Let us turn again to God's Word
in that second portion that we were reading in the Lamentations
of Jeremiah chapter 3 and I read from verse 55 through to 58.
Reading down here in Lamentations 3 verse 55 through to 58 I called upon thy name, O Lord,
out of the low dungeon. Thou hast heard my voice. Hide not thine ear at my breathing,
at my cry. Thou drewest near in the day
that I called upon thee. Thou saidst, Fear not, O Lord. Thou hast pleaded the causes
of my soul. Thou hast redeemed my life. Well, as we turn to this portion
in this remarkable book, I want to address the subject of deliverance
from the dungeon. Deliverance from the dungeon. It is, of course, the experience
of Jeremiah that we read there in the opening part of Jeremiah
38 that really lies behind these words. He was a man persecuted
because he was such a faithful servant of the Lord. He only spoke the words that
God laid upon him. We could say, thus says the Lord. Thus says the Lord there in that
38th chapter of the prophecy. in verses 2 and 3. And how they
rejected his ministry and they cast him into the dungeon. As we see at verse 6 of that
chapter, they took Jeremiah and cast him into the dungeon of
Malachi, the son of Hamilech, that was in the court of the
prison. And they let down Jeremiah with cords, and in the dungeon
there was no water but mire. So Jeremiah sunk in the mire."
And aren't these the things that he has in mind even as we find
him writing here in the Lamentations. Verse 53, they have cut off my
life in the dungeon and cast a stone upon me. waters flowed
over mine head, then I said, I am cut off. But in the midst of that situation,
we see him as a man of prayer. I called upon thy name, O Lord,
out of the low dungeon, he says, at verse 55. And then, of course, as we saw
in that 38th chapter of the prophecy, That prayer was not in vain.
There was one who did take up his case with the king, even
the eunuch, Ibn Malik, and Jeremiah was brought out of the dungeon,
although he remained in the courts of the prison. Do we not, when
we think of these things, learn something more here concerning
the truth of the doctrine of the inspiration of the Word of
God? God did not simply dictate words
to these holy men. Peter speaks of how holy men
of God were moved by the Spirit of God. How did the Spirit work?
Well, the Spirit didn't just work with regard to their understanding
and impress truths upon their minds, but brought them into
circumstances and situations, and we find these men writing
out of all the fullness of those experiences that they've been
brought into. Divine inspiration is a remarkable
doctrine, really, the way in which God has been pleased to
bring to us His holy works. And so, Jeremiah's ministry is
very much an experimental ministry. How he is writing time and again
out of the things that he is brought to feel by the Lord's
dealings. As he says here in the opening
verse of this chapter, I am the man that has seen affliction
by the rod of his wrath. Verse 6 he says, he has set me
in dark places as they that be dead of old, he hath hedged me
about, that I cannot get out, he hath made my chain heaven. Also when I cry and shout, he
shutteth out my prayer. All what circumstances and situations
this man was brought into. And so, this morning, as I said,
I want us to consider this passage from verse 55 to 58. and the deliverance that he experiences
from the dungeon and dividing really what I say into two principal
parts first of all to look at God's purpose God's purpose in
bringing him into that situation God's purpose in a sense in bringing
a man into the place of conviction and then secondly God's power
as the Lord appears, as the one who is able to deliver, to deliver
Jeremiah, to deliver all of his people. First of all, then, God's
purpose in bringing one into the dungeon, as it were, because
there is really a spiritual significance in what Jeremiah is passing through
at this time. He says, Out of the low dungeon. That's the place from where he
is brought to call upon God and cry to him. I called upon thy
name, O Lord, out of the low dungeon. and time and again in
scripture we read of others who were also in circumstances very
similar to that that Jeremiah was in. Think of the experience
of Job and there in Job 12.14 he shutteth up a man and there
can be no opening in God's brings a man, not in a literal, physical
sense into the dungeon, but maybe in that man's feelings, in that
man's experience. That was very much the case with
regards to Job and all those things that came upon him. How
God was, as it were, shutting this man up into the midst of
all that great trial and trouble. We have it also, of course, in
the language of the Psalmist, In Psalm 88, I am shut up, says
Heman, and I cannot come forth. And there's that hymn in the
book 835. There are those hymns in Gatsby's
that are not really suitable for singing in public worship,
but they're useful sometimes for us to read in the way of
our private devotions. eight three five deep in a cold
and joyless sound a doleful gulf of gloomy care where dismal doubts
and darkness dwell the dangerous brink of black despair chilled
by the icy stamps of death i feel no firm support of faith what
remarkable words and yet surely the hymn writer is himself writing
there of something of the experiences he had to pass through, those
dismal doubts, the awful darkness that comes because of the sin
that easily besets us, the sin of unbelief, the dangerous brink
of black disparities. God does deal with these people
and bring them into those situations and circumstances where they
understand then something of what Jeremiah is describing here
in the words of our text this morning. The Lord shuts his people
up. We know. We know that there is
such a ministry. There's a ministry of the law,
as well as a ministry of the gospel. As we've said several
times before, isn't that how God's Word is divided? I'm not
thinking of Old Testament and New Testament, because we can't
say that the Old Testament is all law and the New Testament
all gospel. we find gospel in the Old Testament,
we find law in the New Testament. But now these ministries are
complementary one to the other. There is a ministry of the law,
and it's that law of God that brings with it condemnation. It brings the sinner into that
place where he is, as it were, in captivity to his sin. The Lord is holding him down.
The Lord is really a ministry of death. It can minister no
comfort to him. There's no hope for him in the
law. And doesn't Paul speak of that
as the lawful use of the law? The Lord is good, says the Apostle,
right in there in 1 Timothy chapter 1. The Lord is good, if a man
use it lawfully, knowing this, that the Lord is not made for
the righteous man. In other words, that righteous
man that Paul is speaking of is not the self-righteous man,
but it's that man who is righteous in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's
that man who is justified because he is trusting in Christ and
looking to Christ as the Lord, his righteousness. It's not made
for that man. No, Paul says the Lord is made
for the ungodly and sinners. It's made for those who are to
be brought into a sense of what their sin is that they might
understand where they are and what they are. The lawless, the
disobedient, the ungodly, the sinner. That's the one whom the
law is made for. And again, when Paul writes in
the third chapter of the epistle to the Galatians, he reminds
us, there is that ministry of the law before faith came, before
there is saving faith. He says, we're kept under the
law, shut up. Shut up to the faith that will
afterward be revealed. Shut up to feel what our sin
is. Shut up to feel our unbelief
and the utter impossibility of us exercising faith in and of
ourselves alone. Shut up to all our impotence
made to feel our total depravity and our total inability. Well that's that ministry of
the law and it's like this dungeon that the prophet is speaking
of wherein he finds himself shut up the low dungeon all that awful
place where he can in no wise deliver himself that's what he
is speaking of and what a paradox what a paradox it is when the
Lord does begin to deal with us and show us what we are and
make us feel what we are as sinners and the impossibility of saving
faith as dear John Newton says, Oh could I but believe then all
would easy be I would but cannot Lord relieve my help must come
from Thee. Oh isn't this Jeremiah he must
call upon God He must look to the Lord and to him alone out
of that low dungeon. He cannot bring himself out of
such a place. But there's a paradox here. He
feels lifeless and helpless, and his situation so hopeless,
and yet, here is a man who is really spiritually alive. That's
the paradox. He's alive, and yet all he feels
is the awful deadness of the situation he's in, and the deadness
that is in his own soul. Look at the language that we
have previously. Verse 39, Wherefore doth a living man complain? A man for the punishment of his
sins. Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the Lord. Let us lift up our heart with
our hands unto God in the heavens, or the living man, the living
man's complaints. What does that gracious King
Hezekiah say? O Lord, by these things men live,
and in all these things is the life of my spirit. In the dungeon, the life of God,
was truly there to be found in the soul of Jeremiah. And so
it is with the way in which the Lord deals with his people as
he brings them ever to himself. They're in that dungeon and yet
there's God's life there in their souls and it's evident in their
crying and calling, their seeking, And we see it here with regards
to the experience of the prophet I called, he says. I called upon
thy name, O Lord, out of the low dungeon. Doesn't God deal
with his people in such a way to make them feel what their
real need is? Well, we see it time and again
in the language of Holy Scripture. The words of the Apostle Romans
11.32 God has concluded them all in unbelief that he might
have mercy upon them all. How do we come to experience
the mercy of God? First of all God concludes us
in unbelief He puts us, as it were, in that dungeon of self,
where we cannot free ourselves, we cannot deliver ourselves. Thou turnest man to destruction,
and sayest, Return, ye children of men. Our self is destroyed. In order that we might see that
all of salvation is only found in the Lord Jesus Christ. How
God causes His people to cry out unto Him, when they sin against
him. We have the remarkable example,
of course, of Jonah and the prophets all for disobedience. Instead of going east to deliver
that message that the Lord had given him to take to the Ninevites,
he goes on board the ship at Joppa and flies to the western
extremity of the Mediterranean. He wants to get away. But how
the Lord pursues him in the storm, he's cast overboard, swallowed
by the great fish. And then what do we see? From the belly's fish he is brought
to the place of prayer. It's God's dealings and God causing
his disobedient servant to pray. He's in a dungeon. If ever a
man was in a dungeon, surely Jonah was. Then Jonah prayed
unto the LORD his God out of the fish's belly, and said, I
cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me
out of the belly of hell, cried I, and thou heardest my voice. For thou hast cast me into the
deep. Or the mariners had cast him
overboard, but he says thou, the LORD God, thou hast cast
me into the deep, in the midst of the seas, and the floods compassed
me about, all thy billows and thy waves passed over me. Then
I said, I am cast out of thy sight, yet I will look again
toward thy holy temple." What a remarkable example it is that
we have there, that now the Lord God deals with a man to bring
him to pray, the end of himself. And so too here with Jeremiah,
From whence does he call unto the Lord? I call upon thy name,
O Lord, out of the low dungeon. And observe all the weakness
that is here in this prophet, how weak he is. How does he pray? Well, he says in verse 56, Thou
hast heard my voice. Hide not thine ear at my breathing,
at my cry. All he wants God to hear is breathing,
is sighings, is cries. Why the man is all weakness. And that's a weakness that he's
very much feeling. He cannot really articulate his
prayers, words fail him. He comes with his mere breathings
to God, and he sighs out his prayer. Was he not the same also
again with that King Hezekiah? Like a crane or a swallow, he
says, so did I chatter. I did mourn as a dove, mine eyes
fail with looking upward. O Lord, I am oppressed. Undertake
for me. Oh, the Lord, you see, has a
purpose to fulfill. He will bring His people to that
place where they'll feel what they are. They'll feel all their
weakness. They'll have to despair utterly
of themselves. And they'll have to come merely
with their groanings. Again, we see it in David, don't
we? Psalm 38. Lord, all my desire is before
Thee and my groaning. All my groaning is not hid from
thee." Do we know anything of these things? Why are these things
written? It's not just a matter of the history of Jeremiah that
we have here in his prophecy or in the Lamentations. All these
things are written for us, for our learning. That we, through
patience and comfort of the Scriptures, literally endurance, that we
through endurance and comfort of the scriptures might have
hope what a blessed book when we come to understand the spiritual
significance of those things that are recorded they all happened
unto them for examples and they are written for our admonition
oh do we not learn then from these men what it is to really
be brought to that place of prayers And that prayer that is really
true worship. Though to speak thou be not able,
always pray, and never faint. Prayer's a weapon for the feeble. Weakest souls can wield it best. Do we feel our weakness as Jeremiah
was brought to feel his weakness? how he saw himself there as one
so sorely persecuted how they despised him and rejected him
and he goes on to speak of those things verse 60 they were seeing all
their vengeance and all their imaginations against him they
were to have their reproach oh Lord and all their imaginations
against him the lips of those that rose up against me, their
device against me all the day how he pours out his soul then
onto God in the midst of all his trials, all his troubles
and how is it that he can do this because he knows that gracious
ministry of the Holy Spirit God sees that his people need not
only one to be interceding in heaven or the blessed ministry
of the Lord Jesus Christ and we'll come to that just now that
blessed ministry as the Lord pledged the cause of his people
but God sees that his people also need one to dwell with them
here upon the earth and to come and minister to them in their
own hearts that blessed ministry of the Holy Spirit those words
that we have recorded there in Romans 8 likewise the Spirit
also helpeth our infirmities, and maketh intercession for us
with groanings that cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth
the hearts, we're told, knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit,
because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the
will of God. Oh, thank God there's that ministry
of God, God the Holy Ghost, One that comes into the hearts of
His people and helps them in the midst of all their weakness
and all their infirmities. But what do we see here? Well,
there's a contrast between the weakness of man, the weakness
of Jeremiah and the power of God and the power of the Word
of God. He says in verse 57, Thou drew
us near in the day that I called upon thee, thou says, fear not."
Oh there's the comfort you see, it's what God says. I like, I
do like the remark of dear Martin Luther when he reminds us it
is the word and promise of God and not our devotions that make
our prayers good. It's not our devotion, it's not
our piety that makes our prayer good. What is it that makes our
prayer good? It's God and God's word and God's
promise. And so I want to turn in the
second place to God's power in deliverance. Well, we've seen
Jeremiah in the dungeons, but there's also deliverance from
the dungeon here. And three things that we have
to observe with regards to this deliverance firstly there is
the promise of God there's the word of God as I
just noted in verse 57 thou drewest near in the day that I called
upon thee or before they call I will answer whilst thou yet
speaking I will hear in the very day in which he called upon the Lord,
the Lord answered and the Lord said, fear not. And observe here, it's his very
presence that dissipates all that fear. It's because God didn't
just speak, but God drew near. God came personally. and appears
to him and speaks to him and speaks this remarkable word of
promise all these fear not's so many fear not's here in the
word of God we've observed in times past the many fear not's
that we find scattered throughout the prophecy of Isaiah think
of the words that we have there in chapter 41 of the book Isaiah
41 10 fear thou not for I am with thee be not dismayed for
I am thy God I will strengthen thee yea I will help thee yea
I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness and
I love that opening fear not because it's so emphatic isn't
it it doesn't just say fear not it's so personal there's a singular
pronoun put in there fear thou not Well, it comes to the individual,
you see. That's the significance of the
singular pronoun. Fear thou not, says God. Again,
verse 14, Fear not, thou worm, Jacob. Land ye men of Israel,
I will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One
of Israel. Verse 13, I, the Lord thy God, will hold
thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not, I will help thee. But those words at verse 14 really,
who is it addressed to? Worm Jacob. Oh, it's addressed to Israel,
but we're reminded of what Israel
was before he was Israel. he was Jacob the supplanter and
he's worm Jacob fear not thou worm Jacob and
ye men the margin says ye few men oh Jacob so small so insignificant
now God comes with all his gracious words of promise and when we
come to the New Testament the words of the Lord Jesus said
in Luke 12, fear not little flock all ye few men of Israel fear
not little flock it is your father's good pleasure to give you the
kingdom says the Lord Christ here is God's promise you see
we know that it was only a little remnant that were going to be
preserved in Babylon What an awful time of sifting that Babylonian
captivity was. It was just a remnant. Isaiah
was very much reminded of that when he received his call there
in chapter 6 of the book of Isaiah. This chapter, of course, tells
us of how he saw the glory of the Lord in the temple and received
his call, his commission. Whom shall I send? Who will go
for me? And he says, here am I, send
me. Verse 11, they said, I, Lord,
how long? And he answered, until the cities
be wasted without habitation. and the houses without man and
the land be utterly desolate. It's that situation that Jeremiah
is really lamenting over that is being spoken of there some
hundred years previously by the prophet Isaiah. until the cities
be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and
the land be utterly desolate. And the Lord hath removed men
afar off, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the
land. But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return. A tenth, just one in ten. Oh, it's a remnant that the Lord's
going to preserve. I will also live in the midst
of the unafflicted and poor people and they shall trust in the name
of the Lord. Oh, no wonder they're fearful.
How they feel their smallness and their weakness. How they
need those many fear nots. And that's the promise of God.
That's the promise of God, and that's what we have here in our
text this morning. Thou drewest near in the day
that I called upon thee. Thou saidst, Fear not. In that day it shall be said
to Jerusalem, Fear thou not. That's the language of Zephaniah.
In Zephaniah 3.16, how these prophets are repeatedly set before
the people the promises of God. and these many fear not or the
Lord will deliver his people do we believe that? the Lord
is able to deliver us out of all our troubles, all our trials
but there's not only the promise of God there's something else
here, there's the intercession of the Lord Jesus Christ in verse
58 O Lords, thou hast pleaded the causes of my soul. Wasn't that Jeremiah pride? There was one also pleading his
cause. That's a lovely hymn, isn't it,
that we sang just now, one of William Cooper's hymns. William
Cooper was a great poet. and besides his poetry he wrote many
hymns of course the only hymns together with John Newton but I do like what he says at
the end of that 967th hymn that were a grief I could not bear
did thou not hear and answer prayer but a prayer hearing answering
God supports me under every load poor though I am, despised, forgot,
yet God my God forgets me not, and he is safe, and must succeed,
for whom the Lord vouchsafes to plead." Or the Lord pleads
for His people. And isn't that what we see here?
It's the intercession of the Lord Jesus Christ that we have
at the beginning of verse 58. And Jeremiah says much the same
in the course of his prophecy. There in chapter 50 verse 34,
their Redeemer is strong. The Lord of hosts is his name.
He shall truly plead their cause. All the strength of the Lord,
you see, the power of the Lord to deliver His people, their
Redeemer is strong. And this is the one who will
thoroughly or thoroughly plead their cause. Who is this Redeemer? It's the Lord Jesus. That one who has vanquished sin
and Satan, that one who has triumphed over death and the grave, that
one who has risen and ascended on high, And He is able, able
to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him, we're
told in the Hebrews. He's able to save them. He pleads
for them. He ever lives. His very presence
there before God is a constant prayer on their behalf. He ever
lives to make intercession for all that come unto God by Him. He is that One who is the Great
High Priest, the Great Advocate. If any man sin, John says, we
have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the Righteous.
And He is the propitiation for our sins. Well, look at what the beloved John is saying there
in the opening verses of that second chapter of his first epistle. He speaks of an advocate, the
righteous, the propitiation, and that's telling us something
very much with regards to the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ. What does he do as an advocate? He pleads, and he pleads his
own work he pleads his righteousness and his propitiation he pleads his active obedience
that righteous life that he lived and he pleads his passive obedience
that death that he died when he made the great propitiatory
sacrifice or he pleads at life of obedience to all the commandments
of God and it's at righteousness of course that he is imputed
to his people he is the Lord our righteousness or they are clothed with those
garments of salvation that robe of righteousness But not only that, He is also
the propitiation. His sacrificial death, He is
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. And you see, there's a sense
in which here we're really reminded of Christ's two-fold priestly
office. He has entered heaven now to
appear in the presence of God for us. and advocate Jesus Christ
the righteous the propitiation for our sins but previously,
previously before he ascended into heaven as the God-man he
was upon the earth and he had a work to accomplish and now he is determined to do
all that work that the Father has committed to him even to
the death of the cross, that great sinner-turning sacrifice. And so what do we have here?
Not only the intercession of Christ, but we have that great
provision of redemption. Verse 58, O Lord, thou hast pleaded
the cause of my soul. Thou hast redeemed my life, He
says. He has paid the ransom price,
the price of redemption. And to whom has he paid that
price? He's paid that ransom to the
Holy Lord of Gods. Let us be clear. Some people
seem to get so confused. They think that Christ paid a ransom to the devil.
The devil's a usurper. He has no rights at all. He's
a rebel against God. But Christ came to redeem his
people from all that curse that would come upon them as the transgressors
of God's holy law. For the soul that sinneth it
shall die, the wages of sin is death, he must die. That death
that was there just desert. He must satisfy all the demands
of God's holy law, not only in the obedience of his life, but
also in that great oblation, that sacrifice that he makes.
And here is Jeremiah's comfort. Thou hast redeemed my life. Or the Son of Man came to give
His life. A ransom for men. And so God's Word, God's promise
is now all sealed. That promise of the covenant
is sealed with the blood of Him who is the testator and the mediator,
sealed with the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so, will not God hear the prayers of those who come to plead the
Lord Jesus? I called upon Thy name, O Lord,
out of the low dungeon, or whatever that dungeon may be to us today, Thou drew us near in the day
that I called upon Thee." What a call it was! My breathing, my cry, that's
all it was. Words failing us sometimes. We
cannot adequately express ourselves. We can only sigh out our prayers
with our breathings and make a humble cry to the Lord, but
the Lord does hear His people, I called upon Thy name O LORD
out of the low dungeon Thou hast heard my voice, hide not Thine
ear at my breathing, at my cry Thou drewest near in the day
that I called upon Thee Thou saidst, fear not O LORD Thou
hast pleaded the causes of my soul Thou hast redeemed my life
Oh God, grant that we might know then something of the deliverance
that the Prophet is speaking of. Deliverance out of the dungeon. What does the Psalmist say? I
close with the opening words there in Psalm 40. He inclined
unto me and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of
an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a
rock. and established my goings. Oh, the Lord grant then that
we might be those who know those blessed deliverances of His grace. Amen. Let us now conclude the
worship this morning as we sing the hymn 1104. The tune is Montgomery
375. Convinced as a sinner, to Jesus
I come. informed by the gospel, for such
there is room, or whelmed with sorrow, for sin will I cry, lead
me to the rock that is higher than I. The Hymn 1104, the tune
375. to Jesus my God. If all my good lusts and poor
thoughts vary through, all well-met with sorrow, of sin will I thrive. It leads to the hope that is
higher than I O blessed be Jesus for answering
prayer And raising my soul from the pit of despair In every new
trial When sorely afflicted and ready
to faint Before my Redeemer, I'll spread my complaints The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ
and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you
all. Amen.