Jeff Schreve - Circumstantial Evidence
Hey, does your trust in God waver, depending on the circumstances? Do you question God’s goodness in the face of trials? Today, we’ll look in depth at the prophet Jeremiah and the hopelessness he felt when Jerusalem was totally destroyed. Yet, even when all hope seemed lost, he found renewed hope in the Lord. And so can you.
We’re in a series called «Fake News: Exposing the Lies of the Devil». And today we want to talk about circumstances. I’ve entitled this message, «Circumstantial Evidence». You know, circumstances are what circumstances are. The things that happen in life, those aren’t fake, those are real things. But what the devil does is he comes alongside us at our weakest point, at the time where we’re in such consternation and the bad circumstances have come in like a flood, and that’s when the devil, the ultimate spin doctor, will start to spin those circumstances and tell you and tell me, «See, this proves that God is not real. This proves that God doesn’t love you. This proves that it’s foolish and futile and stupid to praise God, to believe in God, to worship God».
The devil really likes to work in the arena of bad circumstances. So in our message today, we’re going to look at a great chapter in the Old Testament. It’s in the book of Lamentations. Lamentations was written by Jeremiah the prophet. Lamentations, it’s five chapters. Most people, they just run across Lamentations and they say, «I don’t want to read that book. That just kind of sounds depressing». The word «lamentations» comes from the Latin word, which means funeral dirges. In the dictionary, we run across «lamentations» and it means this: «The passionate expression of grief or sorrow». That’s what it means to lament. And that’s what Jeremiah is doing in the book of Lamentations.
See, Jeremiah was prophet for 40 years to God’s people, and he told them, «You guys need to turn around». Told the leaders, «You need to respond to the Lord. You need to repent and get things right with God because if you don’t, judgment is coming». But they didn’t respond to Jeremiah. They wanted to kill Jeremiah. They didn’t like him at all. They didn’t like what he was saying. But what he said came to pass. Here is our question for today: Do you view God through the lens of your bad circumstances or do you view your bad circumstances through the lens of God?
I’ll begin reading in verse 1: «I am the man who has seen affliction because of the rod of His wrath. He has driven me and made me walk in darkness and not in light. Surely against me He has turned His hand repeatedly all the day. He has caused my flesh and my skin to waste away. He’s broken my bones. He has besieged and encompassed me with bitterness and hardship. In dark places He has made me dwell, like those who have long been dead. He has walled me in so that I cannot go out; He has made my chain heavy. Even when I cry out and call for help, He shuts out my prayer. He has blocked my ways with hewn stone; He has made my paths crooked. He is to me like a bear lying in wait, like a lion in secret places. He has turned aside my ways and torn me to pieces; He has made me desolate. He bent His bow and set me as a target for His arrow. He made the arrows of His quiver to enter into my inward parts. I have become a laughingstock to all my people. Their mocking song all the day. He has filled me with bitterness. He has made me drunk with wormwood. He has broken my teeth with gravel; and He has given me, and He has made me cower in the dust. And my soul has been rejected from peace; I have forgotten happiness».
Wow, that’s coming from Jeremiah the prophet. What I want you to notice as we look at these 25 verses in Lamentations chapter 3, I want you to notice with me three insights concerning this passage. Insight number one, the devil wants us to see God as mean and cruel and sadistic. The devil works in bad circumstances so that you would connect the dots in the circumstances, and the bad circumstances, therefore, cause me to conclude that God is mean, that God is cruel, that God is sadistic. He somehow gets sadistic joy from watching me squirm like a worm in hot ashes. That is the gospel according to the devil.
Now, Jeremiah here is really sharing from the heart. You know, it’s kind of like in the book of Psalms. One of the reasons I love the book of Psalms 'cause Psalms is so true to life because the Psalmist, David, so much of the time, he just tells you what he’s feeling. He tells you what’s going on inside, and Jeremiah is doing this here. He’s telling you what he’s feeling. He’s sharing his feelings, and his feelings are not good because his feelings are saying, «God, what’s up here? God», you know, you read that and you think, «Well, God must be mean and cruel and sadistic».
I think Jeremiah is believing that God is mean and cruel and sadistic. He’s struggling with that, because the devastation is so great. He’s never experienced anything like this before. Here’s the thing: Circumstances and feelings, they always fit together. Have you noticed that? Circumstances and feelings fit together. You say, «What do you mean by that»? Well, we use the word «happy». You know, happy comes from a shorter word which is hap. H-A-P, hap. And hap means an occurrence, a happening. We get the word «happenstance» from the word «hap».
And here is what happens to us. When we have good happenings, good occurrences, you know what? We’re happy. Why are you happy? 'Cause I got good hap. I mean, things are going good for me. Everything’s coming up roses, and when everything’s coming up roses, you’re happy. But when your hap is bad, you’re unhappy. You win the lottery. Shouldn’t be playing, but you win the lottery and you’re happy, right? You get a promotion at work. You’re happy. Somebody comes to your house and says, «I was just led to give you $100,000». Wow, send it my way. But you’re happy. Wow, this is… so you win a trip, you’re happy. You’re hap is good, you’re happy. But then you lose your job, you lose your health, you lose a loved one. You’re unhappy. Why? 'Cause your hap is bad.
Jeremiah says in the Contemporary English Version, verses 19 and 20: «Just thinking of my troubles and my lonely wandering makes me miserable. That’s all I ever think about, and I am depressed». He said happiness is gone. I’m just depressed. All I see is devastation, and circumstances are bad and therefore feelings are bad and they go together and then the devil moves in. The devil moves in on your negative circumstances, your bad circumstances, because feelings match up with what’s going on in the hap. And so, what is the devil? He comes in and he says, «You see that? You can’t trust God. You see that? God’s not good. You see that? God doesn’t love you. Look around you, look what’s going on in your life».
So circumstances and feelings become the devil’s playground, the devil’s workshop, and he begins to work. The spin doctor goes to work with those bad circumstances to spin it so that you would think negatively about God, so that you would have a warped view of God. And that’s what happens to Jeremiah. Well, the devil works in our negative circumstances. That’s the first discovery, the first insight here. The devil wants us to see God as mean and cruel and sadistic. But secondly, the devil wants us to lose hope. See, once you believe the lie that God is mean and God is cruel and God is sadistic and God is doing all these terrible things to me, he’s like a bear just waiting for me. He’s behind a bush. He’s waiting to tear me apart. God is the God who gives you gravel sandwiches.
As Jeremiah said, «He’s made me to eat gravel and broken my teeth on a gravel sandwich». You ever had a gravel sandwich? You ever had a bowl of grape nuts? It’s kind of the same thing. But that’s what… and it’s worse, you know? And Jeremiah’s eating a gravel sandwich and he says, «This is terrible. He’s broken out my teeth». And then he says in verse 18: «So I say, 'My strength has perished, and so has my hope from the LORD.'» I’ve lost my strength to go on, and my hope in the Lord is done. I can’t hope anymore. It says in the ERV, the Easy to Read Version, it’s Larry’s favorite version. It says this in verse 18 of Lamentations chapter 3: «I said to myself, 'I no longer have any hope that the LORD will help me.'»
That’s Jeremiah. My strength is perished. My hope in the Lord is gone. I no longer have any hope that God is gonna help me. Why? Because when I pray, He doesn’t listen to me, He shuts me out. He gives me the gravel sandwich. He’s like a bear hiding, waiting to destroy me. And that, all his feelings and his circumstances, they’re coming together along with the lies of the devil, «Curse God and die. You have no more hope». Many of you remember the name «Jack Kevorkian,» Dr. Jack Kevorkian. He was the assisted suicide doctor. He would have people call him that were sick with a terminal illness, in pain, and didn’t want to go anymore. And they would call Dr. Jack and he’d come over there with his IV of poison to kill them. Rush Limbaugh called him Jack the Dripper, and here, you would call Dr. Jack to come kill you. Why? Why would anyone do that? Because when you lose hope, you lose your desire to go on.
You say, «It’s never gonna get any better». And listen, people who commit suicide, the reason they commit suicide for so many of them is because they say, «I’ve lost all hope,» and when you lose hope, you lose everything, and you don’t want to go on anymore. «Why should I go on? It’s never gonna get any better». You lose hope. Listen, the devil wants you to think God is mean and cruel and sadistic. But what does God want? God wants you to fix your eyes on Him and see the truth. And that’s what Jeremiah does. In the words that have been immortalized in song, he says in verse 22: «The LORD’S lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; Great is Thy faithfulness. 'The LORD is my portion, ' says my soul, 'Therefore I have hope in Him.' The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, to the person who seeks Him».
I like the little poem that says this: «Look at yourself and you’ll be depressed, look at your circumstances and you’ll be distressed, but look at the Lord and you’ll be blessed». And Jeremiah began to look at the Lord and he began to see, no matter how bad the circumstances might be, God is still good. God is still good. His lovingkindnesses never cease and His compassions never fail. God’s lovingkindness. That’s a word used in the New American Standard. It’s the Hebrew word «chesed». C-H-E-S-E-D, chesed. It’s kind of a heavy «C-H» sound, and it means God’s loyal love, God’s covenant love. It’s used in the Old Testament 183 times. You can count on God’s love. His love for you, as we sang today, His love for you is rooted in the cross. God’s love, God’s mercy, God’s compassion. It’s new every morning. You wake up in the morning and there’s fresh love and fresh compassion for you.
And Jeremiah, he quit looking at all the devastation around him. He couldn’t quit listening to the spin doctor, the devil, telling him that’s because God is a bear waiting to devour you. He’s a lion waiting to kill you. And he started saying, «That’s not true. God is a God who loves me. God is a God who is compassionate to me». Regardless of your circumstances, God is still good. I love what the prophet Zephaniah says in chapter 3, verse 17: «The LORD your God wins victory after victory and is always with you. He celebrates and sings because of you, and He will refresh your life with His love». That’s God. So no matter what you’re facing in life, no matter how bad the circumstances, God is still good. Not only is God still good, but no matter how bad your circumstances, God is still faithful.
We sing that song, «Faithful God, You reign forever». When the Lord Jesus comes back, He comes back and it says He has a name written, «Faithful and True,» because He’s faithful. He said, «I will come again,» and He will come again. God is faithful. Now, the apostle Paul said in the last letter he ever penned, he told Timothy, «If we are faithless,» anybody in here can relate to being faithless? «If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny himself. He is faithful God. He will always be faithful God». Paul said in 2 Timothy chapter 4, the last chapter he ever wrote. He said, «At my last defense, no one supported me, all deserted me. But the Lord stood with me and He strengthened me because He’s faithful God». And he says, «I will never leave you nor will I ever forsake you».
And when you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you pass through the fire, the flame will not burn you for I’m the Lord, your God, the holy one of Israel, your Savior. You can count on God. Great is Thy faithfulness, and He’s faithful to love you, even when you’re not lovable. He’s faithful to have compassion and mercy on you, even when you don’t deserve a shred of it. He is a good God. And then, regardless of your circumstances, God is still worth it. He’s still worth it. I don’t care what has happened in your life. And I dare say, no matter how bad your life might be right now, you have not experienced the depth of suffering that Jeremiah did.
To see as a prophet, to see God’s city totally destroyed, God’s people totally devastated, hauled off into captivity, killed and slain on the streets, the ark of the covenant destroyed. To see all that, I mean, you’re just shocked that «God, how does that happen»? Man, it’s the A to Z of grief and pain. But he says, «God is still worth it. 'The Lord is my portion, '» he says in verse 24, «says my soul. Therefore, I have hope in Him. The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the person who seeks Him». So just wait. Wait for Him. Keep seeking Him. The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the person who seeks Him. Waiting is never passive. It’s always active. As I wait for the Lord, I seek the Lord, I seek Him. And He says in Jeremiah 29:13, «And you’ll seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart».
God is a God that we can find as we seek after Him. He is our portion. I was talking to my nephew the other day, and he did a book study in his Bible study, Francis Chan’s book, «Crazy Love». And he said, «You know, they had a question in there and the question was this». He said, «If you could die and go to heaven and be there with your family and with your friends, but Jesus wouldn’t be there, would you still want to go»? And my nephew, Josh, just told me, he said, «You know, I don’t think I’m at the place where I would say no to that. I mean, to be in heaven. Perfect place, beautiful place with my wife, with my children, with my family, with my friends. I mean, that seems like that would be the ultimate, but Jesus isn’t there». And he said, «I know that’s not the right answer, but that’s kind of where I am».
And I said, «Well, I appreciate your honesty». I said, «Here’s the thing. Heaven wouldn’t be heaven without Jesus». It’s all about Jesus. And that’s why Jesus said, «If you love father or mother more than Me, you’re not worthy of Me. If you love son or daughter more than Me, you’re not worthy of Me». And when we understand that everything in life is about Jesus and He is the center and the circumference of everything, the sum and the substance, it’s all about Him. And my life and my soul finds peace and rest only in Him.
I liked what Adrian Rogers used to say. He said, «Suppose you had this deal offered to you. Somebody would say to you, 'I’ll give you a million dollars in cold hard cash, if you will lay down your salvation for 24 hours, just not be a Christian for 24 hours, lay down your salvation for 24 hours. And after 24 hours, you can pick your salvation back up again and you have a million dollars in cash.'» He said, «There’s some reasons why you wouldn’t wanna do that. Number 1, you could die in those 24 hours and be lost forever. Number 2, Jesus could come back in those 24 hours and you would have missed it. And number 3, 24 hours with Jesus is better than a million dollars any day of the week».
Regardless of your circumstances, God is still worth it. Paul closes the book to the Corinthians and says, «Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord». It pays to serve the Lord. It pays to seek the Lord. It pays to come after Him with all your heart. Why? Because He’s worth it, because He’s God. He is your Creator. He is your Savior. Says in verse 32 of chapter 3: «For He causes grief and He will have compassion according to His abundant lovingkindness».
I want to close with this story. Many of you are familiar with the name «Charles Lindbergh». Charles Lindbergh, very famous person in American history, he was a pilot among other things. And one of the things that Charles Lindbergh did was he took on the daunting task of flying the first solo flight from New York to Paris across the Atlantic Ocean in a little plane called the Spirit of Saint Louis. That little plane went about 100 miles an hour. The flight was gonna take him 33 ½ hours, if he could make it. Here’s a picture of him with his plane just to show you how little that plane was. I don’t imagine any of us would get in that plane. Didn’t have any real instruments to speak of. He didn’t have all the sophisticated things that we have. Didn’t have an altimeter. He had a compass. Had a compass and he kind of knew where he needed to go. But he makes for his flight on May 20, 1927, leaving from New York to get to Paris.
Well, relatively early in the flight, he runs into trouble. He goes through some storm clouds and there’s lots of fog and there’s lots of moisture in the air and just has to fly by sight. Like I said, he doesn’t have instruments, and so he’s in a difficult spot, and then he begins to notice that the condensation on his wings is starting to freeze, and he says, «I’m in trouble here. I’m gonna either need to go back and end my quest to be the first man to make a solo transatlantic flight or I’m gonna have to come up with something because otherwise I’m gonna go down, down, down. These wings are gonna freeze over, and then I’m just gonna go down and be lost in the Atlantic».
And then all of a sudden, he said, like Lieutenant Dan, «What am I gonna do? What am I gonna do»? And then he had a moment of inspiration, and what Lindbergh did was he pulled back on the stick, and he was flying at about 800 feet. He pulled back on the stick, and all of a sudden that little Spirit of Saint Louis started to climb up and up and up and up and up and it seemed like it took forever. But eventually as he went up, he broke through the fog and he broke through the storm clouds and he broke through to a dazzling sunshine, and the wings were fine and the air was fine up there. And Lindbergh learned something he already knew: When you’re in the fog, when you’re in the storm clouds, if you will go up, you will find that the sun is always shining. The sun is always shining.
Listen, some of you are facing some really difficult circumstances and the devil has moved in on you and you’re believing the fake news coming from the devil as he spins your circumstances and saying, «You can’t trust God. God doesn’t love you. God’s not gonna see you through». What you need to do is pull back on the stick of faith and go up, up, up, up, up until you see the sun, until you get your eyes on Him, the God who is good, the God who loves you, the God who has compassion for you, the God who is faithful, the God who is worth it.