1 How does the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become as a widow! she that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces, how is she become tributary!

2 She weeps sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks: among all her lovers she has none to comfort her: all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they are become her enemies.

3 Judah is gone into captivity because of affliction, and because of great servitude: she dwells among the heathen, she finds no rest: all her persecutors overtook her between the straits.

4 The ways of Zion do mourn, because none come to the solemn feasts: all her gates are desolate: her priests sigh, her virgins are afflicted, and she is in bitterness.

5 Her adversaries are the chief, her enemies prosper; for the LORD has afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions: her children are gone into captivity before the enemy.

6 And from the daughter of Zion all her beauty is departed: her princes are become like harts that find no pasture, and they are gone without strength before the pursuer.

7 Jerusalem remembered in the days of her affliction and of her miseries all her pleasant things that she had in the days of old, when her people fell into the hand of the enemy, and none did help her: the adversaries saw her, and did mock at her sabbaths.

8 Jerusalem has grievously sinned; therefore she is removed: all that honored her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness: yes, she sighs, and turns backward.

9 Her filthiness is in her skirts; she remembers not her last end; therefore she came down wonderfully: she had no comforter. O LORD, behold my affliction: for the enemy has magnified himself.

10 The adversary has spread out his hand on all her pleasant things: for she has seen that the heathen entered into her sanctuary, whom you did command that they should not enter into your congregation.

11 All her people sigh, they seek bread; they have given their pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul: see, O LORD, and consider; for I am become vile.

12 Is it nothing to you, all you that pass by? behold, and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow, which is done to me, with which the LORD has afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.

13 From above has he sent fire into my bones, and it prevails against them: he has spread a net for my feet, he has turned me back: he has made me desolate and faint all the day.

14 The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand: they are wreathed, and come up on my neck: he has made my strength to fall, the LORD has delivered me into their hands, from whom I am not able to rise up.

15 The LORD has trodden under foot all my mighty men in the middle of me: he has called an assembly against me to crush my young men: the LORD has trodden the virgin, the daughter of Judah, as in a wine press.

16 For these things I weep; my eye, my eye runs down with water, because the comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me: my children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed.

17 Zion spreads forth her hands, and there is none to comfort her: the LORD has commanded concerning Jacob, that his adversaries should be round about him: Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them.

18 The LORD is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment: hear, I pray you, all people, and behold my sorrow: my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.

19 I called for my lovers, but they deceived me: my priests and my elders gave up the ghost in the city, while they sought their meat to relieve their souls.

20 Behold, O LORD; for I am in distress: my bowels are troubled; my heart is turned within me; for I have grievously rebelled: abroad the sword bereaves, at home there is as death.

21 They have heard that I sigh: there is none to comfort me: all my enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that you have done it: you will bring the day that you have called, and they shall be like to me.

22 Let all their wickedness come before you; and do to them, as you have done to me for all my transgressions: for my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.

THE UNHEEDED SORROWS OF JESUS

Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?

Lam 1:12

Where is the difference between the Church and the world? The world looks on; the Church participates in the sufferings of Jesus.

I. Now the first thing is, What is the fact? What are these strange things which are being enacted here in the garden, and in the court, and on the hill?

That Central Figure it is the Son of God! He is come to this earth, a Man, a simple Man.

And now His sufferings which have been all along very deep, and His patience eloquent are reaching the lowest point, and far below the lowest point of human endurance!

And this Man is the Eternal Son of God!

If this be true, there must be something more than meets the eye.

II. What is the solution of this great mystery God s own dear Child sent through such a travail as that? What is the underlying secret? Twofold.

(1) First, it is God s abhorrence of sin. Sin was as heavy as the world, but Christ was weightier than the world, therefore Christ outweighed the sin. Nothing but the Passion of Jesus could ever make it a just thing for God to forgive man.

(2) The other secret is love. The whole Trinity loves the sinner so loves, that at any cost whatever, they resolve to restore him to the lost peace, the lost image, and the lost heaven.

III. Now see your part. Where were you in the Passion? Understand this, that if you were the only person that ever lived the only person that ever did wrong, if you had only done one wrong action, or thought one wrong thought yet, all that Christ did and suffered would have been as much required to save you as it is required to save millions upon millions.

Then you did it. You did it!

That is the way when you are tempted to a sin to look at it: Can I do this sin, and crucify Christ?

That is the way to look at a sin when you have done it: It is red with the blood of Jesus Christ!

IV. But fourthly, no less for comfort and for joy. It was all for me; for me, pointedly, decidedly, individually, for me!

Were your sins multiplied into all the drops of ocean, and all the stars of both hemispheres one tear of those eyes one drop of that dear Saviour s life-blood is sufficient to wash it all out!

Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?

I speak to those who play with religion. Do you know that your soul s eternity hangs upon the question of what that Suffering One is to you? Have you no sins to confess? Have you no guilt to cancel? Have you no cravings to satisfy? Will you pass on, and go along your easy journey of life, and leave that dear Lord, and His Cross, an unnoticed and uncared thing?

If that be nothing, what is anything?

Rev. Jas. Vaughan.

Illustration

This Book is remarkable for its great variety of touching images and plaintive laments, all expressing the deepest sorrow. The prophet seems to be passing to and fro amid the ruins of the city and Temple, burned with fire, strewn with the bodies of the slaughtered soldiers and people. He sets himself to turn the people in penitence and faith to the God of their fathers, Whose commands they had so deeply disobeyed. The widowed city is depicted as weeping sore, her cheeks covered with tears, deserted by her former lovers, and overtaken in the narrow mountain passes by her foes. The very roads cry out for the pilgrim feet which no longer traverse them. The departure of her beauty, the sad memory of happier days, the shamelessness of the people s sin, the violation of the holy place by Gentile feet, the extremity of famine, the unutterableness of her sorrow, the twisted yoke of her sins, the treading of her fruit as in the winepress beneath the feet of Him Who desired to be her Lover and Saviour all these are depicted in graphic colours. And, finally, the city herself ( Lam 1:18, etc.) is introduced, lifting up her voice in the bitterest grief, and crying in the ear of God.