What to Remember When You Hit Bottom, Part 3

Just a few months ago, Chuck Swindoll delivered a brand-new series of messages to the congregation where he serves as Senior Pastor. Responding to the obvious concerns consuming our culture today, Chuck decided to preach from a passage in the Old Testament that bears a striking resemblance to our times.

And we're pleased to present this study to you now. Today on Insight for Living, we invite you to follow along in Lamentations 3. Chuck refers to Lamentations as Jeremiah's Journal of Woes.

He titled today's message, What to Remember When You Hit Bottom. Isn't it interesting God preserved Lamentations for all of us to read so many years later, as many of our cities are going through terrible times? We turn to Lamentations and we realize that there's a limit. There's a limit to God's patience and there's a limit to His grace.

And you go, what's next? Jeremiah gives us the words, I am one who's seen afflictions. Chapter 3, verse 1. I've seen afflictions that come from the rod of the Lord's anger. He has led me into darkness, shutting out all light. He has turned His hand against me again and again all day long. He has made my skin and flesh grow old. He has broken my bones. He has besieged me and surrounded me with anguish and distress, buried me in a dark place like those long dead.

This man is at the bottom, finally reached the bottom. You've been there. I've been there. When all of this begins to happen, you move into a realm of hopelessness.

It's a dangerous place to be. Jeremiah offers a far better option than self-pity, I'm pleased to say. When you hit bottom, you remember something important. If you're going to pull out of the self-pity, Jeremiah is our model. He does that very thing. Look, if you will, beginning at verse 19.

The thought of my suffering and homelessness is bitter beyond words. So he's at the bottom, admittedly. He has no place to look but up.

And look at what he does. He looks up. I will never forget this awful time as I grieve over my loss, yet I still dare to hope. Love those words in verse 21. I still dare to hope. And at the bottom, I've come to the pit of my life. Devastation is all around me.

I dare to hope. When? When I remember this.

Here it is. Right from the inspired Word of God. Look for yourself. Verse 22, I remember the Lord's loving kindness never ends. His loyal love never ends.

Never. Second, I remember His mercies, plural, always more mercies than misery. His mercies never cease.

I remember that. In the pit, at the bottom, I remember, Lord, your loving kindness never ceases. Your mercies never end. Your faithfulness never diminishes. It's always great. I remember that. Such thoughts, please observe, are provided for us every morning.

I love it. Verse 23, His mercies begin afresh each morning. Think of it as each sunrise. Even when you can't see the sun behind the clouds, that sun is there.

It's coming up. Every morning. Every morning. Every single morning, His loyal love is fresh. His mercies, which is His ministry to us in our misery, never cease, and His greatness never diminishes. Thank you, Lord, for the sunrise.

Thank you for the reminder. I don't care what the news said last night. I don't care how bleak it may seem. In the outlook, I'm taking the up look, and when I look up, I see loyal love, divine mercies, and phenomenal, undiminished greatness all pouring forth from the Lord.

He never takes a hike. He never goes away. In the message, we read, I remember it all.

Oh, how well I remember the feeling of hitting the bottom. But there's one other thing I remember, and remembering, I keep a grip on hope. God's loyal love couldn't have run out. His merciful love couldn't have dried up.

They're created new every morning. How great Your faithfulness. And then He concludes, I'm sticking with God. I say it over and over. He's all I've got left.

He's all I've got left. And so verse 24, I say to myself, look at this, in place of self-pity, as a result of the sunrise and the things I'm remembering coming to mind, I say to myself, the Lord is my inheritance. He is the one full of mercy, full of love, full of greatness.

That's the sunrise every morning. My loving kindness is yours. My mercies are yours. My faithfulness, yours to claim. My inheritance is yours. My deliverance is yours. My compassion is yours.

It's all yours. But the world will never remind you of that. It'll only tell you what's going wrong and how bad things are. Not with the Lord. He doesn't live his life and his existence in the realm of bad news. He's sovereign over all, in all through all and beyond all. You know, when you latch onto that, when you pray. When you pray.

I encourage you, drop to your knees, pour out your heart, flush out all the worry, all the fears, get rid of that. Let me show you verse 55, and then I want to tell you a true story. Verse 55, you heard me when I—no, he says, I called on your name, O Lord, from deep within the pit.

There it is. I called on your name. You heard me when I cried. Listen to my pleading. Hear my cry for help.

Yes, you came when I called. You told me, do not fear. There it is again, do not fear. For long enough have we been focusing only on a virus. For long enough have we been focusing only on news of chaos and destruction and devastation.

Long enough have we watched the squabbling between various parties of people and spent our lives talking about that. No wonder our hope is worn thin. None of that is coming from the Lord.

All of that is horizontal. So change the perspective. Take time to read very slowly and very carefully these verses I just read. In fact, look at verse 28. Let them sit alone in silence beneath the Lord's demands. Let them lie face down in the dust, for there may be hope at last. Lord, I don't want to fake this. I want it to be real, and I want it to come on my knees. I'm going to count on you to do it. Start within my mind, and may it pass from my lips to others so that I can be a source of encouragement even in a dark time like this. Now the story.

Please listen carefully. The marathon is one of the most strenuous athletic events in sport. The Boston Marathon attracts the best runners in the world. In the spring of 1980, Rosie Ruiz was the first woman to cross the finish line at the Boston Marathon. She had the laurel wreath placed on her head in a blaze of lights and cheering. She was completely unknown to the world of running.

An incredible feat. Her first race of victory in the prestigious Boston Marathon. Then someone stepped back and noticed her legs. They were legs that had loose flesh. Cellulite.

Not the legs of a runner. Questions began to be asked. No one in the race had seen her along the 26.2 mile run. The truth finally came out. She had jumped into the race during the last mile.

There was immediate and widespread interest in Rosie. Why did she do that? When it was certain that she would be found out. Athletic performance cannot be faked. But she never admitted her fraud.

Stay with me here. One interviewer concluded that she really believed that she had run the complete Boston Marathon and won. She was analyzed as a sociopath. She lied convincingly and naturally with no sense of conscience. She appeared bright, normal, and intelligent. But there was no moral sense to give coherence to her social actions. Camping on that story, Eugene Peterson in his book, Run with the Horses, applies it with great insight. Don't miss this.

Now I quote. In reading about Rosie, I thought about all the people I know who want to get in on the finish, but who cleverly arrange not to run the race. They appear in church on Sunday wreathed in smiles, entering into the celebration. But there is no personal life that leads up to it or out from it. Occasionally they engage in spectacular acts of love and compassion. We're impressed, but surprised. For they were never known to do that before. Then it turns out to be a stunt. A stunt.

No personal involvement either precedes or follows that act. They are plausible and convincing, but in the end they do not run the race. Believing through the tough times, praying through the lonely hours. They have no sense for what is real in religion. The proper label for such a person is religiopath. Ever heard of that? I had never heard of that until I read it from Peterson. The proper label for such a person is religiopath.

The world's full of them, I might add. Peterson then concludes, no one becomes human the way Jeremiah was human by posing in a posture of victory. It was his prayers, hidden but persistent.

I love that. Hidden but persistent that brought him to the human wholeness and spiritual sensitivity that we want. What we do in secret determines the soundness of who we are in public.

May I repeat the principle? What we do in secret determines the soundness of who we are in public. Prayer is the secret work that develops a life that is thoroughly authentic and deeply human. What do you do in secret?

What do you like when nobody's looking? Are you a phony? A religiopath?

You want to look like a runner, but you know you're not. Your prayer life is frighteningly scant to the point of being shameful. When is the last time you literally were on your knees, pouring out your heart for this country?

For those who were so disillusioned, they think tearing something up is really building the country. When is the last time you prayed through your fears? You poured out your soul to God for strength. What are you like when no one is looking?

I suggest that the place to begin for all of us. I have no public ministry if what I'm doing in private is shallow. They're just words.

I'm just giving you words. So I stood below the statue of Jeremiah, and I really thank the Lord for that model. I'm going to be like that. I don't want a statue.

Forget that. I want to be like that man was. Like Jesus, who though he was rich, yet for our sakes he became poor, that we through his poverty might be rich. You gave up all the glories of heaven to invade this sorry, filthy planet and to deal with sorry, filthy humanity who wanted nothing to do with him. But he came and he died.

In the meantime, in his private life, he met alone with the Father and said to him again and again, I'm doing what you sent me to do. That's why he's worth believing in. He's our model. He's the one to follow. Please bow your heads.

Just sit still for a moment. I don't know how long the virus will be with us, but it won't be with us as long as our Lord is. He's eternal. I don't know how long they'll be devastating things going on in the streets, but it won't be as long as the Lord is.

He'll be here when all of that turns a corner. The question is, what are you going to be doing in the meantime? Grouching about a virus. Worried about getting a few germs. Fussing over those who don't have control over their own emotions.

Complaining about people who don't see things like you do. Or is it going to be the Lord in first place? Each morning when he makes himself fresh and anew is the time for you to say, Today is your day, Lord. I give it to you. I hold nothing back. Think your thoughts through me. Speak your words through me. Touch others' lives through me, and I'll get out of the way as you use me. But begin within me.

Keep me authentic. If you've never come to Christ, today's the day to come. What on earth are you waiting for? He's available.

His death is effective. His cross awaits your coming. Come now.

Come now. Show us again, our Father, that you are all powerful, that you do all things well. Even when you wait and things go on and on that seem out of control, you do all things well. Even when we can't see the end that you have in mind, you do all things well.

Even when it's painful, you do all things well. Remind us that we are not here to be pleased. We are here to give and to serve. We are here to become like your Son. Do that work, Father, in these treacherous days that we might look back and say, in many ways, they were some of the best days of my Christian life.

I was at the bottom, and the sunrise brought me to the top. Thank you in advance, especially for those who come to Christ today. In His name I pray.

Everyone said, Amen. And this concludes our study from the book of Lamentations, chapter 3. Chuck Swindoll titled today's message, What to Remember When You Hit Bottom. To learn more about this ministry or Chuck Swindoll, be sure to visit us online at insightworld.org. It's our hope and prayer that these daily studies motivate you to take your next steps in your spiritual journey.

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