Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations

On Saturday, eight of us read through these books, straight through, beginning to end.

Earlier this year, I wrote an article about Bible marathons, a growing craze at Multnomah. Since then, I had wanted to try it out for myself, so a group of friends and I gave it a try.

We started at 8 a.m. with Isaiah. We experienced Isaiah's "Holy, Holy, Holy" moment, heard his prophecies concerning the Messiah and saw how hard-hearted God's people were despite His unfailing love for them. Convicting. Every couple hours, we took a break and spent a few minutes discussing the previous chapters. Some of our observations on Isaiah: God brings Salvation near, even when we don't deserve it; He is superior over nations and false gods; He never fails.

After a lunch of taco soup, we launched into Jeremiah. A massive hailstorm soon commenced. One marathoner commented, "This is OK, but if the frogs come, I'm out of here!" In Jeremiah, we witnessed God's faithfulness to an unfaithful people. They asked Jeremiah what the Lord said about something and when he told them, they accused him of lying! They only wanted to hear good news. Poor Jeremiah! He was thrown into a cistern, beaten, spit on, nearly murdered and went barefoot for three years! He was an emotional guy, too (known as the "weeping prophet"). At one point, he was so disgruntled with his position as prophet to a hardened people, that he severely cursed the man who brought his father the news of his birth! (What did that poor guy ever do to you?)

Lamentations contained poetic funeral dirges: a response to Jerusalem's fall and subsequent exile to Babylon, which we read about (in great detail) in Jeremiah. Just as we were feeling very depressed, we read these words in Lamentations 3:21-26.

"Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, 'The Lord is my porion; therefore I will wait for him.' The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him."

A great promise to end a day in God's Word.