Many of us have a favorite city. It may be San Francisco, London, Paris, New York, Chicago or even smaller cities. Each one has a particular personality and represents something that we value. I love cities. They are more than buildings and crowds. They are beautiful even when they are quiet – maybe especially when they are quiet. William Wordsworth was passing through London on his way to Paris and the sun was rising over the Westminister Bridge when he wrote this:

Earth hath not anything to show more fair;
Dull would be he of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty;
This City now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theaters and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.

Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendor, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne’er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! The very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

Most of us cannot put it in words like Wordsworth but there is something extraordinary about a place we love. And so it was with Jeremiah and Jerusalem. He is not vindicated with the fall of Jerusalem. He is devastated because he loves the city. So, here he sits above the desolate city and mourns the loss of the city and the loss of splendor.

“How deserted is the city,
Once so full of people!
How like a widow is she,
Who once was great among the nations!
She who was queen among the provinces
Has now become a slave.”

That’s the context for the passage this morning. Jeremiah has stayed behind having been released from captivity by the conquering army. He has chosen to remain with the remnant to live in the rubble of a once great city and nation. Now the text becomes personal.

Jeremiah’s Role as Scapegoat
Lamentations 3:1-20:

1 [a]I am the man who has seen affliction
by the rod of the LORD’s wrath.
2 He has driven me away and made me walk
in darkness rather than light;
3 indeed, he has turned his hand against me
again and again, all day long.
4 He has made my skin and my flesh grow old
and has broken my bones.
5 He has besieged me and surrounded me
with bitterness and hardship.
6 He has made me dwell in darkness
like those long dead.
7 He has walled me in so I cannot escape;
he has weighed me down with chains.
8 Even when I call out or cry for help,
he shuts out my prayer.
9 He has barred my way with blocks of stone;
he has made my paths crooked.
10 Like a bear lying in wait,
like a lion in hiding,
11 he dragged me from the path and mangled me
and left me without help.
12 He drew his bow
and made me the target for his arrows.
13 He pierced my heart
with arrows from his quiver.
14 I became the laughingstock of all my people;
they mock me in song all day long.
15 He has filled me with bitter herbs
and given me gall to drink.
16 He has broken my teeth with gravel;
he has trampled me in the dust.
17 I have been deprived of peace;
I have forgotten what prosperity is.
18 So I say, “My splendor is gone
and all that I had hoped from the LORD.”
19 I remember my affliction and my wandering,
the bitterness and the gall.
20 I well remember them,
and my soul is downcast within me.

Notice the words/phrases like “driven away”, “weighed down”, “dwell in darkness”, “wandering”. These are all words that do not just describe a personal complaint. They are a picture of a special role in the life of the worship of Israel. This is a picture of Jeremiah’s understanding of his ministry far beyond what he thought at the beginning. He had seen himself as a prophet but that has turned into something far more than that.

Leviticus 16:15-22:

15 He shall then slaughter the goat for the sin offering for the people and take its blood behind the curtain and do with it as he did with the bull’s blood: He shall sprinkle it on the atonement cover and in front of it. 16 In this way he will make atonement for the Most Holy Place because of the uncleanness and rebellion of the Israelites, whatever their sins have been. He is to do the same for the tent of meeting, which is among them in the midst of their uncleanness. 17 No one is to be in the tent of meeting from the time Aaron goes in to make atonement in the Most Holy Place until he comes out, having made atonement for himself, his household and the whole community of Israel. 18 Then he shall come out to the altar that is before the LORD and make atonement for it. He shall take some of the bull’s blood and some of the goat’s blood and put it on all the horns of the altar. 19 He shall sprinkle some of the blood on it with his finger seven times to cleanse it and to consecrate it from the uncleanness of the Israelites. 20 When Aaron has finished making atonement for the Most Holy Place, the tent of meeting and the altar, he shall bring forward the live goat. 21 He is to lay both hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the wickedness and rebellion of the Israelites—all their sins—and put them on the goat’s head. He shall send the goat away into the wilderness in the care of someone appointed for the task. 22 The goat will carry on itself all their sins to a remote place; and the man shall release it in the wilderness.

What is described here is the Day of Atonement, the day in the year when the High Priest appears before God and atones for the sins of the people. Two goats are offered. The first is killed and the blood is sprinkled on the altar. The second is allowed to live but it becomes the scapegoat and is made to carry the sins of the people far into the wilderness where it is abandoned and left. This is Jeremiah’s ultimate calling. He is not just decrying the sins of the people. He carries the weight of them in himself. He is left in the wilderness, in the desolate city.

As well, it is a picture of Christ who both “takes away the sin of the world” by being the scapegoat and the sacrifice who gives his blood for the remission of sins. Jeremiah. Sometimes we focus so much on the blood sacrifice that we fail to recognize what Christ went through in being separated from God for our sakes. That was the real struggle in the Garden of Gethsemane. It was not the fear of physical pain – although that was real. It was the dread of being separated from the Father and becoming the scapegoat.

The role of remembrance:
19 I remember my affliction and my wandering,
the bitterness and the gall.
20 I well remember them,
and my soul is downcast within me.
21 Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:
22 Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
23 They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him.”

Remembering is very important in Scripture. There are also many places we are told not to remember. What are we encouraged to remember?

Remember the Lord. Remember who brought you out of Egypt. Remember the Sabbath. Remember who gave you wealth.

What are we encourage to not remember? All the sins for which we’ve been forgiven. All the regrets that have been put aside by God. All the things that God has forgotten.

But we find ourselves reliving those things time and again, don’t we. Corrie Ten Boom was teaching the Bible in Germany after the war and she knew people were having a very hard time understanding forgiveness. She told them that God has put our sins at the bottom of the deepest ocean and posted a “no fishing” sign there. We need to hear that. We need to forget what God has forgotten. That is why this passage is so helpful. When we find ourselves remembering those things that make our souls downcast we can “call to mind” those words from God that give us hope. What are those? It’s probably different for all of us but for Jeremiah it was “great is your faithfulness” and that is the same for me. I did a study once of Psalms and underlined every time “hesed” (enduring love) was used. It is there so often because David and the others had to keep reminding themselves of God’s enduring love – no matter what. And so do we. We need to call to mind those words from Scripture and hymns that keep us from being downcast and forgetting what we ought to remember while recalling what we ought to forget.

The Goodness of God
25 The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him,
to the one who seeks him;
26 it is good to wait quietly
for the salvation of the LORD.

God is good and is good in different ways. Let’s look at that.

God’s goodness extends to all men – not just believers. This is what John Calvin called “common grace” and it is the natural gifts of God that benefit everyone. There are four.

Creation and the order of nature. The world is not chaotic or random. While it is not completely predictable it has a particular order that makes sense. There are seasons and physical laws. These are all witnesses to God’s faithfulness.

Civil authorities to maintain order and punish wrong doing.

The conscience and moral law. There is a natural law that virtually all but the insane recognize – the law of right and wrong. It is hard-wired into the world.

The manmade advancements like science, the arts, medicine, education and industry. These are all the areas that man can advance to make our lives better.

Yet, there is another goodness of God that is far more a mystery and impossible to completely understand. It is what some have called the “terrible goodness of God”. In “Mere Christianity” C.S. Lewis says, “Some people talk as if meeting the gaze of absolute goodness would be fun. They need to think again. They are still only playing with religion.” This is the goodness that roars and is fearsome. It is the goodness that is inexplicable and oftentimes hidden in darkness.

Abraham experiences the wonderful goodness of God at the birth of Isaac and yet only one chapter later he is called on to sacrifice his son by a good God. Job is blessed beyond measure and suddenly this good God has turned him over to be tested by Satan. Yet, both of them can say their hope is in God. “Though he slay me yet will I trust him.” Jeremiah can say in his agony, “Great is his faithfulness”. I doubt any of us have had this level of experience with God’s terrible goodness. We have had notions of it in our lives and we have had experiences that do not fit our categories of a “good” God.

Oftentimes we find God saying “Don’t fear” in these times. I don’t think he is telling us not to fear men or circumstances but not to fear what we cannot understand at the time – the terrible goodness of God. To trust him even though we do not understand. Always he says at these times, “I am with you. Even though I may seem far away, I am with you.”

Psalm 23 says, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will not fear for you are with me.” In Isaiah 43 we read, “But now, this is what the Lord says – he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you.” It is these times when we experience the “terrible goodness” of God that we are shaped for what is next. We are being prepared.

Ray Stedman puts it this way: “I have to get you ready for a battle that is going to go on far beyond this life. So I want men who will be mine. who will be absolutely, wholly mine so I can train them, prepare them, and bring them through trials and hardships, teaching them the great principles. When we finally get up against it, up against the real conflict, I will have men that I can depend upon. But I will have counted the cost.”

That is what he is talking about. When we learn our lessons here — when we learn how to handle sorrow and heartache and desolation of spirit in this limited way here — we will be prepared so that nothing can overthrow us; we will be unconquerable in the battle that God faces in the subjugation of the entire universe.

I often think of this: What lies beyond? Is not God preparing us now to do a mightier work in the future? Is he not getting us ready to carry on a conflict that will extend to the uttermost reaches of this vast universe of ours? Of course he is. God never does anything without a purpose. He never creates anything without intending to use it. And all this lies ahead of us. That is why it is so important that we learn how to face up to sorrow and to learn what God would have us to learn in the midst of it.”

Yes, God is good all the time and all the time God is good but don’t take that to mean everything will work out to our understanding. Everything does work for good but it may be a good that is hidden to us – just as it was to Jeremiah, Job and Abraham. The issue is whether we will be able like them to say, “Great is thy faithfulness.”