Grief From Innocence Or Disobedience - Lamentation

Lamentations 2:13-14 (ESV)

What can I say for you, to what compare you,

O daughter of Jerusalem?

What can I liken to you, that I may comfort you,

O virgin daughter of Zion?

For your ruin is vast as the sea;

who can heal you?

Your prophets have seen for you

false and deceptive visions;

they have not exposed your iniquity

to restore your fortunes,

but have seen for you oracles

that are false and misleading.

Lamentations is a lament about the destruction of the city of Jerusalem in 586 B.C.   The nation of Israel continued to spurn the word of God and, as a result of this constant disobedience, God destroyed the city by the hands of the Babylonians.   Some of the people died during the Babylonia siege, some died trying to escape at the sword of the Babylonians, most were taken captive.   Some died because the people in the city, so hungry, ate their own new born babies.   This is a horrific scene and story.  Jeremiah, probably the author, lived through it all, as one of the main voices of God’s word.  However, he was not the only one who prophesied during that time.  There were other prophets besides him.  His message from God was, “This is going to happen, give up and go to Babylon and be safe and God will bring you back here one day.”    The other prophet’s message was, “Keep doing what you are doing.  We are God’s chosen people and the Babylonias are more wicked than us.  Jeremiah is a traitor because he wants you to give into a foreign god.”  The above lament gives us the rest of the story.   The false teachers lead them astray and brought on even more destruction.  Sometimes when grief comes our way and we fall into a long lament and grief cycle, but it is for no fault of our own (read the book of Job again).  But sometimes when we fall into calamity it is because we are listening to false doctrine and false world views.   These people fell into this destruction because they refused to listen to Jeremiah and instead, choose to listen to these no longer remembered, prophets.  Here is the prophecy of one of those prophets.  

Jeremiah 28:10-11 (ESV)

Then the prophet Hananiah took the yoke-bars from the neck of Jeremiah the prophet and broke them. And Hananiah spoke in the presence of all the people, saying, “Thus says the LORD: Even so will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon from the neck of all the nations within two years.” But Jeremiah the prophet went his way.

Hananiah soon dies after this display of disobedience toward God’s real prophet, Jeremiah.    We may have grief that comes upon us, causing us to fall into a lamentation, because of innocence.   However, we often fall into calamity and lamentation because of our own disobedience.