Hunted to the End Lamentations 4:18

Jerusalem looked for help from their neighbors when they were overtaken, however there were none to come to their aid. Jeremiah wrote in the book after his name in chapter thirty-seven and verse five:

Then Pharaoh's army was come forth out of Egypt: and when the Chaldeans that besieged Jerusalem heard tidings of them, they departed from Jerusalem.”

And though it appeared that Jerusalem's people might have a refuge in Egypt, they vanished when the Chaldeans came. In chapter four and verse eighteen of Lamentations Jeremiah tells how the people perceived the destruction which came from the Chaldeans. We read:

They hunt our steps, that we cannot go in our streets: our end is near, our days are fulfilled; for our end is come.

The verse begins, “They hunt our steps, that we cannot go in our streets:” The people of Jerusalem felt as though they were being hunted, and like prey fleeing from a predator, they could not enter into the streets. According to Matthew Henry when the Babylonians overtook the city of Jerusalem “raised their batteries so high above the walls that they could command the town and shoot at people as they went along the streets.”

The verse continues, “our end is near, our days are fulfilled; for our end is come.” Their summation of their defeat was: “our end is near” “which means “very close”; “our days are fulfilled” or “come to completion” and the reason was “for our end is come” which infers there is no longer any delay.

When we think about the words contained within this verse, there are at least two things that come to mind: the horror of conditions so bad they could not enter their streets for fear of death, and their understanding that their judgment was pending and then completed. It was as though they knew there was judgment coming upon them, and that which they feared the most was just as they thought it would be. When we have fears of pending judgment for something we have done either purposefully or accidentally, we may have confidence in this: every judgment and penalty we deserve, Jesus paid fully for upon Calvary's cross. As Paul the apostle wrote in the book of Romans in chapter eight and verse one:

There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

Because the people of Jerusalem forsook God, He forsook them, and because Jesus Christ paid the price for our forsaking God, we are accepted by Him. May the Lord continue to remind us when we see the judgment fall for His people that “Jesus paid it all. All to Him I owe.”

Next time we will see how quickly Jerusalem's enemies overcame them, so read ahead, and we shall join together then.

Until tomorrow...there is more...

 

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