In 587 BC, after an agonizing two-and-half-year siege, the great pagan king Nebuchadnezzar finally breached the walls of Jerusalem. Babylon’s chokehold on Jerusalem for those couple of years had devastated the city, driving its starvation-crazed inhabitants to the unimaginable point of cannibalism.

But now, the foreign military unleashed its full fury, reducing to ruins much of the holy city, “the perfection of beauty” and “the joy of all the earth” (Psalm 50:2; 48:2). And it thrust a spear into its spiritual heart by destroying the great temple Solomon had built nearly four centuries earlier (Jeremiah 52:4–14). The conquest is still felt among observant Jews, who commemorate it annually with fasting and laments on the ninth of Av, the fifth month of the Hebrew calendar (Jeremiah, Lamentations, 441).

The Bible preserves the inspired record of one saint who managed to survive the carnage. We know it in our English Bibles as Lamentations, a collection of five beautifully composed, honest, raw poems, in which the anonymous poet gives an inspired collective voice to the grieving nation of Israel.

He captures in verse the devastating and disorienting psychological, emotional, and spiritual distress suffered by those who lived and died during the darkest, most tragic chapter in Israel’s old-covenant history, when the Lord, in judgment, had “become like an enemy” to his own people (Lamentations 2:5). It is the saddest book in all of Scripture.

Which is why it is remarkable that smack-dab in the middle of this book of tears is, arguably, the Bible’s most well-known, most beloved declaration of God’s love, mercy, and faithfulness:

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;     his mercies never come to an end;they are new every morning;     great is your faithfulness. (Lamentations 3:22–23)

Driven into Darkness

To truly appreciate this beautiful, beloved declaration, we need to keep in mind the kinds of shock this author and his people had experienced.

They had seen Jerusalem’s beloved walls, strongholds, and palaces — the structures that for centuries had been symbols of God’s strength and protection for the Jewish people (Psalm 48:12–14) — turned to rubble (Lamentations 2:5, 8–9). They had seen priests massacred in the temple and the sacred building burned to the ground (Lamentations 2:6–7, 20). They had seen infants die of starvation in the arms of their mothers (Lamentations 2:11–12), parents eat the remains of their children (Lamentations 4:10), young women brutally raped, and once-free men enslaved and humiliated (Lamentations 5:11–13). They had seen bodies of young and old, common and noble, lying in the streets where they had been slaughtered, left to become shriveled horrors (Lamentations 2:21, 4:7–8).

And they knew this was God’s doing: “The Lord has done what he has purposed; he has carried out his word, which he commanded long ago” (Lamentations 2:17). After centuries of prophetic warnings issued to his stiff-necked, disobedient people (Isaiah 1:7–9; Amos 2:4–5), God at last brought upon Israel the dreadful covenant curses Moses described in Deuteronomy 28:47–57.

The sovereignty of God over this human anguish pours out through the poet’s pen as he writes,

[The Lord] has driven and brought me     into darkness without any light;surely against me he turns his hand     again and again the whole day long.

He has made my flesh and my skin waste away;     he has broken my bones;he has besieged and enveloped me     with bitterness and tribulation;he has made me dwell in darkness     like the dead of long ago.

He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;     he has made my chains heavy;though I call and cry for help,     he shuts out my prayer;he has blocked my ways with blocks of stones;     he has made my paths crooked. (Lamentations 3:2–9)

Therefore,

my soul is bereft of peace;     I have forgotten what happiness is;so I say, “My endurance has perished;     so has my hope from the Lord.” (Lamentations 3:17–18)

We can barely fathom such multilayered darkness and suffering: afflicted by God, decimated by man, alone, with no light, no peace, no happiness, no hope.

And then.

Light in Deep Despair

Suddenly, we come to one of the most unexpected, jarring literary pivots in all of Scripture — one might even call it a resurrection of one who had been “like the dead” (Lamentations 3:6).

“Into this darkness of destruction, death, and despair comes light, and in this light hope revives.”

Nothing about the horrific circumstances of the city, the nation, or the author gives any reason for hope. By all appearances, all has been lost. God, in his righteous wrath, administered through a foreign superpower, has slain his “firstborn son” (Exodus 4:22). The tomb has effectively been sealed. All one can do now is weep beside the grave — or hide from those who had done the killing.

Then into this darkness of destruction, death, and despair comes light, and in this light hope revives. For suddenly, unexpectedly, the lamenting author breaks into this beautiful, and now beloved, declaration:

But this I call to mind,     and therefore I have hope:

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;     his mercies never come to an end;they are new every morning;     great is your faithfulness.“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,     “therefore I will hope in him.” . . .

For the Lord will not     cast off forever,but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion     according to the abundance of his steadfast love. (Lamentations 3:21–24, 31–32)

What revives the author’s dead hope? Answer: not what, but who. The very sovereign God who had brought the darkness and anguish.

‘This I Call to Mind’

Specifically, his hope revives by the word of this sovereign God that the author has stored in his heart (Psalm 119:11). And he has stored a lot of it in his heart. Read Lamentations carefully and you’ll notice many allusions to passages found throughout the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms — especially the Psalms. For example, read these excerpts from Psalm 103 and listen for their echoes in that beloved Lamentations text:

Bless the Lord, O my soul,     and forget not all his benefits,who forgives all your iniquity,     who heals all your diseases,who redeems your life from the pit,     who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy. . . .

The Lord is merciful and gracious,     slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.He will not always chide,     nor will he keep his anger forever.He does not deal with us according to our sins,     nor repay us according to our iniquities.For as high as the heavens are above the earth,     so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;as far as the east is from the west,     so far does he remove our transgressions from us.As a father shows compassion to his children,     so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him. . . .

The steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him,     and his righteousness to children’s children (Psalm 103:2–4, 8–13, 17)

God’s word revives this grieving author’s hope. He calls Scripture to mind in this dark, desperate moment. He recalls the Lord’s promises that his steadfast love will never cease toward those who fear him, and neither will his mercies. And he remembers that God’s great faithfulness is inextricably connected to his unceasing steadfast love (Psalm 57:10).

For the author (and the saints he speaks for), passages like this become “a lamp to [his] feet and a light to [his] path” (Psalm 119:105). Even here in the darkest pit, even now when all seems lost, as he and his nation suffer the terrible consequences of sin, in God’s light, he sees light (Psalm 36:9). And this light resurrects his hope.

Darkness Will Not Overcome the Light

The anguished poet of Lamentations, recording his hope amidst grief, reminds us of God’s power to unexpectedly resurrect dead hope. And the horrific nature of his circumstances, as an expression of God’s righteous judgment on Israel, remains a potent reminder that we are never in a pit so deep, and we never endure tragedies so severe, that God cannot, with a word, bring light to our path that overcomes our darkness with hope.

“Jesus knows tragic carnage and destruction, and all the darkness we experience, from the inside.”

I doubt this poet realized that these words — the words of “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3) — would so powerfully foreshadow Christ. Jesus knows tragic carnage and destruction, and all the darkness we experience, from the inside. That’s why he is for us the “light that shines in the darkness” (John 1:5).

It’s also why, when we are in our most hopeless pits, when our “soul is bereft of peace,” when we “have forgotten what happiness is,” when it feels like our “endurance has perished” and “so has [our] hope from the Lord” (Lamentations 3:17–18), Jesus, through his Spirit, loves to resurrect our hope by helping us call to mind God’s “living and active” word (Hebrews 4:12). And when his light shines in our darkness, “the darkness [will] not overcome it” (John 1:5).

At the beginning of Romans 9–11, Paul tells us he is sad. Really sad. “I speak the truth in Christ — I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit — I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart . . . for the sake of my people . . . Israel” (Romans 9:1–4 NIV). Paul is so sad that he doesn’t finish his thought and tell us what’s wrong with Israel. For that, we have to wait an entire chapter.

We come to find out that many within Israel had rejected Jesus, their long-awaited Messiah, and as a result weren’t “saved” (Romans 10:1). This reality not only made Paul sad; it also raised difficult questions about God. Did Israel’s unbelief mean that God had rejected his people — or worse, failed to keep his promises (Romans 9:6; 11:1)? And if God could reject his people and default on his promises, wasn’t this awful news for everybody, not just Israel but Gentiles too?

His Secret

To answer these questions, Paul reveals a secret hidden in the Bible and revealed only once God sent Jesus. God would save Israel and keep his word, but he would do so in a surprising way.

First, he would begin by reducing believing Israel to a tiny remnant. True, believing Israel and all Israel had never completely overlapped, even from the start (Romans 9:6–13). But it was only later, during the Assyrian and Babylonian exiles near the end of the Old Testament, that God reduced believing Israel to a mere remnant (Romans 9:27–29). And, surprisingly, believing Israel’s remnant status did not change even when the Messiah, Israel’s Savior, came (Romans 9:30–33; 11:7–10). As the apostle John put it: the Messiah “came to . . . his own, but his own did not receive him” (John 1:11 NIV).

Second, God would use Israel’s unbelief to make space for Gentile salvation (Romans 11:28, 30). Surprising space. Everybody expected Gentiles to one day join with Israel, but nobody anticipated they would become Israel. Paul tells us, however, that Gentile salvation would fulfill Old Testament promises about the salvation of Gentiles (Romans 10:19–20; see also 4:17; 15:9–12) and the salvation of Israel (Romans 9:25–26). Paul never explicitly calls Gentiles Israel, and he preserves a place for “natural” or ethnic Israel (Romans 11:17–24). But when he applies Israel’s promises to Gentiles, he shows us that the line between the “wild” and “natural” branches in the church is harder to see than anyone would have guessed.

Third, God would use Gentile salvation to get Israel’s attention. The surprising salvation of Gentiles would provoke Israel to envy and then salvation (Romans 11:11–12, 15). This was one of the reasons Paul shared Jesus so tirelessly with Gentiles. He hoped his success as “apostle to the Gentiles” might lead to Israel’s salvation. Granted, Paul knew he couldn’t provoke all Israel, but he hoped and prayed that he could provoke some (Romans 11:13–14).

Finally, God would provoke all Israel to salvation only when Jesus returned (or “in connection with” Jesus’s return). This might just be the most surprising part of Paul’s secret. Careful readers of God’s promises in the Old Testament were right: Israel would be saved when the Messiah came. But nobody could have guessed that Israel’s salvation would be at the Messiah’s second coming. Two comings! Nobody saw that coming. Paul tells us that Israel would be saved when Jesus returned from heavenly Zion, a place Jesus opened with his death, burial, and resurrection (Romans 11:26–27). In this way, Israel’s conversion would mirror Paul’s own — transformed by a heavenly vision of the risen Lord.

Paul tells us this secret then bursts into praise (Romans 11:33–36). Only an infinitely wise author could craft a plot where (nearly) every expectation created is fulfilled in an unexpected way. Surprising faithfulness. As paradoxical as that sounds, there’s really no other way to describe it. And there’s no other story like it.

His Grief

While Paul’s secret wonderfully dispels any doubts we might have about God’s faithfulness, I don’t think it diminished Paul’s grief. We may be surprised by what Paul writes in Romans 9–11, but Paul wasn’t. He wrote Romans 9:2 knowing full well what he would write in Romans 11:25–27. He wrote these chapters with a tear-stained face despite the secret he reveals.

After all, Israel wouldn’t be saved until Jesus returned, and Jesus wouldn’t return, Paul tells us, until God completed his work among the Gentiles (Romans 11:25). For Paul, this at least meant that Israel wouldn’t be saved until somebody pushed beyond Rome and evangelized the Gentiles on the edge of the map. So, Paul tells us how eager he is to get to Spain (Romans 15:14–33). Still, Paul knew that every delay, every setback, every change of plans, every pocket of unreached Gentiles meant more time would pass without Jesus’s return and, therefore, more death and judgment for so many — too many — within Israel.

Paul also knew that the timing of Israel’s salvation would mean that many within Israel would miss out on experiences he writes about in his letters and preached about everywhere he went. The Israel that would be saved at Jesus’s return would be an Israel that would miss out on life in the church during this present age. They would miss the goodness of working out their salvation (Philippians 2:12–13), struggling to walk by the Spirit (Galatians 5:16), and renewing their minds (Romans 12:2). Israel would miss out on the goodness of waiting for Jesus’s return and all the ways this experience prepares us for and enriches our experience in the world to come (see Matthew 25:21, 23).

His Example

Paul’s secret dispels our doubts about God’s character, but it doesn’t — it shouldn’t — diminish our grief. Not if we’re going to follow Paul’s example, which is precisely what the Bible calls us to do (1 Corinthians 11:1).

Paul’s example teaches us to celebrate every part of God’s story. In fact, it’s a sign of immaturity — or worse — if we can’t. Paul’s heart swells when he tells God’s story. That’s why he ends these chapters with a soaring doxology, reveling in God’s wisdom and knowledge. Our hearts fail to align with Paul’s if we’re unable to feel what he feels in Romans 11:33–36. We fail to follow Paul’s example if we can tell God’s story without wonder and praise.

At the same time, Paul teaches us that doxology can and should be accompanied by lament, by anguish. Paul’s heart breaks when he tells God’s story. That’s why he begins these chapters like he does and why he speaks of his tears elsewhere (Philippians 3:18). It is a sign of immaturity — or worse — if we can’t feel what Paul feels in Romans 9:2. In fact, here, as elsewhere, Paul was simply following the example of his Lord, who shed tears for precisely the same reason as Paul (Luke 19:41–44). Jesus’s tears, moreover, point us to an unfathomable mystery: God’s own “response” to his story (2 Peter 3:9).

Friends, rejoice in God’s story. Let it cause you to hallow his name. But in your rejoicing, don’t fail to weep. Don’t fail to cultivate a heart that is eager for others to share the good you have received from God and a heart that is grieved — even unceasingly grieved (Romans 9:2) — when they don’t. To the paradox of God’s surprising yet faithful story, let us add the paradox of our response to it: “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). In this way, we learn to follow Paul as he followed and waited for Christ.

Surviving a crisis is more than making it through the first day of disaster.

That initial day is often a blur. We operate on autopilot, numb to what’s happened. Our stomachs twist into ever-tightening knots as we try to make sense of the unthinkable.

We may lean into God for strength to survive the next moment, and he shows up in unmistakable ways. God feels close, friendships feel intimate, help is all around. We trust God with the future since we can’t think beyond today.

This experience is like being suddenly thrown into the wilderness with nothing but the clothes we are wearing. We are disoriented and don’t know our way around or how to survive. So we call out to God, who sends angels to feed us, as he did for Elijah (1 Kings 19:4–8). He strengthens us when we want to give up. He knows that we’re exhausted.

This is utter dependence on God. Somehow we are enduring because God is sustaining. Whether we’re kneeling or prostrate or curled up in a ball, we recognize our hopelessness before God. Moment by moment, we see our need for him.

Wilderness of Bewilderment

After my son died, I felt God carrying me as friends surrounded me. I declared boldly at his funeral that God never makes a mistake (and I firmly believe those words). But months later, walking past an empty room and reliving the events of Paul’s last days, I spiraled downward. Could I have prevented this? Why didn’t God save him? Why doesn’t God protect his people who’ve been faithful?

The God who once felt breathtakingly near now felt miles away. Reality had settled in, and I was left feeling lost and lonely. I wondered what happened to the hope and faith that had characterized those early days.

This stage of unsettledness has occurred after every major crisis I’ve been through. Maybe you can relate to that bewilderment. Waking up every morning without the one you love. Realizing that doctors’ appointments, physical pain, and emotional distress will be part of life going forward. Adjusting to a life of limitation without the rush of support you once had. These can all be part of the long and lingering tail of suffering.

We realize we’ve gone farther into the wilderness. One meal from an angel isn’t enough. We need food for an indefinite time. We want to get out, to move past all the pain, but somehow we can’t figure out how to escape. Every route we take is a dead end. We are tired of dependence and want to return to a place of security and comfort.

Worn Down by Distress

We see this pattern in Scripture. Job was a righteous man who responded with faith and trust the day everything was taken away. He worshiped God and recognized that God alone could give and take away. Even when his body was covered with sores, Job leaned on God. But after sitting in agony in the dirt, day after day, Job couldn’t maintain his worshipful demeanor. He lamented to everyone, wondering why God hadn’t rescued him yet. The long and lingering tail of suffering was wearing him down.

Similarly, God delivered the Israelites from slavery, but they grew discouraged in the heart of the wilderness. They wondered why God had brought them there and longed for the life they once had. Even though they had been slaves, at least their lives had been more certain then. The long and lingering tail of suffering was wearing them down.

God kept providing for the Israelites, but like many of us, they didn’t appreciate his provision. As Nehemiah acknowledged to God,

You in your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness. The pillar of cloud to lead them in the way did not depart from them by day, nor the pillar of fire by night to light for them the way by which they should go. You gave your good Spirit to instruct them and did not withhold your manna from their mouth and gave them water for their thirst. Forty years you sustained them in the wilderness, and they lacked nothing. Their clothes did not wear out and their feet did not swell. (Nehemiah 9:19–21)

God was offering his children sustaining grace, but sustenance wasn’t what they wanted.

Unlikely Promised Land

In Trusting God in the Wilderness, Ted Wueste offers an invaluable perspective on God’s provision:

On a foundational level, God always provides what is truly needed to live a life of dependence. Let that sink in for a moment. . . . How often do our ideas of provision have more to do with living in such a way that we are independent and self-sufficient as opposed to vulnerable or dependent upon God? (29)

Wueste goes on to say,

God doesn’t leave us to fend for ourselves. We may feel alone but we aren’t. He is leading us somewhere. . . . The journey is about deepening our dependence on him. Why? Because dependence is the promised land. Hear that clearly. A life of dependence is the truest, most real hope in our lives. Our hope is in him, not some location outside of difficulty. (39)

“Literal daily dependence sounds unsettling at best and frightening at worst.”

Wueste’s celebration of dependence may seem startling to you. It was to me. I never thought of dependence as the promised land, that depending on God for everything was my truest hope. My ideal provision is being self-sufficient, with God as a solid backup plan in case my plans go awry. Literal daily dependence sounds unsettling at best and frightening at worst.

Could I Really Trust God?

When I was diagnosed with post-polio syndrome, the doctors said that my body would continue to weaken and perhaps leave me a quadriplegic. That meant a life of complete dependence on others. And when my husband left me several years later, I would often wake up in the middle of the night, terrified. I played out my worst-case scenarios. Who will care for me as my body fails? Will everyone abandon me? What if my physical decline happens faster than I thought? The questions haunted me. Could I fully trust God with all I needed?

The nights were long and lonely, and the long and lingering tail of suffering was wearing me down. Yet I knew that I needed to keep coming back to God, so I poured out my questions and pain to him night after night. I confessed that I felt let down by him. That I wanted more than he was providing. That I longed for certainty more than I longed for his presence.

“God was showing me his extravagant love in countless ways. I just needed to pay attention.”

It was through this honest wrestling that God met me. I realized that though the future felt uncertain to me, it was fully known to him. I no longer felt deserted by God in the wilderness, but instead began to feel his presence more intensely. I noticed signs of his love that I’d once overlooked. He was loving me when I asked for peace, and it flooded over me. He was loving me when I felt depressed, and a friend called unexpectedly. He was loving me when I opened the Bible, and it came alive to me. God was showing me his extravagant love in countless ways. I just needed to pay attention.

Seeing My Suffering Differently

Job knew God before his calamities, but he saw God in the midst of them. He said, “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you” (Job 42:5). Moses spoke to God face to face in the wilderness, and those conversations literally transformed him. His face was radiant — so radiant that he wore a veil afterward. Everyone knew he’d been talking to God (Exodus 34:29–35). We too are radiant when we look to God in our struggles (Psalm 34:5), and we are transformed as well. This is the stunning outcome of living in the wilderness with God: we know him better, we may see and savor him more deeply, and ultimately we are transformed into his image (2 Corinthians 3:18).

If you’re discouraged in the wilderness, desperate to escape, know that many saints before you have felt that way too. Confess your disappointments to God as you wrestle with him in prayer. Pay attention to signs of God’s love, and keep talking to him. Trust that he is doing a deep work in your life, and ask him to show you his presence and provision.

And when you do, perhaps your perspective will change. Perhaps you’ll discover that dependence truly is the promised land, because God has become even more precious to you.