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Lamentations 3

1
I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.
2
He has led me and caused me to walk in darkness, and not in light.
3
Surely he turns his hand against me again and again all day long.
4
He has made my flesh and my skin old. He has broken my bones.
5
He has built against me, and surrounded me with bitterness and hardship.
6
He has made me dwell in dark places, as those who have been long dead.
7
He has walled me about, so that I can’t go out. He has made my chain heavy.
8
Yes, when I cry, and call for help, he shuts out my prayer.
9
He has walled up my ways with cut stone. He has made my paths crooked.
10
He is to me as a bear lying in wait, as a lion in hiding.
11
He has turned away my path, and pulled me in pieces. He has made me desolate.
12
He has bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.
13
He has caused the shafts of his quiver to enter into my kidneys.
14
I have become a derision to all my people, and their song all day long.
15
He has filled me with bitterness. He has stuffed me with wormwood.
16
He has also broken my teeth with gravel. He has covered me with ashes.
17
You have removed my soul far away from peace. I forgot prosperity.
18
I said, “My strength has perished, along with my expectation from the LORD.”
19
Remember my affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the bitterness.
20
My soul still remembers them, and is bowed down within me.
21
This I recall to my mind; therefore I have hope.
22
It is because of the LORD’s loving kindnesses that we are not consumed, because his mercies don’t fail.
23
They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.
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 a man should hope and quietly wait 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 and keep silence, because he has laid it on him.
29
Let him put his mouth in the dust, if it is so that there may be hope.
30
Let him give his cheek to him who strikes him. Let him be filled full of reproach.
31
For the Lord will not cast off forever.
32
For though he causes grief, yet he will have compassion according to the multitude of his loving kindnesses.
33
For he does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.
34
To crush under foot all the prisoners of the earth,
35
to turn away the right of a man before the face of the Most High,
36
to subvert a man in his cause, the Lord doesn’t approve.
37
Who is he who says, and it comes to pass, when the Lord doesn’t command it?
38
Doesn’t evil and good come out of the mouth of the Most High?
39
Why should a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins?
40
Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the LORD.
41
Let’s lift up our heart with our hands to God in the heavens.
42
“We have transgressed and have rebelled. You have not pardoned.
43
“You have covered us with anger and pursued us. You have killed. You have not pitied.
44
You have covered yourself with a cloud, so that no prayer can pass through.
45
You have made us an off-scouring and refuse in the middle of the peoples.
46
“All our enemies have opened their mouth wide against us.
47
Terror and the pit have come on us, devastation and destruction.”
48
My eye runs down with streams of water, for the destruction of the daughter of my people.
49
My eye pours down and doesn’t cease, without any intermission,
50
until the LORD looks down, and sees from heaven.
51
My eye affects my soul, because of all the daughters of my city.
52
They have chased me relentlessly like a bird, those who are my enemies without cause.
53
They have cut off my life in the dungeon, and have cast a stone on me.
54
Waters flowed over my head. I said, “I am cut off.”
55
I called on your name, LORD, out of the lowest dungeon.
56
You heard my voice: “Don’t hide your ear from my sighing, and my cry.”
57
You came near in the day that I called on you. You said, “Don’t be afraid.”
58
Lord, you have pleaded the causes of my soul. You have redeemed my life.
59
LORD, you have seen my wrong. Judge my cause.
60
You have seen all their vengeance and all their plans against me.
61
You have heard their reproach, LORD, and all their plans against me,
62
the lips of those that rose up against me, and their plots against me all day long.
63
You see their sitting down and their rising up. I am their song.
64
You will pay them back, LORD, according to the work of their hands.
65
You will give them hardness of heart, your curse to them.
66
You will pursue them in anger, and destroy them from under the heavens of the LORD.
Chapter overviewAI-generated

Overview. This chapter is the heart of Lamentations, expressing the profound depth of personal and communal suffering while pivoting from despair to hope through trust in God’s steadfast mercies. It moves from a first-person account of being besieged by divine wrath to a declaration of hope rooted in the Lord’s faithfulness, then calls for repentance and justice.

Flow.

  • The speaker describes his anguish as divinely orchestrated oppression, feeling abandoned, broken, and without recourse (vv. 1–20).
  • Amidst this darkness, a turning point emerges: recollection of God’s mercy brings hope, grounded in His covenant love and daily faithfulness (vv. 21–33).
  • The chapter expands to affirm God’s moral governance—He does not delight in affliction—and calls His people to self-examination and return (vv. 34–41).
  • It concludes with a communal lament echoing earlier cries, pleading for God’s intervention and justice against enemies (vv. 42–66).

Connections. Following chapter 2, which portrays Jerusalem’s devastation as God’s judgment, chapter 3 personalizes that suffering while introducing a path through it—hope not in circumstances but in the Lord’s nature. This inner transformation prepares for chapter 4, which returns to public lament but with a more structured reflection on sin and consequence, and ultimately leads into chapter 5’s corporate cry for restoration, showing how individual endurance shapes communal repentance.

What it teaches. The chapter teaches that God’s judgments, though severe, do not override His covenant mercies. His discipline is not arbitrary, and He remains the helper of the afflicted who cry to Him (WCF 5.5). The confession that “the LORD is my portion” (v. 24) reflects a soul resting in divine promises (HC LD 9), while the call to repent and seek God aligns with the constant scriptural summons to turn from sin (BC Article 24). Yet God does not willingly bring grief; He is just and will judge those who oppress His people (, cf. CD 1.9). His sovereignty extends even to evil actions, yet He remains holy in all His ways (WCF 3.7; ).

Apply. Trust grows not when suffering ends, but when you remember who God has shown Himself to be.

AI-generated. Not a substitute for Scripture, your pastor, or the confessions.