization that you hate – that is just plain funny.

Whether you get up as soon as the alarm goes off or whether you hit the snooze button more times than your daily step count, we all wake up with something immediately on our minds. 

And if we don’t have something immediately on our minds, statistics show that most of us will have something on our minds pretty quickly once we grab our smartphones. 

I was reading a research report this week that said that 80% of smartphone owners check their phone within the first 15 minutes of waking up – I think that might be more like the first 15 seconds. 

The report said that checking your phone that quickly after you wake up can distract your mind and create significant amounts of stress that will set the tone for the rest of the day.

The report also noted that looking at your phone right when you wake up can hijack your time and attention, and make you less productive.

Having your heart and mind and time hijacked first thing in the morning doesn’t sound like a good way to start the day.

Is there a different way to wake up?

A way to not get hijacked?

A way to start your day with something that won’t just set the tone for your day, but can keep setting the tone for your whole life?

Yes, there is a way.

What is it?

Let’s find out…listen to Lamentations 3, beginning with verse 19:

19 Remember my affliction and my wandering, the wormwood and bitterness. 20 Surely my soul remembers And is bowed down within me.

Well, that definitely sounds better than being hijacked, right?

Nothing better first thing in the morning than a fresh cup of affliction with a splash of wormwood cream and three shots of bitterness. 

These are the words of Jeremiah who lived about 600 years before Jesus was born. 

Rather than completely forget the terrible things in his life, he is remembering them.

Again, that doesn’t exactly sound like the way you want to wake up – but look at how this unfolds. 

Listen to the way Jeremiah describes his life leading up to his morning cup of bitterness.

In verses 1-15 he says he’s been 

• Driven into darkness – darkness like the grave
• His flesh and skin have wasted away
• His bones have been broken
• He’s been imprisoned with heavy chains
• His prayers are shut off and not answered
• He’s been torn apart
• He’s been struck with arrows
• He’s been publicly mocked
• His teeth have been broken with rocks

And you thought you had a rough week?

Now most of that is poetic language not things that actually happened, but here’s the kicker about all of it – Jeremiah says God is to blame.

He says that God is the one who created and purposed and allowed all of that. 

Do you ever feel that way?

Like everything in the world is going wrong and you wonder where God is and what God is doing and why God isn’t intervening and why God isn’t changing things and in a sense you are crying out, “Why is God doing this to me?”

Listen to what Jeremiah says after describing his teeth getting bashed in…

Lamentations 3:17-18

My soul has been rejected from peace; I have forgotten happiness. So I say, “My strength has perished, And so has my hope from the LORD.”

• Rejected from peace
• Emotionally separated from what it means to be happy
• Not enough strength to even pick up the cup of bitterness
• Utterly and totally and completely hopeless

Have you ever felt that way?

Have you felt that way this past week?

Jeremiah wasn’t tapping into the power of positive thinking. 

He wasn’t ignoring his affliction or pretending his affliction never happened and trying to focus on fluffy butterflies and fresh cooked bacon and pumpkin spice lattes. 

He was remembering his suffering, but he wasn’t worshipping his suffering.

If we aren’t careful, we will take that one bad thing that happened to us, that one hard thing, that one tragic thing, that one unfair thing, and it will become an idol in our lives.

We will worship that affliction and rearrange our thoughts and our attitudes around that affliction.

We might even rearrange the rest of our lives around that affliction.

Not in a helpful, constructive way like raising money for medical research or working to change social or legal injustice – but rearranging our marriage or our family or our friendships or our jobs or our hobbies around the dangerous desire for an unnecessary, unhealthy, unending pity party.

Jeremiah wasn’t against pity and sympathy – he needed some – but he wasn’t going to worship it. 

He was going to remember his affliction and the cup of his bitterness, but then he was going put something else in his cup.

What?

21 This I recall to my mind,

He remembers and then he recalls.

For the past 30 years I weekly remind myself and often share with others my thoughts on the difference between responding and reacting.

Reacting tends to be acting without thinking – something happens, and you just do something…anything.

Responding is a way of acting with thinking – something happens, and you do something that matches the need of the moment. 

The gospel calls us to be responders not reactors.

Someone might say, “There are moments in life when you don’t have time to respond.”

I graciously disagree.

You can respond in a millisecond. 

Thinking doesn’t have to be something you stop and do.

Thinking can be something that you are already doing.

The Psalmist said it this way…

Psalm 119:11

Your word I have treasured in my heart, That I may not sin against You.

 

None of us are perfect, but as believers one reason we should read and study the Bible is to help us respond to life. 

If we aren’t reading and studying and praying through and marinating on God’s truth that he put in his book, then we will post and repost and repeat and regurgitate like unregenerate reactors instead of posting and reposting and repeating and rejoicing like redeemed responders.

Jeremiah seems to be calling us to a similar thing – we need to be wise “rememberers”, but we really, really, really need to be diligent “recallers”. 

What is the difference between remembering and recalling?

Maybe we could say it this way…

• We remember things that have happened
• We recall things that have been declared

In my own life I could say…

• I remember eating a Neptune Burger in Boston
• I recall declaring it was the best burger I’ve ever had

I’m recalling a declaration that has not changed. 

A grandson might remember his grandpappy being a nice man and an annoying penny-pincher, but he will recall that in his will his grandpappy left all of his money to his grandson.

• Remembering takes us to moments that were good or bad
• Recalling takes us to moments that are ironclad

So, Jeremiah has remembered his cup of suffering and now he is recalling a truth that cannot be changed. 

And what does this recalling immediately do?

21 This I recall to my mind, Therefore I have hope.

• Remembering his affliction is a set up to recalling
• Recalling a declaration is a set up to hope

What kind of hope are we talking about?

There’s a lot of ways that we hope in life…

• You might hope that your team wins
• You might hope that your candidate wins
• You might hope that your TV show doesn’t get cancelled
• You might hope your spouse’s TV show does get cancelled
• You might hope that the sermons get shorter
• You might hope that the sermons get longer (2.7% of you)

Or as a wise philosopher once said, “Wherever you go, I hope there’s pancakes.”

Some of you have different hopes…

• You hope your spouse will quit being so mean
• You hope your spouse will quit being so indifferent
• You hope your kids will quit being so foolish
• You hope your parents will quit being so demanding
• You hope your grandparents will quit being so negative
• You hope your friends will quit being so wishy-washy
• You hope the politicians will find more wisdom
• You hope the researchers will find more cures
• You hope the doctors will find more answers

Sometimes in life, when things are dark and you feel like your prayers are being cut off or you feel like your teeth are getting knocked out with rocks, you need more than pancakes.

You need an ironclad declaration of hope.

Jeremiah remembered his suffering and then he recalled an ironclad declaration and that ironclad declaration gave him hope – so, what was that hope that cannot and will not ever be erased?

22 The LORD's lovingkindnesses indeed never cease,

We talk about loving forever.

We even text about loving forever…

• BFF – best friends forever
• FIMH – forever in my heart
• BFVR – bacon forever

And the old country song says, “I’m going to love you forever and ever, amen.”

But we can’t actually do that. 

G.K. Chesterton

The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost.

As beautiful and grand and noble and needed as our love for others should and must be, our love is limited.

We might want to romanticize about people looking down from heaven or us looking up to people in heaven, but the practical reality is that death separates us from love.

Not our memories of love, but the practical interaction of love.

I can recall my declaration of love for a Neptune Burger, but if I never go to Boston again, I will only have a memory.

My declaration was not ironclad, therefore, I cannot and should not put my ultimate hope in that burger.

As much as it might rattle our sentimental and emotional and nostalgic feathers, that same truth applies to people not just burgers. 

We should never take a declaration of love from a boyfriend or girlfriend or spouse or family member or friend and put our ultimate hope in that declaration. 

Their love is not perfect and no matter how many times they say it, their love is not forever.

Paul said this to the folks in Rome…

Romans 8:38

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,

 

Romans 8:39

nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

In a number of different ways we can be separated from the love of people, but if you are in Christ, you cannot be separated from the love of God.

Jeremiah is recalling the declaration of God’s love and it is giving him deep and unwavering hope. 

So, what is this declaration of love?

Well, the language that Jeremiah uses helps us.

In saying that the “lovingkindnesses of the Lord indeed never cease”, Jeremiah is kind of indirectly asking a question with that announcement. 

What’s the question?

• “I was driven into darkness like the grave.”
• “My flesh and my skin have wasted away.”
• “My bones have been broken.”
• “I’ve been imprisoned with heavy chains.”
• “My prayers have been cut off.”
• “I’ve been torn apart.”
• “I’ve been struck with arrows.”
• “I’ve been publicly mocked.”
• “My teeth have been broken with rocks.”
• “Why am I not dead?”

And that’s this moment in Jeremiah’s life. 

He looks up from the cup of his suffering and says…

• “Oh yeah, I can’t be separated from the love of God.”
• “His love never ends and never quits and never fails.”
• “Oh yeah, even if I die, I can’t be cut off from his love.”
• “God’s love and only his love is forever and ever, amen.”

Even and especially death cannot kill the love of God. 

Jeremiah knows that no matter what happens to him that he cannot be consumed. 

How does he know that?

What declaration is he recalling?

Well, truthfully, there is a host of declarations the Lord made that Jeremiah could pull from, but at the very least I think we can infer that he was leaning on a declaration from the very beginning. 

This is what God said to the serpent, the Enemy…

Genesis 3:15

And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.

So, the Enemy’s arm of harm was only able to strike the heel, but he could not reach any higher. 

So, who is the seed of the woman that was bruised on the heel?

Galatians 4:4-5

But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman…so that He might redeem…

The seed of the woman is Jesus. 

And how has Jesus made a way to rescue and redeem people like me and people like you?

Through the cross.

The bruise of death on his heel only lasted 3 days and then by rising from the dead he eternally bruised the head of the Enemy – a fatal bruise.

But what does that supernatural, intergalactic, eternal truth have to do with you?

If things are not right between you and God right now, if you are without Christ, there is nothing in the account of your soul but the curse of sin.

But because of the cross and the empty tomb the account of Christ is full of righteousness.

So, when you repent of your rebellion against God and your sin against His holy and right and just law and put your faith first and most in Christ, something happens to your account. 

There is a glorious transfer of funds. 

The curse of sin is deleted from your account and the righteousness of Christ is imputed to you. 

The righteousness of Christ is credited to your account. 

• You can’t earn that credit to your account
• You don’t make that deposit to your account

The change to your account can only come by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. 

Christ redeems us from the curse!

• The cross was enough!
• The cross is enough!
• Jesus paid it all!

I think Jeremiah was recalling the unique lovingkindness of the Lord that by grace, through faith, he could not be consumed – and that gave him rich and deep and lasting hope. 

Hope that he could wake up to every morning. 

What does that look like in real life?

Marshall and Susan Shelley were expecting their second child and on November 22, 1991, just a few days before Thanksgiving, Susan gave birth to her son at 8:20 pm. 

Two minutes later, at 8:22, he died.

The nurse who was holding their dead child gently asked, “Does the baby have a name?”

Susan said, “Toby. It is short for a biblical name Tobiah, which means ‘God is good.’”

Years later Marshall was telling Toby’s story to a group of alumni at Wheaton College and he finished by simply saying this, “Life is hard, and God is good.”

That’s what Jeremiah is recalling. 

His afflictions and his sufferings were hard.

His troubles and his tragedies were hard.

But they did not consume him because the love of God for him was good and real.

Do you believe that?

Is that true for you?

We can listen to Martin and Susan’s story and admire and respect them, but the question for our hearts is this…

Can we say the same?

• Have you been redeemed?
• Have you been rescued?
• Has the curse been removed?

Then you have every reason to hope in the love of God.

I cannot force you to believe this, but I can graciously and boldly proclaim it…

Life is hard, and God is good.

How do we know that is true?

Because Jesus paid it all.

Message by Dow Welsh |

September 20, 2020 © Holland Avenue Baptist Church

 

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Above are pre-sermon manuscript notes, not sermon transcript

Sermon scriptures NASB unless otherwise noted

Lots of help from many pastors and theologians

Weekly help from Bruce Hurt at www.preceptaustin.org

Two Minutes to Eternity - Toby's Story

God and God Alone - Steve Green

So are you a snooze button person that you snooze button? Trying to keep the dream alive for a little longer? You know, just trying to hang in there with it. This week I was trying to help somebody find a new alarm clock. And in my looking for alarm clocks, I was stunned. With all the alarm clocks that are out there. It's really pretty amazing because, you know, there's an alarm clock that is like a siren on the top of a police car, like a big blue light. Can you imagine waking up one of those early morning nightmares? And the room is a blue light man, that z a little spooky. Now, some of you, you're used to a blue light and you know, that's okay. That's that's fine. Way No, you've grown accustomed to it. There's another one that launches a little space rocket. So, like when the alarm goes off, it shoots the space rocket. I guess you're supposed to aim it at your face. You know, the Rocket Hitchen wakes you up. You know there's another one that's a floor mat. Yeah, you You have to get out of bed and put your feet on the mat before the alarm will cut off. You know, that's a motivator. But my favorite that I saw beyond compare is called the snooze and lose. Okay, Snooze you lose is set up with a system that through WiFi it is connected to your bank account. And every time you hit the snooze button, it makes a donation to an organization that you hate. That is the most fantastic thing. Oh, my goodness. I laughed my head off. Yeah, that's a good one. Well, whether you are somebody that on the first ring of the alarm boy, you're you're out of the bed or whether you hit that snooze button about as many times is the count of your steps every day, no matter who you are and how you wake up in the morning, we all wake up something with something immediately on our minds, right? I mean, there's something on our minds when we wake up something that we're dealing with. And if there's not something immediately on your mind when you wake up, usually according to statistics, you'll have something on your mind in a very short amount of time. Once you grab your smartphone. Yeah, I was reading a report this week that said that of the 80% that 80% of the people who own smartphones look at their smartphone within the 1st 15 minutes of getting up, Okay. I mean, truthfully, I think that statistic is probably the 1st 15 seconds of getting up. But, you know, looking at the phone first thing now, the report noted that checking your phone that quickly after you wake up can do this. It can distract your mind. It can create significant amounts of stress. And it will set the tone for the rest of your day that that stress and that distraction will set the tone for the rest of your day. It also noted that looking at your phone right when you wake up can hijack your time. It can hijack your attention, and it can make you less productive during the day. No, I mean, I'm just thinking on the surface, having your heart and mind and time hijacked first thing in the morning doesn't sound like the way that you should want to wake up. So is there other options? Is there a different way toe wake up? Is there a way. Toe, wake up where you're not getting hijacked a soon as you get up. Is there a way for you to wake up where you're doing? At least this one thing that doesn't just set the tone for the day but really begins to set the tone for your entire life day after day after day. Is there a way to wake up like that? Well, there is. And what is it? Let's see if we can find out together. Listen to lamentations three. Beginning with verse 19. Remember my affliction and my wandering the wormwood and bitterness. Surely my soul remembers and is bowed down within me. Well, that sounds better than getting hijacked, right? Nothing like a good morning. Fresh cup of affliction with a splash of wormwood cream and three shots of bitterness. That's how we wanna wake up, right? These are the words of Jeremiah prophet who lived about 600 years before Jesus was born. Rather than completely forget the terrible things in his life. He remembers them. I mean, that doesn't exactly sound like how we wanna wake up. E wanna wake up? Remember all the terrible things that have happened my life, all the affliction, all of the suffering. But yeah, that's how he woke up and listen to how it unfolds. Listen, Thio, how he unpacks this again. We're down in verse 19. If you go back up the verse one and walk through one through 15 these air some of the ways that Jeremiah describes his life. Okay, like this. He was driven into darkness. Darkness like the grave his flesh and hiss skin had wasted away. His bones had been broken. He had been in prison with heavy chains. His prayers had been cut off. His prayers were not answered. He says he's been tort apart. He's been struck with arrows. He's been publicly mocked. And get this. He's had his teeth busted in with rocks. You thought you had a bad week? Goodness gracious, listen to that description. Now most of that is poetic. Language is not specific direct things that happened. But here's the kicker of all of it. Through all of that description, Jeremiah blames God. He puts it on God. He says that God is the one who created and purposed and allowed all of those things to happen to him. Do you ever feel that way? You feel like everything is going wrong in life that everything's falling apart and you start thinking, Where's God? But why? Why isn't God intervening? Why isn't God changing things? And if we're honest, really, what goes through our mind is is something along this God, Why are you doing this to me? Why are you doing this to me? Listen, what Jeremiah said after he says he got his teeth bashed in Chapter three, verse 17 and 18. My soul has been rejected from peace. I have for gotten happiness. So I say my strength has perished and so has my hope from the Lord Man rejected from peace, emotionally separated from the whole concept of being happy. He doesn't have enough strength to pick up that cup of bitterness. And then the worst part is he is utterly and totally and completely hopeless. Have you ever felt that way in life? Have you felt that way this week? This sense of hopelessness, the sense of having nothing. He's interesting because Jeremiah is not kind of doing the power of positive thinking here, right? E. I mean, he's he's remembering his afflictions. He's not ignoring them. He's not acting like they didn't happen. He's not just trying to think of Sugar and Spice and all things nice. Now he's remembering his affliction. He remembers them, but he's not worshiping them. There's difference, right? He's remembering. But he's not worship. I think most of us can look at times in life, and we can see that we've We've skirted on the edge of that because if we're not careful, what we'll do is we'll take that hard thing that happened to us. We'll take that difficult thing that stress, that anger, that terrible moment. That tragedy, even, and what we'll do is we'll take it and it will become an idol in our lives. Well, actually, begin toe worship. Our reflection will rearrange our thoughts and our attitudes around our suffering and our affliction. Sometimes we will reschedule our lives around our suffering and our affliction, not in a good way, not like raising money for medical research or, you know, trying toe to fight against social or legal and justice know what we do is we take our marriage and we take our family. We take our friends and our jobs and our hobbies. We take everything in life, and we unnecessarily force it into and unnecessary unending pity party. Yeah, Jeremiah is not against pity. He's not against sympathy things. Guy needed something. Hey, needed some pity. He needed some sympathy, but he wasn't going to worship it. He wasn't going toe worship his affliction. He was going to remember his cup of bitterness. He was going to remember it, but then he was going to pour something else in the cup. What was that? What? He says in Verse 21. This I recall to my mind, he remembers. And then he recalls, I'd say for about the last 30 years, I remind myself a least weekly, sometimes daily and others about my my thoughts on the difference between reacting and responding. My kids hopefully have heard this more than they wanted to hear. Reacting is when something happens and you just do something, anything, you just do something that's that's reacting. Responding is doing something with thinking. You have something that happens, but you respond with something that kind of matches the moment and matches the situation. Now someone might say, Well, you know, sometimes in life you just don't have time to respond. You know, there's just too much happen. You don't have time to respond. Okay, I will graciously disagree. And here's why. Thinking is not something you have to stop and do. Thinking is something that you can be doing already. The psalmist put it this way. Someone 1911. Your word I have treasured, King James says. I hid in my heart that I may not sin against you. None of us are perfect. But his believers, one reason that we should read and study the Bible is to help us do life. If we aren't reading and studying and memorizing and praying through and marinating over the truth of God that he put in his book, then we will post and repost and repeat and regurgitate almost anything functioning like un regenerative reactors instead of posting and re posting and repeating and rejoicing like redeemed responders. So just casual look at our lives this week, just just kind of think back over the last seven days. Your functionality has it looked more like an unregenerate reactor arm or, like a redeemed responder, are just just reacting to things just quick thoughts about anything or or is the truth of God's word, marinating in your mind and heart to such a degree that when things happen, you're actually able to respond instead of just react. Jeremiah, I think, in a similar way with the ours at least is calling us to think about something along those same lines. He is saying that we definitely need to be wise remembers, but we really, really need to be diligent. Recall er's we need to remember, but we really need to recall. So what's the difference? What's difference in those to ours? Well, I'm overly simple, So let's just put it this way. We could say this. We remember things that have happened, and we recall things that have been declared. We remember things that have happened. We recall things have been declared. So let's just kind of think through that. So I remember having a Neptune burger at Neptune oysters in Boston. Okay, I remember that happening, and I recall declaring that it was the greatest hamburger I have ever had. Okay, remembering and recalling, Ah, grandson might remember that his grandpappy was a super nice guy who also was an annoying penny pincher. But he will recall that his grandpappy left all of his money to his grandson. It's the picture of remembering things and recalling things. Remembering may take us to moments that could be good or bad, but recalling is taking us to a declaration that is ironclad, something that cannot change. So Jeremiah, he's remembered his cup of suffering. He's remembering his cup of bitterness, is suffering his affliction. But then he's recalling a truth that cannot change. And what does that truth due to him? Think of the next part of Verse 21. This I recall to my mind. Therefore, I have hope so. He's remembering his affliction and that setting him up to recall a declaration and recalling that declaration is setting him up for hope. It's setting him up for hope. What kind of hope are we talking about? Because we know how to hope for things right? I mean, way hope our team will win. We hope our candidate will win. We hope our favorite TV show will not get canceled. We hope our spouses favorite TV show would get canceled. You know, I mean way have these moments things that way, hope for We hope that the sermons will will get shorter, you know, and some hope that the sermons will get longer. You know, all 2.7% of you all. You know it's way hope for things, you know, there's one philosopher said. Wherever you go, I hope there's pancakes. I mean, we know about hope, but some of you this morning you have some different hopes. You're hoping that your spouse will quit being so mean. You're hoping that your spouse will quit being so indifferent. You're hoping that your kids will quit being so foolish. You're hoping that your parents will quit being so demanding. You're hoping that your grandparent's will quit being so negative. You're hoping that the politicians will find some more wisdom. You're hoping that the researchers will find some or cures. You're hoping that the doctors will find some more answers. See, we know what it means to hold, and there's times in life when when things air so dark and we feel like our prayers are being cut off way feel like our teeth are getting bashed in. And in those moments we need something mawr than pancakes. You need an iron declaration of how ironclad can't be changed. Its there that z what Jeremies doing? Jeremiah? He's remembering his suffering. And then he's recalling this ironclad declaration of hope and that hope changes. How he's thinking is changing. How he's acting is changing how he's thinking because he realizes that hope cannot be taken away. Ever. So what is this hope that cannot be erased? What he says in Verse 22 The Lord's loving kindnesses indeed, never cease Thio. That's his hope. His hope is in the reality that the love of God cannot see. It's not just the love but notice. It's plural loving kindnesses. There are so many expressions of God's love and they never cease. You know, we talk about loving forever, right? We've been text about loving forever. You know, we might text BFF best friends forever. We might text f i M h forever in my heart we might text bfv our bacon forever way. Have ways to talk about forever Way Understand that concept Your country song says what? I'm going to love you forever and ever amen. But here's the reality way can't actually truly do that. G. K. Chesterton put it this way. The way toe love anything is to realize that it might be lost way here, the word love, and we immediately think about how we love other people on how other people love us and that's good, but is beautiful and grand and noble and needed as our love should be and must be, for others are love has limits. Practically speaking, our love can't work past death. But that doesn't mean that we won't have memories of love. It just means that the practical interaction of love is gone. So we're limited. If I use my burger in the thing, See, I can recall my declaration that the Neptune Burger is the greatest burger I've ever had. But if I never go back to Boston and I never go back to Neptune Oyster and I never have that hamburger again, then my love is going to be limited for that Hamburg. In other words, there's no reason for me to put my ultimate hope in my declaration of love for that burger, and you know, it may work against our our norms. It may rattle our feathers of sentimentality and nostalgia and emotions, but it's not just true for burgers. It's true for people you should never take a declaration of love from a spouse or a family member or friend or from anybody else, and build your entire mint, your entire hope on it. You should put your ultimate hope in anyone's declaration of love. Why? Because their love is limit. As as good as it may be, their love can't actually be forever. Paul said this way to the folks at Rome. Romans eight, Verse 38 for I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels nor Principalities, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ, Jesus, our Lord. In a number of different ways. We will be separated from the love of people, but we cannot be separated from the love of God. It is impossible. And so Jeremiah. He's recalling the declaration of God's love, and that declaration is giving him hope. It's giving him hope that will not waver, will not disappear. It will not fade. It cannot be erased. So what is this declaration of love? Well, the language that Geremi uses really helps us because in saying the loving kindnesses of the Lord never cease in saying that he's kind of asking indirectly a question in the middle of that. So what's the question? Well, think of it again. Just thinking through what he said. It's a Ziff Jeremiah sitting there going. You know what? I've I've been in darkness. I mean the kind of darkness of the grave. He says. You know what my flesh and my skin have waste away? My my bones have been broken. He says. You know, I've been imprisoned with heavy chains. My prayers have been cut off. I've been tourney apart. I've been struck with arrows, he says. I've been mocked over and over again in public, in front of people, and my teeth have been bashed in with rocks. And then the question is this Why hasn't got kill me? Why am I not dead? But this this is terrible stuff. Why am I an idea? Why have I not been consumed by this and then, dear, my answer, his question. He's like, Oh, yeah, I forgot. I can't be separated from the love of God, God's love. It never ends. It never quits. It never fails. Even if I die, I can't be separated from God's love. So actually, God's love and Onley, God's love will last forever. And his love is my love. I have that. That's why I'm not consumed. Even and especially death cannot kill the love of God. Jeremiah knows that no matter what happens to him, he can't be consumed. How does he know that? How does he know that he that he can't be consumed? Well, it's because of this declaration that he's recalling. And what declaration is that? Well, listen way have ah, host of declarations that God has given us that we can lean on. Jeremiah had a lot of personal declarations from the Lord that he could lean on. But I want to in for a little bit that he was leaning back on kind of the first Declaration of love, or at least one of the first declarations of love all the way back at the beginning. Genesis, Chapter three, verse 15. This is what God said to the serpent, the enemy and I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed, he shall bruise you on the head and you shall bruise him on the heel. So the enemies arm of harm was only going to be able to reach up as faras The hell he just be ableto strike the hell and he's going to be able to strike the heel of the seed of the woman who is the seed of the woman here jump to the New Testament. Galatians Chapter four Paul writes this. But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his son born of a woman so that he might redeemed the seed of the woman is Jesus. And how did Jesus make a way to rescue and redeem people like me and people like you? How is the redemption story found all the way back in the beginning? Well, the way that Jesus rescues and redeems is through the cross. See, the very nature of the story of the cross is where our greatest hope is. See the bruise on his heel? Onley lasted three days and then he was raised from the grave. And so the power and the authority of Jesus being raised from the grave isn't even the end of the story. Because then, as Genesis tells us that resurrection bruised the head of the enemy. In other words, it was a fatal bruise, and that fatal bruise matters. Why? What does that supernatural, intergalactic, eternal truth have to do with you today? Well, if things were not right between you and God, if your heart would honestly say yeah, I mean, I've been out of church, son went there. My grandparents took when I was a kid and maybe I prayed a sinner's prayer. I think I got baptized, I don't know, but your heart would say, Yeah, you're you're not following Jesus. If things aren't right with you and God, if you're not a believer, then that means the only thing that is in the account of your soul is the curse of sin. That's that's all this there. But see the cross and the empty tomb, the resurrection of Jesus. It means that the account of Jesus is full of perfect righteousness. Perfect righteousness. That means that if you were to repent of your sin, to turn to God, to say, God, yes, I'm rebelling against your ways. God, I'm denying your existence or at the very least, not involving your existence. in my way of thinking, I don't care about my sin. I don't care about what I do wrong. If you repent of that, repent of your rebellion toward God, it means a transfer happens. The accounts change to repent and turn to Jesus means that the curse of sin is removed from your account and the righteousness of Christ is deposited into your account. So you can't do anything to earn that credit to your account. You can't make that deposit to your account. It only comes by grace alone for faith alone in Christ alone. That's the only way it happens. Christ redeems us from the curse. See, the cross was enough and the cross is enough because Jesus actually truly paid it all. All of it. See, what Jeremiah is doing is he's looking at his affliction. He's looking at this suffering. He's looking at the bitter things that he's endured. He's looking at those hardships. There's troubles, those trials, those tragedies, all of those things. And he's saying those things air riel. I see those. I know those, but I'm going to remember them. And then I'm going to recall the declaration of the kindness of God, and he's remembering that by grace through faith that his story has changed and he can't be consumed. Death cannot actually overtake him because God has rescued and redeemed. And that truth that story from before the foundations of the world that is told to us in Genesis and played out in the New Testament. That story, that gospel truth becomes his greatest hope and our greatest hope. Ah, hope that cannot be taken away. So what does that look like in real life? Marshall and Susan Shelly were expecting their second child, and a few days before Thanksgiving, November 22nd, 1991 Susan gave birth to their son at 8:20 p.m. At 8 22 he died. The nurse, who was holding the body of their lifeless boy gently turn to Marshal Susan and said, Is there a name? Do you have a name for the baby? And almost with no hesitation, Susan responded. His name's Toby, which is short for Tobia and to buy a means God is good. You know what happened in that moment with Susan? She wasn't reacting. Her life had been a pattern of remembering and recalling, and she was responding. Her response. Waas in yes awful terrible moment. I still know God, it is good. A few years later, Marshall was speaking to a group of alumni week in college. He was telling Toby story, and when he finished, the last thing he said was this. He said, Life is hard and God is good. Life is hard and God is good. That's what Jeremiah is saying. Hey, his afflictions were really they were hard. Just his difficulties, his suffering, his bitterness. It was really It was hard. His troubles, his tragedies for really they were hard. But they did not consume him because he knew that the love of God was good. And it was really it was really and it was good and it was never ending. Do you believe that? I mean, do you Do you really believe the God's love is good and really are? Or is that that more of a magnet on the refrigerator? Is it true for your heart that God is good? Is that true? Let me ask you this way. Have you been redeemed? Have you been rescued? Has the curse of sin been removed? If so, then you have every reason to hope and the goodness of God, if every reason to hope in the loving kindness of God cannot force you to believe these things. But I think it's good for us to think through it because, see, we can hear that story and we can say Man Marshall and Susan Boy and I really admire and respect. But the question for our hearts is, would we say the same thing? It is our hope in the gospel such that that story could be written by us and there's a little more to that. Story is beautiful up again. I'll put a link to that Article three end of my sermon notes on the website. You can find it there, but this is true. I can't make you believe it. I wish I could, but I can't graciously and boldly proclaiming Life is hard. Thank God is good. How do we know that's true? We can boil it down toe One fact Jesus paid it all. He paid it all.