Now, if you would, open your
Bibles to Lamentations, chapter 1. Lamentations 1. Now, in the book, you know this very
well, Lamentations, Jeremiah the prophet is lamenting over
the destruction of Israel. But throughout this book, and
particularly in the first chapter that we'll look at this evening,
There's such a clear picture of the sufferings of Christ.
He says in verse 12, this is the title of the message. Is
it nothing to you? Is it nothing to you? All ye
that pass by, is it nothing to you? When we pass by Christ,
see him in the word. What is it to you? That's the
question I want each of us to answer in our own hearts tonight. What is it to you? Is it nothing
to you? What is Christ to you? What is
the suffering of Christ to you, to your heart? I know it's not
much to most people. I don't know how many people
live in the tri-state area. A very small percentage of them
are here tonight. Pretty evident, to most people,
the sufferings of Christ is nothing. But you already knew the answer
to the question, what is the sufferings of Christ to most
people? We know that answer from God's word. The question for
us to answer to our own hearts tonight is, is it nothing to
you? What is it to me? If all we see
is the unjust suffering of a good man, we need to take another
look. If the only thing that we really
see or understand is some doctrinal idea that the Savior is suffering
as a substitute for someone, we better look again. There's
more than that here. We need to pray that God will
give us eyes to see, that he'll make the suffering of Christ
to be everything to us. And that's what I want us to
see in these verses. Now, verse one. How does the city sit solitary
that was full of people? How has she become a widow, she
that was great among the nations and princess among the provinces?
How has she become tributary? How is it that Christ is all
alone? You know, suffering is worse
when you're alone. And we'll see that throughout
the chapter, how many times he mentions that suffering is going
on. alone. Janet tells me it's better if
someone is with you and someone cares when you're suffering.
I found that it's best when she tells me she's sick for me to
say, I'm sorry. And that goes a long way to making
it better to say, I'm sorry. I just really care. And even
if I can't do anything, just sit beside her, you know, I'm
sorry. And it's better. Our Lord had
none of that. No one said, I'm sorry. No one was with him. No one has
ever been so alone. No one really cared, truly, about
the suffering of our Lord as he suffered for sin. Where are
all the people who just a short while ago were throwing their
coats down and palm leaves and shouting, Hosanna! Blessed is
the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord. Where's
the multitude now? They're gone. They've disappeared
and our Lord's alone. Where are the disciples who'd
been with him for three years, who seemed to hang on his every
word for three years? Where's Peter, who swore these
fellows might forsake you, but not me. I'll die for you. Where are you, Peter? Gone. With the rest of them, they're
gone. And our Lord is suffering alone. And the worst that makes
this suffering the worst. Where is the father? Christ very
boldly told those Pharisees, I and my father are one. How
come he's alone? Where's the father now? The father's
deserted him. Can you imagine the suffering
that it caused the son of God to be separated from the father?
Is it nothing to you is suffering? Verse two, he goes on and says,
she weepeth sore in the night and her tears are on her cheeks.
Among all her lovers, she had none to comfort her. All of her
friends have dealt treacherously with her. They are become her
enemies. Now, we know how the Lord wept in anguish, he sweat
drops of blood in the garden just at the thought of being
made sin, just at the thought of the suffering that he knew
awaited him, how he wept just in anguish. And after that, one
of his disciples, a close friend, betrayed him for a few pieces
of silver. All the rest of his friends deserted
him and fled in fear. You know that, humanly speaking,
that had to make his suffering worse, to be deserted like that
and suffer alone. Verse 3 says, Judah has gone
into captivity because of affliction and because of great servitude.
She dwelleth among the heathen. she findeth no rest. All her
persecutors overtook her between the straits." Now, all of us,
we're born servants of sin. We're born into captivity to
sin. And the Lord Jesus Christ took
our place. As our substitute, He took our
place. He allowed the persecutors to
take Him. He allowed them to bind Him and
lead Him away. He allowed himself to be put
into captivity because the sin of his people had been imputed
to him. He allowed himself to be put
into captivity when he willingly became guilty of our sins, the
sins of his people. And when he allowed himself to
become captive to them, what did they do to him? They persecuted
him. They're the persecutors. They
plucked out his beard. They lacerated his back. Pilate
said, I want nothing to do with this man. I'll wash my hands
of him. But before he turned them over to him, remember what
he read over there, Mark? He beat him. He had him scourged.
Wasn't quite done with him just yet, was he? They lacerated his
back. They put a crown of thorns on
his head. Then they nailed his hands and his feet to a piece
of wood and hung him up there and mocked him and jeered him
in his agony. They persecuted him. They abused
his body so much that he didn't even look like a man. He looked
like a piece of bloody meat from the slaughter, hanging there
between heaven and earth. Behold, is there any sorrow like
his sorrow? He dwelt among the heathen, because
we dwell among the heathen. We are the heathen. And he was
put to death as a heathen, hung between two thieves. As a heathen,
he suffered crucifixion. Crucifixion was the death that
they reserved for the worst criminals, just the worst heathens. And
that's what he was when he was made sin for his people. He's
suffering all of this as a substitute for his people, bearing the punishment
that his people deserve. Can that be nothing to us? Verse
4, the ways of Zion do mourn because none come to the solemn
feast. All her gates are desolate. Her priests sigh. Her virgins
are afflicted, and she is in bitterness. Her adversaries are
the chief. Her enemies prosper. For the
Lord hath afflicted her, for the multitude of her transgressions.
Her children are gone into captivity before the enemy." Now, to the
natural man, it looked like Christ was defeated as he hung there
on the cross. He looked desolate and defeated.
It looked like his enemies were captive. Or his enemies were
prospering. They were holding him captive,
taking his life. Looked like they were the ones
that were prospering. And his enemies were the chief, the chief
priests, the men who were supposed to be the religious leaders,
to recognize him. But they didn't recognize him.
They didn't worship him. They crucified him, put him to
death. And we can never minimize the
physical suffering that those chief priests and Roman soldiers
inflicted on our Lord. But here in verse 5, we get a
hint of the real suffering of Christ. He says here, for the
Lord hath afflicted her, for the multitude of her transgressions.
The real suffering of Christ was inflicted by the Father. Men didn't take His life. Men
didn't cause Him to suffer. The Father did. Now we know,
beyond a shadow of a doubt, God's sovereign. So since God's sovereign,
this event did not take place against the Father's will. This
was the Father's will. The Father presided over the
death of his son. Cecil read it in a study. It
pleased the Lord to bruise him. His bruising, his crushing, was
done by the Father. Well, why? This is the question. Why did the Father do this to
His only begotten Son? Well, it says here, for the multitude
of her transgressions. Well, now wait a minute. This
is the sinless Savior. He's holy. He's perfect. He's
undefiled. That's true, He is. He did no
sin. He wasn't even acquainted with
any sin. There's no guile found in His mouth. But the Father
made Him to be what He was not. made him to be seen. The father
made him guilty of the multitude of sin, the multitude of sin
from the multitude of God's elect and the holy father. Killed him
for it, for those sins put to death by his own father. What suffering? Is it nothing
to you? Well, verse six, he goes on,
he says, from the daughter of Zion, all her beauty is departed. Her princes are become like hearts
to find no pasture, and they are gone without strength before
the pursuer." Now, these persecutors that took our Lord, they stripped
him naked. They tortured him, and they hung
him naked on a cross to die. He's suffering there, stripped
naked in front of that wicked crowd that gathered just for
sport as they were on their way to observe the Passover at Jerusalem.
But worse than that, our Lord stripped himself. He stripped
himself of his glory. He stripped himself of all of
his beauty and suffered under the wrath of God, naked before
his father, spiritually naked as a sinner, stripped of his
beauty, stripped of his righteousness because he had become a sacrifice
for sin that God poured out his fury on. How can that be nothing to us?
Verse 7, he says, 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 adversary saw her and did
mock at her Sabbaths. Now this one who's hanging on
Calvary's tree is the Prince of Glory, the one who in eternity
past was daily the delight of his Father. Now he's come all
the way down, given up his glory for a time, and is dying as a
sinner condemned under the curse of the law. And as he hung there,
you had to wonder if he didn't think back to those days of old,
when he was daily the delight of his father and a stark contrast
to where he is now. That would make his suffering
worse, no doubt. And he gave himself into the hand of the
enemy. He gave himself to them. And
we see how men will treat the son of God if God will give his
son into their hands. They treated him more cruelly
than a man's ever been treated. And in the midst of all that
cruelty, no one ever one time offered to help. No one ever
one time said, that's enough. That's enough. You remember the
movie Braveheart when they were torturing William Wallace and
people were crying out, mercy, mercy. Just end it quickly. That's what they wanted him to
do. Just kill him quickly. No one ever said put an end to his
suffering and kill him quickly. He died without mercy. Instead,
they mocked him. They said, if you're the Christ,
come down, save yourself and we'll believe you. He saved others. Himself he cannot save. Some
Christ he is. Look over in chapter 2, your
Lamentations, verse 15. They mocked him and his suffering.
All that passed by clapped their hands at thee. They hissed and
wagged their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, Is this
the city that men call the perfection of beauty? Is this the city men
call the joy of the whole earth? Could this be the Messiah? No,
it couldn't be. How they mocked him. Even those
thieves who were suffering the same condemnation he did. Even
the thieves made fun of him. I mean, how low do you got to
be where the worst criminals are even mocking you and making
fun of you? His suffering is just, we can't
imagine the depths of it. We just get, even in all these
verses that we read, we just get a hint of the depth of his
suffering for his people. Well, verse eight, he says, Jerusalem
hath grievously sinned. Therefore, she is removed. All
that honored her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness.
Yea, she sieth and turneth backward." Now here's the reason that all
of this is happening. It's sin. Sin is what's causing
all this suffering. Sin is what's causing any suffering
that's ever happened on the face of the earth. And particularly
in these moments, sin is what's causing this suffering. The Lord
Jesus Christ became guilty of grievous sin. Just as guilty
as he would have been if he had committed all that grievous sin. See, because that's what we do.
We haven't just sinned. We don't just, you know, sin
a little bit. It's grievous sin, just a river of sin, river of
constant sin, just sin in our sleep. Because that's what we
are. It's what we think. It's what we breathe. It's what
we eat. It's sin. It's grievous sin. And Christ
took the guilt of his people. He called that sin his grievous
sin. The Father treated him as the
one who had committed all that grievous sin. Now, you notice
I didn't say the Father treated him as if he had committed all
that sin. This is not an as if deal. The
father treated him as the one who committed all this previous
sin and the father killed him for it. Therefore, because he
was made sin, he was removed. The father looked down and saw
his son as a mass of sin. And the father turned his back
on him. Now over the time of our Lord's
earthly ministry, many times the Father had honored Him as
the Son. He spoke from heaven and said,
this is my beloved Son and who I'm well pleased. You hear Him. But now the Father is silent. The Father turns His back and
separates Himself from His Son. And men who had honored Him as
a prophet turn their back on Him in His humiliation. They've
seen His nakedness, both God and man. turn their back on him,
and he suffers alone. Verse 9, her filthiness is in
her skirts. She remembereth not her last
end. Therefore, she came down wonderfully. She had no comforter. O Lord, behold my affliction,
for the enemy hath magnified himself. What Jeremiah is talking
about here is a woman in her menstrual cycle. And the Old
Testament law declared a woman in her menstrual cycle to be
unclean. And Christ Jesus, our Lord, is declaring himself to
have been made unclean. Unclean. He suffered outside
the camp because he was unclean with sin. But while he's doing
this, he's doing something utterly wonderful. He's accomplishing
the salvation of his people. And the salvation of a sinner
is so wonderful. That it can only be accomplished
by someone whose name is wonderful. And this one whose name is wonderful
has become unclean. He's been made unclean by the
Father in order to accomplish our salvation. And he was punished
for it. Punished by both God and men. Now verse 10. The adversary has
spread out his hand upon all her pleasant things. For she
hath seen that the heathen entered into the sanctuary, whom thou
didst command that they should not enter into thy congregation.
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." Now, the adversary spread
out their hands against Christ, and they did it under the guise
of religion. They cried, Crucify Him! But then they wouldn't go
in the room where they were beating him. They wouldn't go into the
room where he's being judged. They didn't want to get too close
to the cross or they'd be defiled. And they couldn't go down here
to the temple and observe the Passover. Their religious ceremony
was more important to them than the Messiah who'd come and was
being crucified. And the Savior says, guilty. The Savior says this is an act
of justice because I am become vile. He says, I am become vile. How can that be? I do not know, and I don't know
any man who does know. And the only reason we know that
the Savior became vile is because he says so. I don't know how
he could become vile, but I know this. I'm vile. I know that. I am vile. And if Christ is going to save
me, if he's going to make me as righteous as he is, then he
must become what I am. He must become vile and he must
pay the penalty for it. And that's exactly what he did
for his people. He willingly made himself vile
in order to pay the penalty for our sins. Is it nothing to you? Well, verse 12, he says, Is it
nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Behold, and see if there
be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, wherewith
the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.
All this sorrow is happening in justice. God in justice is
punishing his Son. God is the one presiding over
the cross, and he's afflicting his Son because God is holy. God hates sin and the father
is not playing games here. This punishment is real. It's
not just something we read about in a book. This happened. His
punishment and suffering was real. The father is not pretending
the son's guilty. He made the son guilty and he
poured out his fierce anger against sin on his own son. The father
poured out his fierce anger because sin is found in his son. Now, if God's doing something
so extreme, he must be accomplishing a great purpose. He has to be,
doesn't he? And he is. In order for the son
to suffer so much under the hand of the father, the only reason
the father would do that is if he's accomplishing some great
purpose. And that's what he's doing. Accomplishing the great
purpose of redemption. That cannot be nothing to those
people for whom Christ died. It can't be. Verse 13, he says,
From above hath he sent fire into my bones, and it prevailed
against them. He hath spread a net for my feet.
He hath turned me back. He hath made me desolate and
faint all the day. Now, we know no bone of our Lord
was broken. That was a picture of the Passover
lamb. They didn't break any bones of that Passover lamb. Now, at
the crucifixion, the soldiers broke the legs of those thieves
so they'd hurry up and die so they could get on with it, so
they could get on with their religious ceremony. But there was no need
for them to break the legs of the Savior. He had already accomplished
the eternal purpose of God and given up the ghost. But before
he did that, he suffered hell. He suffered hell. The Father
sent the very fire of hell into his bones and it consumed him. It killed him. Is that nothing
to us? Verse 14 says, the yoke of my
transgressions is bound by his hand. They are reeds and come
up upon my neck. He hath made my strength to fall.
The Lord hath delivered me into their hands from whom I am not
able to rise up. That great heavy yoke of our
sin, the Father took it and He put it on the back of our substitute. The weight of it pulled our Savior
down to death. Think what it would have done
to you and me. Eternally it would have crushed
us. But because He took that yoke of sin on Himself, we take
His yoke upon us. His yoke is easy. His burden
is light. And we have that easy yoke, that
light burden, because Christ took our yoke of sin that we
could never bear. Well, verse 15 says, The Lord
hath trodden underfoot all my mighty men in the midst of me.
He hath called an assembly against me to crush my young men. The
Lord hath trodden the virgin, the daughter of Judah, as in
a winepress. The Father utterly crushed his
son underfoot. in the wine press. This is the
mighty God dying. The mighty men of Jerusalem,
they are nothing. These mighty men of Jerusalem
who must have somehow tried to stop these invaders from coming
into Jerusalem. They were destroyed. That's just
a picture of the mighty God dying. Who can ever understand that?
A multitude gathered against the Lord and against His Christ.
A multitude did. But it was the Father who crushed
him. Look over in chapter 2 again,
verse 17. The Lord hath done that which
he had devised. He hath fulfilled his word that
he had commanded in the days of old. This was his eternal
purpose. He hath thrown down and hath
not pitied, and he hath caused thine enemy to rejoice over thee.
He hath set up the horn of thine adversaries. This was the purpose
and will and doing of the father when he crushed his son. 16 For these things I weep, mine
eye runneth down with water, because the comforter that should
relieve my soul is far from me. 17 My children are desolate,
because the enemy prevailed. Zion spreadeth forth her hands,
and there is none to comfort her. 18 The Lord hath commanded
concerning Jacob that his adversary should be round about him. Jerusalem
is as a minstrel's woman among them." Now, this sorrow was real. It made our Lord cry real tears. And the Comforter, the Holy Spirit,
deserted him, just like the Father deserted him. God's holy. The Holy Spirit, by the name,
is holy. He cannot comfort. God's son,
when he's made sin. Now, with someone's mourning,
when the loss of a loved one or something, what we do is we
bring them food. It's our custom. Well, that was
their custom in Jeremiah's day, too. And they'd go a little further
than that. They'd bring food. They'd sit
down next to the one who's mourning and actually break bread and
give them little pieces of it to chew, just to make it as easy
as possible for them to try to comfort them. Well, no one brought
any comfort of any kind to our Savior. He suffered without mercy. Because he likens himself to
a minstress woman who we saw a minute ago has been made unclean.
And because Christ made himself unclean, we see that the Father
was right to punish him. The Father was right to put him
to death. The cross, if it's not anything
else, the cross is an act of divine justice. See verse 18,
the Lord is righteous for I have rebelled against his commandment.
Here I pray you all people and behold my sorrow. My virgins
and my young men are gone into captivity. Now the father is
righteous. He's holy. Now we think that
God's holy. The thing that immediately comes
to mind is, well, then God must punish sin because he's holy.
But this is true also. Because God is holy, He cannot
punish the righteous. If God punished the righteous,
that would be unholy. Well, what's God doing punishing
His Son? He's punishing His Son because
Christ was actually made sin. The sin of God's elect became
His sin. Now, that's a mysterious transaction.
I don't understand it. I don't know how it happened.
I don't know the depth of it all. But I know it's so. Now,
the Lord Jesus never sinned and thought, word, or deed He never
committed to sin. Yet He calls our sin His sin. He never disobeyed His Father
in any point. He never disobeyed the law in
any point. He knows the law better than
anybody. It's His law. He spoke it. He never rebelled
against God's law. Yet He says, I have rebelled
against his commandment. He doesn't say I'm hanging here
because my people rebelled against his commandment, does he? I have rebelled against his commandment. That's why he suffered. That's
why the holy God punished him and put him to death. Now I can't
explain that transaction. Christ being made sin. But I
know That's my only hope of redemption. That Christ was made sin for
me. That he suffered the hell that
I deserve. That he died the death that I've
earned. The wages of sin is death. That
he took my sin and his own body on the tree and put it away through
his awful, bloody sacrifice and freely gave me his righteousness. That's my only hope. The only
way the righteousness of Christ can ever be mine, and if I'm
going to appear in glory, I must be as righteous as God's Son.
The only way the righteousness of Christ can in reality be mine
is if my sin was actually made his. Now, like I say, I can't
explain that transaction, but I know that so. My sin became
his. And his righteousness became
mine. He was made what I am so that
I can be what he is. Now, verse 19, he says, I called
for my lovers, but they deceived me. My priest and my elders gave
up the ghost in the city while they sought their meat to relieve
their souls. None of the Lord's friends would help him, did they?
They all deserved him and fled. One of them betrayed him. The
chief priests and the elders are supposed to be the religious
leaders to point people to Christ. They're the very ones that organized
all these shenanigans. Yet the Lord had been so gracious
to that nation, to that people. He gave them his word. He gave
them his law. He sent them the prophets. Every
prophet God ever had, he sent to these people. He gave them
the tabernacle, the sacrifices and the priesthood. Yet the first
chance they got, they killed the Lord of Glory. And they did
it for their belly, seeking meat for their belly, advancing their
own religious, political ambitions. Religion wasn't worship to them,
it was a political ambition to gain a hierarchy. They did it
for their belly, for meat. Now verse 20, he says, 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
sore bereaveth, at home there is his death. Now this great
sorrow, caused turmoil in the heart and soul of our Savior. And that's turmoil that sinners
like us can't understand. We cannot imagine the distress
that it caused the Holy God to be made sin. We just we can't
imagine that. That suffering a sinner like
you and me can never understand because that's all we've ever
known. We've never known holiness. He never knew sin. Yet he was
made to be sin. How that caused him to suffer
is beyond our ability to understand. And then nails pierced his hands
and his feet. A spear pierced his side. But
the greatest suffering was caused from home when the Father pierced
him. Pierced him with the sword of
justice and brought him to death. In verse 21, they have heard
that I sigh. There is none to comfort me.
All mine enemies have heard of my trouble. They are glad that
thou hast done it. Thou wilt bring the day that
thou hast called, and they shall be like unto me." Now, the enemies
of the Lord are glad all this is happening to the Lord Jesus.
They rejoice to hear his sighs and moans of pain. Now, they
don't realize it yet, but what they're glad for is not what
they've done. They're glad for what thou hast
done. what God has done. This never would have happened
if this wasn't the will of the Father. This suffering is what
God has done to accomplish his will in redeeming his elect.
And those religious fanatics, they did accomplish the will
of the Father when they crucified Christ. Now, they accomplished
God's eternal will, but they're still going to face a day of
reckoning for it. What did our Lord say? It must needs be that
offenses come. But woe to that man by whom the
offense cometh. There's going to be a day of
reckoning for this. There's a day coming when they are going to
suffer eternally for their sins, just like the Lord suffered in
eternity of hell for his elect. See verse 22, he says, let all
their wickedness come before thee and do unto them as thou
has done unto me for all my transgressions. For my size are many and my heart
is faint. Now God's going to eternally
punish the wickedness of every son of Adam that's ever lived.
Eternally, he will punish every sin of every man. Either we will
be punished eternally, or Christ our substitute was punished eternally
in a few hours. That's something only God can
do. He was punished eternally in just a few hours. And he was
punished eternally for what he says are my transgressions. See, again, this was something
that was done in justice. Now, back to where we started. What is the suffering of Christ
to you? Is it nothing to you, all you
that pass by? Every time we preach, we pass
by the cross. We pass by our Lord to get a
vision of the Lord. If we preach to write, that's
what we've done. Is it nothing to you? I thought today. How many times
have I been at work on Wednesday and just rushed home, got something
to eat, rushed over here because that's what I do on Wednesday
nights. Is it nothing to you, to me? When we hear the gospel, does
it grip our hearts so that we're affected Does it break your heart
and at the same time lift you up and give you cause for rejoicing?
I know this. I could talk until I'm blue in
the face, I'm not, I want to be careful, I'm not trying to
make somebody feel sorry for the Lord here. Now, that's that's
that is not my intention. I hope it didn't come across
that way, because no matter how long I talk. I'm not going to
be able to make the sufferings of Christ mean anything to your
soul. The suffering of Christ will
be nothing to you until you see Christ suffering for your sins. If he's suffering for your sake,
in your room, in your stead, that will mean everything to
you because he will mean everything to you. And I pray the Lord will
make it so. All right, Mike.