Lament is Permitted

Jeremiah 8:18-9:1

Pentecost 15, September 21, 2025

Holy Trinity Cathedral

“Lament is Permitted”

You may have noticed that a couple of this Sunday’s Scripture passages are downers.  We could ignore them.  Just like we can ignore the bad news being broadcast in so many media.  Turn off the radio; change the station; block the news feed.  I could preach a happy, comforting sermon (and sometimes that might be needed). But if we can’t acknowledge the suffering spoken of in the Jeremiah reading and the psalm today, we do a disservice to all of us who are struggling with the why of human existence.

How many of you, when somebody asks you how you are doing, automatically answer “fine”?  On certain days, in certain circumstances, that probably means everything is going well.  But if we are being honest, most of the time “fine” covers a lot of the alternatives.  The Canadian author Louise Penny has a character explain it this way.  “Fine means f-ed up, insecure, neurotic, and egotistical”.  Yes, I admit that am fine.  In western culture, there is a “fake it til you make it” attitude.  We are told to keep a stiff upper lip, to carry on in spite of difficulties.  Stoicism is admired.  Whiners are avoided.  One individual’s standing joke was “I can’t complain- nobody would listen to me anyway”.  I am not downplaying the courage it takes to keep going in rough times.  But collectively, there is a danger in avoidance.  If we don’t name that there is something awful going on, we never deal with it. 

We humans are very good at revising history.  The ones who get to tell the story can pretend the bad bits didn’t happen by writing them out.  Or the events can be justified or reframed to shift the narrative.  If we open our ears and our eyes, however, we can hear some of the voices underneath.  We can listen to the voices of lament.  Instead of thinking we know the answer, we can sit a minute with those who are asking ‘why?’.

The prophet Jeremiah was a voice of lament.  He was probably not a cheerful sort of person.  Then, he didn’t live in a very cheerful time.  700 years before Jesus Christ, civilizations were crumbling.  The promised land, settled by the tribes of Israel and ruled by Jewish judges and kings, was being conquered by the Babylonian empire.  The northern kingdom of Israel had fallen.  Now southern Judah is on the verge of destruction.  Jeremiah was a eyewitness, prophesying to the nobility and temple authorities that their days were numbered.  He foresaw the destruction, and his scribe Baruch wrote down his messages from the Lord into the Book of Jeremiah and another best-seller- the Book of Lamentations. These two books of Hebrew Scripture were the original doom scrolls.

Bad days are coming, says Jeremiah.  Disaster’s on the line.  He tries to help the people make sense of God’s wrath.  The covenant that the chosen people made with the help of Moses at Mt. Sinai has been broken many times through people’s wrongdoing.  Wrath doesn’t mean retribution, but it does mean consequences.  Jerusalem was dedicated as the royal city.  A temple was built in the centre to be the throne for God’s presence with the people.  But the rulers did not see the LORD as the one true king of Israel, and the priests did not follow the law of the covenant or teach the people to do so.  Jerusalem is a physical place, but it is also a metaphor for the people of God.  Both are breaking down.  In Psalm 79 verse 10, the psalmist asks “why should the nations say, ‘Where is their God?’  This is the question that the people of Israel ought to be asking themselves.  They have forgotten the way of righteousness.  They are not fine. 

Jeremiah laments the coming fall of Jerusalem.  His words express his heart-sickness on behalf of the people.  He voices the big question:  “Is the Lord not in Zion?  Is her King not in her?” (Jeremiah 8:19).  But then the voice of lament becomes the God of Israel.  “Why have they provoked me to anger with their images, with their foreign idols?” And from Jeremiah’s words, others take up the cry of anguish in the time of destruction.  They feel abandoned and despairing, sick unto death.  And they are invited together into the lament.

Lament is important.  Whether we are separated by distance or comforting each other with presence, lamentation brings what is already in our hearts into the open.  It allows a collective way:

1. To protest
2. To process
3. To question

To protest suffering is often the first reaction.  Whether or not we see what is happening as fair, our being rebels against the pain we experience and witness.  This is visceral.  We feel it in our bodies. Whether or not tears, or sighs, or words are used.   Whether we stand in silence with hands clutching candles or kneel on dusty ground.

But we also need a means of processing the emotions.  We may blame the enemy.  Blame God.  Even blame ourselves.  However suffering is not a virtue, and guilt is not a helpful endpoint. Before the move to action, lament gives us time to recognize the complexity.

And lament helps us to voice our confusion and questioning.  It gives a sacred dignity to human suffering and brings it before God even as we grapple with our incomprehension.  When we cry out “why?” we are reaching beyond what we know.  We are reaching out for help. 

Jeremiah’s prayer is for mercy and compassion for himself and the people.  He understands that there are consequences for sin.  But then he posits hope.  His reasoning is that if God is consistent about punishing evil, then God will also be consistent in extending mercy.  The lament is an appeal to the One who has the power to relent and heal the sickness of humanity.  This has to come from the divine, for there is no physical medicine that can restore and return the people to wellbeing.  “Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there?”  These are rhetorical questions, to which the answer is “No.”  The only healing comes from the Lord, to those who are willing to admit they are helpless.

When was the last time you permitted yourself to lament?  Maybe at a funeral, or a vigil for a tragedy, or in a public admission of wrongdoing and apology for residential school abuses.  Maybe as you participating in the ending of a group, or a project, or a job?  Maybe when you did not turn away from yet another report of the suffering of men and women and children in a place of conflict or oppression.  It is an act of compassion to recognize and give attention to lament.  It is an act of courage to pray for mercy and compassion even in the face of evil.   Both the prophet Jeremiah and the one who wrote psalm 79 struggled with the meaning of suffering.  They didn’t have the answer.  But they didn’t quit their conversations with God: to protest, to process, and to voice their perplexity.  In lament they found a source of hope.  Does that make you feel any better?  Then I guess we are all “fine!”  Amen.