This Time Have We Gone Too Far?

If you don’t rescue us, we will not be rescued

I was in the 10th grade.

For those of us on the accelerated track, 10th grade math was geometry.

And my 10th grade geometry teacher was a petite young lady named Miss Schute.

I don’t know if she was new or not, but she was very young and she didn’t have the classroom management skills that some of you teachers have.

"Shotgun” Schute as we called her, was serious about teaching.

It was evident she loved geometry and it was evident she wanted us to love it as much as she did.

But we were a bunch of 15-year-olds with a couple of class clowns as leaders and we drove that woman crazy.

I know she dreaded seeing us coming.

Every day, she would start teaching and some something would set one of the clowns off.

Then the rest of us would join in and the class went out of control.

And we thought we were hysterical.

Until one day Miss Schute melted down - right before our eyes.

She broke down into tears and she tried to talk through her sobs but it didn’t work.

She ran out of the room.

The room went graveyard quiet.

You could hear the question in the air, “This time, have we gone too far?’

It’s funny - we weren’t bad kids.

In fact, we would have been considered good kids - some of the best kids really - honors kids.

But our class clowns gave us something we honors kids hadn’t experienced - rule breaking.

We were rule keepers - and rule breaking was kind of fun.

Until it wasn’t.

In a few minutes, the head of the math department came in to the room that was still grave yard quiet.

He was a very wise man.

He didn’t yell, didn’t give us detention - he didn’t threaten us.

He simply explained to us how badly we had hurt Ms. Schute.

And that we really disappointed him and really disappointed her.

I don’t remember exactly how many days she was out - but it was several.

Ms. Schute came back to class but she was different.

And so were we.

She came in and started teaching.

And we kept our mouths shut and did what she asked.

Over time, many of us went to her privately and apologized.

And she was gracious.

But I will never forget the fear of the thought, “This time, have we gone to far?”

This is the last message from the book of Lamentations.

It’s written differently than the other 4.

The first 4 are acrostic poems.

In the case of the Lamentations, the first letter of every verse corresponds to the letters in the Hebrew alphabet in order.

Chapter 5 doesn’t do that.

It’s written as a prayer and it ends with an interesting thought:

“This time, have we gone too far?”

I invite you to open you Bibles and follow along as we study.

If you are joining us by live stream, we are thrilled that the Lord led you to First Baptist Gray.

If you are nearby, we invite you to join us in person - especially on Big Church day on the second Sunday of September.

But right now, if you would open your Bibles to Lamentations 5, we’re going to read all 22 verses.

Hear now the word of the Lord:

Lamentations 5:1–22 ESV

Remember, O Lord, what has befallen us; look, and see our disgrace! Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers, our homes to foreigners. We have become orphans, fatherless; our mothers are like widows. We must pay for the water we drink; the wood we get must be bought. Our pursuers are at our necks; we are weary; we are given no rest. We have given the hand to Egypt, and to Assyria, to get bread enough. Our fathers sinned, and are no more; and we bear their iniquities. Slaves rule over us; there is none to deliver us from their hand. We get our bread at the peril of our lives, because of the sword in the wilderness. Our skin is hot as an oven with the burning heat of famine. Women are raped in Zion, young women in the towns of Judah. Princes are hung up by their hands; no respect is shown to the elders. Young men are compelled to grind at the mill, and boys stagger under loads of wood. The old men have left the city gate, the young men their music. The joy of our hearts has ceased; our dancing has been turned to mourning. The crown has fallen from our head; woe to us, for we have sinned! For this our heart has become sick, for these things our eyes have grown dim, for Mount Zion which lies desolate; jackals prowl over it. But you, O Lord, reign forever; your throne endures to all generations. Why do you forget us forever, why do you forsake us for so many days? Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we may be restored! Renew our days as of old— unless you have utterly rejected us, and you remain exceedingly angry with us.

This is the word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

Will we ever realize what we have done?

Would it matter if we could open the Bible and see, unequivocally that God is the one responsible for what is going on around us?

Jeremiah could do that - I think we can too.

Remember me talking about Deuteronomy 28.

The Lord says in Deuteronomy 28:1-2 ““And if you faithfully obey the voice of the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I command you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of the Lord your God.”

Then in verse 15, the Lord says, Deuteronomy 28:15 ““But if you will not obey the voice of the Lord your God or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you.”

So, hearing those two verses, what determines how God’s love appears to us?

Before you answer, let me explain that.

In one instance, the Lord will love us by blessing us and making us a great people in the world.

Our cup will run over, so to speak.

But, in the other instance, the Lord will love us by disciplining us to repentance.

So, between those two ways for Him to love us, what is the driver?

“If you faithfully obey the voice of the Lord your God.”

That sounds an awful lot like Jesus’ words in John 14:15 ““If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”

So we know that they did not obey God’s voice.

But did God do what He said He would do?

Did he cause “these curses [to] come upon you and overtake you?”

Deuteronomy 28:25 ESV

“The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You shall go out one way against them and flee seven ways before them. And you shall be a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.

He did that - historical fact - Babylon overran Jerusalem in 586 BC.

Deuteronomy 28:30 ESV

You shall betroth a wife, but another man shall ravish her. You shall build a house, but you shall not dwell in it. You shall plant a vineyard, but you shall not enjoy its fruit.

Lamentations 5:11 “Women are raped in Zion, young women in the towns of Judah.”

Lamentations 5:2 “Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers, our homes to foreigners.”

Lamentations 5:9 “We get our bread at the peril of our lives, because of the sword in the wilderness.”

Deuteronomy 28:41 ESV

You shall father sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours, for they shall go into captivity.

We know that happened.

Daniel was a part of the group that went into captivity.

Deuteronomy 28:43 ESV

The sojourner who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower.

Lamentations 5:8 “Slaves rule over us; there is none to deliver us from their hand.”

Deuteronomy 28:47–48 ESV

Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things, therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything. And he will put a yoke of iron on your neck until he has destroyed you.

Lamentations 5:4 “We must pay for the water we drink; the wood we get must be bought.”

Lamentations 5:5 “Our pursuers are at our necks; we are weary; we are given no rest.”

Deuteronomy 28:66 ESV

Your life shall hang in doubt before you. Night and day you shall be in dread and have no assurance of your life.

Lamentations 5:9 “We get our bread at the peril of our lives, because of the sword in the wilderness.”

If we went back into the first 4 chapters of Lamentations, I suspect we would find every curse the Lord promised fulfilled right before Jeremiah’s eyes.

The Lord did what He said He would do, didn’t he?

But Pastor Randy, it took 1,000 years - couldn’t it simply be coincidence?

Maybe or better still we believe Peter 2 Peter 3:9 “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”

Will we ever realize that the Lord hasn’t changed?

In verse 19, Jeremiah says, Lamentations 5:19 “But you, O Lord, reign forever; your throne endures to all generations.”

In our Awana class the other week, we started memorizing verses beginning with Genesis 1:1.

Let’s recite it together, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

Someone asked, where did God come from?

The right answer is, He didn’t come from anywhere.

God is from everlasting to everlasting - He is eternal.

And He is unchanging.

Perfectly just, holy, sinless for all eternity.

“But you, O Lord, reign forever.”

So the Lord - Yahweh - reigns forever.

And forever includes today.

He says, If you love me, you’ll keep my commandments.

So, let’s talk about our current situation in the United States.

A land founded on religious liberty and a nation highly favored by God.

We were blessed - don’t it sound like the Deuteronomy blessings belonged to us?

I’m not equating the US with Israel - but I am saying that a nation founded by Christ followers can expect certain blessings to happen.

And we had them - we saw them with our own eyes.

But now, doesn’t it seem like the world has gone mad.

And for a long time, the Church lived with a “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” policy about a whole lot of social things.

We were perfectly happy saying live and let live - still are.

But something happened that won’t let us live that way anymore - and I want us to think about what it was.

Oral contraceptives were introduced in 1950.

The National Institutes of Health states that it “is a medical innovation that has dramatically transformed generations.

“Women have gained incredible freedom and reproductive autonomy.”

It allowed families to “plan” when they had children - which sounds fine - except every time we “improve” on God’s plan, things always go awry.

An unseen shift occurred in male / female relationships.

We went from procreation to recreation.

Once that shift occurred, and the threat of pregnancy was removed from promiscuity and adultery, then something else occurred.

In 1969, California Governor Ronald Reagan signed no-fault divorce bill into law.

Again, several things happened that went unnoticed by the church - and ended up being accepted by the church.

First, the definition of marriage moved from a covenant to a contract.

You’ve heard people say, “The marriage contract...”

But it’s not a contract, it’s a covenant.

But see, when two people are married, what’s supposed to happen is the couple gathers in front of family and friends, and a minister.

The minister leads the couples to make vows to one another, before God - “With God as my witness.”

The congregation is supposed to listen to those vows and take them to heart.

And when the minister pronounces them husband and wife, a marriage covenant is created.

In the Old Testament, when a covenant was created, the penalty for breaking that covenant was a gruesome death.

If you remember the story of Ruth, she makes a covenant with Naomi, “Do not entreat me to leave you...” remember that?

Remember how that ends?

“May the Lord do to me, and worse, if anything but death parts you and me.”

To dissolve a marriage covenant, someone had to be so seriously at fault that the covenant was destroyed.

And the congregation was witnessing the vows so when the bride or the groom faltered, or said they were tired of being married

The congregation was to remind the couple of the vows they made and how serious those vows were.

Because God was watching.

Funny, look what we read in Deuteronomy 23:21

Deuteronomy 23:21 ESV

“If you make a vow to the Lord your God, you shall not delay fulfilling it, for the Lord your God will surely require it of you, and you will be guilty of sin.

That’s how God designed marriage.

But the great conservative politician Ronald Reagan signed into law for California, and it swept the nation - no fault divorce.

Pay your money and the contract was broken.

Contracts are broken all of the time.

Some contracts are written with dissolution clauses in them.

And the church accepted that.

Divorces prior to that time were bitter affairs.

Lots of hurt and tears and pain - and someone had to walk away wrong because it took a lot to break that covenant.

But not anymore.

Recreation - and now seemingly no consequence.

Why are we talking about all of this?

Indulge me for a moment more.

Pretty soon, since procreation was now recreation, the definition of recreation expanded.

Men with men, women with women.

And they wanted something to make them legal - and it seemed reasonable.

If someone lives with someone for 20 years and one of the partners die, shouldn’t the other partner have rights of survivor-ship?

Just like a married couple?

And since marriage is simply a contract between two individuals.

Notice God is gone now.

And notice, gays didn’t remove God - heterosexuals did.

In 2015 the Obergefell decision was handed down legalizing gay marriage.

In God’s economy it isn’t a marriage because marriage is a man and woman for life.

But in the eyes of the courts, it’s a contract and, according the Supreme Court, the 14th amendment equal protection clause means same sex couples must be able to enter a marriage contract.

But if the 14th amendment says equal protections, what’s next?

And now, without me making a list, you’ve read Lamentations now.

Do you see any similarities between then and today?

You should, because the Lord didn’t change.

And while Jesus fulfilled the law, He didn’t remove the law.

Obey is still part of Jesus’ vocabulary.

Will we ever realize that we have sinned?

Lamentations 5:16 “The crown has fallen from our head; woe to us, for we have sinned!”

Our hearts are sick, aren’t they?

What we are seeing, doesn’t it break our heart?

And doesn’t it make it worse to realize that we were duped?

That we listened to experts who were going to make the world a better place, and what?

What did they deliver?

How did the experts make life better for your children?

What will it take to make things better?

Lamentations 5:21 “Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we may be restored! Renew our days as of old—”

We have to realize the world is in a mess because the Church is in a mess.

We have believed in God - but we must follow God.

He is pouring out His curses on us not out of hatred.

But out of love - to call us back.

Austin started this series for us.

In his message, he explained Jeremiah 29:11

Jeremiah 29:11 ESV

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.

The context of this verse that we are all so quick to claim in the book of Lamentations.

In verse 10, the Lord says that you’ll suffer heartache for your sin for 70 years, but then, “I will visit you, and I will fulfill my promise to you...”

And you’ll realize in your suffering that my plans for you - which you neglected to obey - my plans which seemed obnoxious for you to follow.

That you felt were inconvenient and didn’t fit in well with the plans you have for your family.

Those plans were for your welfare, to give you a future and a hope.

Jeremiah 29:12–14 ESV

Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, declares the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.

The Lord has made a way a long time ago to get us out of this mess that we’ve caused.

We believe that Jesus is our savior, brothers and sisters.

But do we believe Jesus enough to follow Him, and obey His commandments in the face of this evil that is all around us now?

No one can fix this until we repent and the Lord Himself restores us.

I pray that this time, we haven’t gone too far.