Chris Campbell

See, O Lord, how distressed I am;
   my stomach churns,
my heart is wrung within me,
   because I have been very rebellious.
In the street the sword bereaves;
   in the house it is like death.

Beloved in the body of Christ,

One of today's readings is from the lamentations of Jeremiah, one of the most human sections of scripture.

Lamenting is such a large part of humanity. We lament our situations, our actions, our loved ones, our sins, and sometimes even ourselves.

Zion stretches out her hands,
   but there is no one to comfort her;
the Lord has commanded against Jacob
   that his neighbours should become his foes;
Jerusalem has become
   a filthy thing among them.
The Lord is in the right,
  for I have rebelled against his word;

But what is to come of this lamenting? If mournful sorrow is one of the most human expressions we can connect with and understand, what does that mean for our own life?

This is the crux of faith! For it is in true suffering that we meet God face to face.

This is why our Lord suffers as he does on the cross: to meet us face to face. He does this so that when we hang on the suffering that we each hold we can know that we are not alone, for the Son of Man hangs there with us.

This is our hope: not that our suffering will end—for that is death—but that our suffering is shared by the God of life which has destroyed death!

As we continue to approach the day of the passion of our Lord, I remember that it is not only a day of lament, but the day that God is truly closer to us than we might ever imagine. It is the day that Jesus, much like we do in lament, will call out "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me!"

We approach the greatest day of lament possible, yet within that lament there is the greatest hope ever imagined! For just beyond the passion of our Christ is the binding of our very existence to Him. And just beyond that, not three days away, is the resurrection of life itself.

May you live in Truth, Peace, and Love,
—Chris