When Mercies Meet our Suffering
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“therefore I will hope in him.”
Lamentations 3:22-24
Your problems today will not be the same problems tomorrow. Let me clarify for a moment: I am not saying that your problems and difficulties today will absolutely be gone tomorrow, nor am I saying that they will be replaced by an immensely different set of difficulties. But I am saying that they will be different. Now, I am not a prophet, and that is not a prediction - its really an experiential proverb. Your problems today will not be your problems tomorrow because everything in life is fluid and changing, even if in the slightest ways. If nothing else, your perspective will be different. It may be better or worse, it may take on the smallest nuances because of a turn of corner or page in the story. You may feel more complacency because another day has gone on, or you may feel more urgency because the solution hasn't appeared yet.
The smallest things affect our outlook. The sun is brighter and it gives a ray of hope. The mercury dips well below freezing and that ray of hope is squashed. A card in the mail from a friend gives us that "I can make it through" feeling; then we open the bill that was underneath that card in the stack, and we forget the brightened mood we just adopted. We have to admit, really, that we are a bit fickle - even the most stable among us is prone to this kind of vacillation. I was thinking about this as I was doing some cleaning earlier. I was vacuuming, nobody's favorite task, but nonetheless I had that sense of accomplishment. I was almost finished. There was a noticeable difference from when I had started. My hard work was paying off. I was fighting dirt and goldfish crumbs and winning. Then I rounded the last corner, and my mood changed. Before then it had been smooth sailing - wide open carpet; but now, I had to move toys, and chairs, the chunks were too big for the vacuum, the cord wasn't long enough, everything was going wrong. My mood went from chipper to downer in the shifting of a moment.
That little situation shows me more about my human nature than many hours of deep introspection can reveal. Our satisfaction is situational and fleeting. The roller coaster of life doesn't require an admission ticket, and it doesn't stop after 60 seconds to let us off. Our problems today will not be the same problems tomorrow, because our outlook today will not be the same outlook tomorrow. So what can we do? What is the solution? How can we remain positive and faithful when we are so fickle and fluid? Fortunately, our Lord knows our makeup - he sees our instability and meets us in that condition.
The words of the prophet Jeremiah that we read above are fitted to this exact conundrum. Jeremiah was faced with a situational anomaly. His city, God's city, was in ruin. He was eyeballing the smoke rising up from the destruction as he penned these words. That problem would not be gone tomorrow. His problem was the same as the others surrounding him, but there was one major aspect that was subject to change - his outlook. I have used the work outlook several times up to this point, but I want to make a shift. Our outlook is our point of reference. What Jeremiah really is proposing in these verses is having a constant point of reference. "The steadfast love (mercy) of the LORD never ceases." "Great is your faithfulness." "The LORD is my portion." This proposed point of reference, the point of reference that sees the Lord and his unchanging nature above all things, is Jeremiah's solution for man's vacillation.
Think of it this way. We can either lay our head on our pillow in the evening dreading the next day because we know our problems haven't left us, or we can restfully resign our dread to the sovereignty and faithfulness of God. We can choose to allow situational fluidity to dictate our mood, or we can allow a constant point of reference on the Lord's faithfulness to plane out the twists and warps of unpredictability. Its the contrast between finding happiness only in the highs and the ideals and finding consistent joy regardless of circumstantial change. Its the variable of the earthly, temporal mindset versus the heavenly, kingdom mindset. Its the difference between being thrown for a loop by "the straw that broke the camels back" and resting firmly in "the Lord gives and the Lord takes away; blessed be the name of the Lord." (Job 1:21)
God's mercies are renewed each day. That is not because they have an expiration date, but because the Lord knows that we need a daily reminder that He is our portion. What does it mean, that the Lord is our portion? It means that He is our daily provision. He is our wilderness Manna. He is our "daily bread," the bread that satisfies by faith. He is that "living water," which, when consumed makes the consumer thirst no more. That is echoed in Psalm 68:19 - "Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears us up; God is our salvation." We face situational change like each day is an insurmountable challenge, but God's mercies are doled out each morning for His children. We look at temporal difficulties like they are solid brick walls, but God's daily bearing of us reminds us that even a brick wall has a limit, and nothing is indestructible in the wisdom of the Lord of the universe. We see a problem and say "there goes our happiness." But God says, "Look up here! I haven't changed, I'm not going anywhere, and I give you what you need every single day."
God's steadfast love, his faithfulness, his mercies new every day - those are the constants. Those are the unchanging elements in the story of His grace. What we are responsible for, what is ours in the life of faith, is to cast our eyes upon those things. Let them be the controlling factor in any and all situations. To purpose that we will not lose sight of God's steadfast love, his mercies, and his faithfulness; and having studied them and cherished them deeply in the smooth and easy days, to approach the days of uncertainty with that triumphant, Spirit-empowered outlook of "therefore I will hope in him."
So, no, your problems today will not be the same tomorrow. They may be better, they may be worse. Something might change and add another layer of uncertainty or mystery. Another day going by may tempt you to despair and lose hope. Another day without change may tempt you to fall back on complacency. But what will not change is this: The Lord is faithful, loving, and merciful. He sees the vacillation of our spirit and meets it with His unchanging nature. He sees the doubt and fear in our inconsistencies and meets them with his unwavering character. He sees the sleepless nights of distress and unrest and meets them with "his mercies are new every morning; great is your faithfulness."
With changing moods but an unchanging hope,
Pastor Aaron Frost
February 26, 2021
