Brought into Darkness Lamentations 3:2

Jeremiah began this chapter by saying that he was the man who saw affliction by the rod of God's wrath. In chapter three and verse two we see even more of how Jeremiah felt about his conditions. We read:

He has led me, and brought me into darkness, but not into light.

The verse begins, “He has led me, and brought me into darkness,...” We often hear that we are to be “led” by the LORD, but not in the manner that Jeremiah tells us. We have to keep in mind that he is in distress, and that he has seen troubles all around him. Jeremiah says that God “brought me into darkness” which is “obscurity or a secret place”. He not only knows the affliction by the rod of wrath of the Lord, but also feels led to a dark place.

The verse goes on to say, “...but not into light.” In contrast to being “brought into darkness” Jeremiah uses that disassociation conjunction “but” to tell his readers that he was not led “into light” or the “light of life, light of prosperity or light of instruction”. Whereas he might have thought he should be led into the light by the LORD, we see him with our minds eye in this very dark place.

C.S. Lewis wrote once in reference to one of his characters, “He is not safe, but he is good”. The idea conveyed is that there may be places that do not seem “safe” for us to travel. Sometimes the Lord Jesus will lead us to “darkness” or dark times, however we can be assured that He does not leave us to travel the “darkness” alone. We sometimes mistakenly judge that He has led us into darkness as Jeremiah because we do not know the whole story. We only know a part, and we certainly do not know the end of a thing until we get there. If we are currently in a time of “darkness”, we are best to position ourselves in close proximity to the one who bought us, saved us, redeemed us and knows what it takes to grow us in our faith and trust in Him – Jesus Christ.

Next time we see how Jeremiah thought God turned against him, so read ahead, and we shall join together then.

 

Until tomorrow...there is more...

 

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