with meditations by my mother, Poetess Gertrude Sanborn
August 28
Lamentations 1:5–Lamentations 3:45
OUR TRICKLING TEARS
Lamentatoins 3:49
"Mine eye
trickleth down, and ceaseth not, without any
intermission."
The book of Lamentations is a series
of five poems lamenting the decline of Israel. God’s
heart is broken. Jeremiah reflected that sorrow with his
pen. The times were difficult. Israel was the nation
from which the promised Messiah was to come. Yet, Israel
was in such a state of sin that the LORD God had turned
the other way. He permitted the nation to be swallowed
up by Babylon. This book is a message of tears and
regret, with an occasional glimpse of hope and renewal.
It is a poem of poems!
Of interest is how the poems are laid
out. In the first two chapters, each verse begins with a
new letter of the Hebrew alphabet. It has three parts.
In the third chapter, we see the third poem. It devotes
three verses to each of the twenty-two letters in the
Hebrew alphabet. Dr. Unger’s Bible dictionary calls
these poems "dirges." The dictionary reads: "In the
fourth dirge, one verse composed of two members is
distributed to each letter." (I’m quoting the dictionary
because I don’t know exactly what it means.) The last
"dirge" is made up of twenty-two verses. They are not
alphabetical.
I suppose the Lamentations that are
the most familiar to me are found in Chapter Three,
verses 22-23. I’m sure you remember them, too. It is of
the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his
compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great
is thy faithfulness. As a student at Moody Bible
Institute, graduating in 1948, I recall the blessing of
singing
that moving song, GREAT IS THY
FAITHFULNESS. Hundreds of voices-–both men and
women-–filled that huge auditorium, declaring that God’s
"compassions failed not!" T.O. Chisholm wrote those
beautiful words that we sang to William M. Runyan’s
melody. We sang all the stanzas. So now, I do not need a
hymn book when that song is sung in our church. I know
every stanza! I believe in teaching young people many,
if not all, the stanzas of some of our majestic hymns.
So many songs today are just fluff with little to no
spiritual depth to them.
William Culbertson was my president.
He served there for years as the spiritual leader of
that school. Another man was president when I arrived. I
don’t know how long he served before my arrival.
Only--he died. It was sad. At first it was all
"hush-hush." As weeks progressed into months, we learned
that this loved man, took his own life. Often pain is
hard to bear. Sometimes the most noble and gifted--full
of spiritual grace and knowledge of God’s WORDS-–cannot
bear the agonies of life.
Another "lamentation" I want you to
ponder in today’s reading is Lamentations 3:49.
When I read it today, I thought, "How true!" How true it
is when grief strikes a soul! After the first burst of
sorrow, our tears flow–-not in the early sobs and
uncontrolled gushes of shock and grief--but in a slow
trickling down the cheeks. They fall softly! They do not
stop! When we talk, they come. When we walk they are
there. When we do our daily work, they trickle down our
cheeks. They are shameless! It is as if our "grief" is
melting! We don’t want our tears falling onto our tea
cups, as we drink our morning tea. We don’t want them to
come when we see a reminder of the past or the loss of
the future. YET, THEY COME–-"WITHOUT INTERMISSION!"
My mother, Gertrude Sanborn, wrote:
(From the Book, WITH TEARS IN MY HEART, by GGS–Pg. 17)
"God gives us tears to wash away the
heartache, to bathe our grief and dim our present loss.
He gives us tears, but promises to dry them, and tell us
WHY we suffered grief and pain."
(ysw)
"ALWAYS,
UNTIL THE END"
(Psalm 119:112)
"I have inclined
mine heart to perform thy statutes always, even unto the
end."
INCLINED–HEART
TO
PERFORM–STATUES
ALWAYS!
MY PRAYER:
"Dear Lord, Draw
my heart till I continually, absolutely
do what you have
commanded all thru my life
in weakness and
strength to do always and only Thy will."
(ggs)
And Sarah
heard it in the tent door, which was behind him.
And they said unto him, Where is Sarah thy wife? And he
said, Behold, in the tent. And he said, I will certainly
return unto thee according to the time of life; and, lo,
Sarah thy wife shall have a son. (Genesis 18:10)
AN IMPORTANT CONFERENCE:
Make plans now to attend the 33rd annual meeting of the Dean Burgon Society.
The theme of this years conference is the four hundred anniversary of the King
James Bible. The date for the meeting is July 27-28, 2011. The place is
Collingswood, New Jersey. This is a meeting you do not want to miss. Please
arrange your schedule to be there in person. To view the 2010 conference please
follow this link: http://www.deanburgonsociety.org/Videos/dbs2010.htm
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