The Day of the Lord's Strange Work Text: Lamentations 2:16
Introduction: When God Unsheathes the Sword
We live in a soft age, an age that prefers a soft God. The modern evangelical mind has constructed a deity who is endlessly affirming, perpetually gentle, and who would never, ever resort to harsh measures. He is a God made in our own effeminate image, a divine therapist whose chief aim is our immediate comfort and self-esteem. But this god is an idol, a figment of our sentimental imagination, and he is utterly useless when the real God, the God of the Bible, decides to act.
The book of Lamentations is a bucket of ice water thrown on such flimsy theology. It is the diary of a divine judgment. Here, the prophet Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, sits in the smoking ruins of Jerusalem and catalogues the horrors. But he does not do so as a detached observer, nor as someone surprised by the turn of events. He is a covenant theologian, and he understands that this devastation is not a tragic accident. It is the meticulously executed curse of a holy God against a rebellious people. God had promised blessing for obedience and cursing for disobedience in Deuteronomy 28, and after centuries of stiff-necked rebellion, the bill has come due.
In this chapter, the prophet details how the Lord Himself has become the enemy of His people. He has bent His bow like an enemy (v. 4), He has swallowed up Israel (v. 5), He has spurned king and priest (v. 6). This is the central, terrible reality we must grasp: the Babylonians are merely the axe in God's hand. The ultimate agent of this destruction is Yahweh Himself. He is performing what Isaiah calls His "strange work," His "alien task" (Is. 28:21), which is the tearing down of His own house in order to build it up again.
Our text today brings us to the voice of the human instruments of this judgment. The enemies of Judah are given a speaking part in this divine drama. And what they say is a venomous, triumphant, and yet unwittingly theological confession. They believe they are celebrating their own victory, but they are in fact announcing the arrival of a day that God, not they, had ordained. In their mockery, we find a sobering lesson about the sovereignty of God, the certainty of His warnings, and the terrifying reality of covenant judgment.
The Text
All your enemies Have opened their mouths wide against you; They hiss and gnash their teeth. They say, “We have swallowed her up! Surely this is the day for which we have hoped; We have found it, we have seen it.”
(Lamentations 2:16 LSB)
The Contempt of the Conqueror
We begin with the description of the enemies' demeanor.
"All your enemies Have opened their mouths wide against you; They hiss and gnash their teeth." (Lamentations 2:16a)
The imagery here is animalistic, predatory. The opening of the mouth wide is the posture of a beast about to devour its prey. It signifies utter contempt and unrestrained verbal assault. These are not polite disagreements. This is the raw, visceral hatred of the ungodly for the people of God, a hatred that has been temporarily unleashed by God Himself for His own purposes. The world's animosity toward the church is a constant, but there are times in history when God removes the leash.
They "hiss and gnash their teeth." Hissing is a sound of serpentine scorn, of utter derision. It's the sound the serpent makes. When the people of God are unfaithful, they are handed over to the serpent's servants for a time. The gnashing of teeth is a display of impotent rage that has now, finally, found its moment of triumph. It is the expression of a long-simmering, bitter envy. Think of the Pharisees gnashing their teeth at Stephen before they stoned him (Acts 7:54). This is the rage of Cain against Abel, of Esau against Jacob, of the world against the seed of the woman.
But we must remember the context. Who are these enemies? They are the Babylonians, pagans who worship idols of wood and stone. From a human perspective, their victory is a theological crisis. It seems that Marduk has defeated Yahweh. But the Bible's perspective is precisely the opposite. These gloating, hissing, teeth-gnashing pagans are nothing more than God's rod of discipline. God is sovereign over the taunts of His enemies. He is sovereign over the spittle that ran down our Savior's face. He uses the free and wicked choices of men to accomplish His own righteous, predestined ends. These enemies think they are in charge, but they are merely actors reading from a script they did not write.
The Arrogant Boast
Next, the enemies speak their piece. Their words are a declaration of total victory.
"They say, 'We have swallowed her up!'" (Lamentations 2:16b)
To swallow something up is to annihilate it, to consume it entirely, leaving no trace. This is the goal of the world in its hatred for the church. It does not want to coexist; it wants to eliminate. The enemies of Jerusalem believed they had accomplished just that. The city was burned, the temple was a heap of rubble, and the people were either dead or in chains. By all outward appearances, the covenant nation of Israel was finished, swallowed by the great Babylonian beast.
This is the recurring boast of God's enemies throughout history. Pharaoh thought he had Israel trapped at the Red Sea. Haman was certain he would swallow up the Jews in Persia. The Sanhedrin thought they had swallowed up the Jesus movement when they crucified its leader. The Roman emperors thought they could swallow up the church with fire and lions. The Soviets thought they had swallowed up Christianity with their state-mandated atheism. And in every generation, secularists believe they are on the verge of finally swallowing up the last vestiges of Christian influence.
But the people of God cannot be swallowed up. Why? Because our Lord and Head was swallowed by the grave for three days, and then He was gloriously vomited back up. He descended into the belly of the beast, into the heart of the earth, and He broke its power from the inside out. Because He lives, we shall live also. The gates of Hell cannot prevail against His church. The enemies may boast, "We have swallowed her up," but God always has the last word. As Joseph told his brothers, who had sold him into what they thought was oblivion, "You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good" (Genesis 50:20).
The Unwitting Prophecy
The enemies' boast culminates in a striking, and deeply ironic, declaration.
"Surely this is the day for which we have hoped; We have found it, we have seen it." (Lamentations 2:16c)
The enemies see this as their day. This is the day of their vindication, the fulfillment of their long-held ambitions. They had hoped for this, planned for this, and now it has arrived. Their glee is palpable. "We have found it, we have seen it." It is a moment of supreme satisfaction for them.
But in saying this, they are unwittingly speaking a profound theological truth. This is indeed "the day." But it is not their day. It is the "day of the Lord." Throughout the Old Testament prophets, the "day of the Lord" refers to a time of historical, temporal judgment, a day when God visits a nation or a city to settle accounts. It is a day of wrath for the wicked and, ultimately, of purification for the righteous. The fall of Jerusalem in 586 B.C. was a classic day of the Lord. The fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 was another. These are historical previews, dress rehearsals for the final day of the Lord at the end of history.
The Babylonians thought this day was the result of their military might and their strategic genius. They were wrong. This day was the result of Israel's covenant unfaithfulness. God had warned them for centuries through prophets like Moses, Isaiah, and Jeremiah himself. He had told them that if they persisted in their idolatry and injustice, He would bring a foreign nation against them to execute His judgment. This day was not a surprise; it was an appointment. The Babylonians were simply the ones who showed up to keep it on God's behalf.
This is a crucial lesson. When judgment falls, the ungodly always misinterpret it. They see it as a victory for their cause. When a nation that has known Christian influence collapses into secular chaos, the architects of that chaos pop the champagne corks. They think it is their day. They do not realize they are simply the scavengers God has summoned to clean up the carcass of an apostate culture. They are the unwitting instruments of a judgment they cannot comprehend, a judgment that will, in its own time, fall upon them as well. Babylon had its day of triumph over Jerusalem, but Babylon's own day of the Lord was coming.
Conclusion: The God Who Swallows Death
So what are we to make of this ugly scene? A conquered people, a destroyed city, and enemies gloating over the ruins. Where is the good news in this? The good news is found by looking at the whole story.
First, this passage teaches us to take God's warnings with the utmost seriousness. God does not bluff. His covenant has real teeth, real consequences, both for blessing and for curse. When we as a people, a church, or a nation drift from His Word, we should not be surprised when He unsheathes the sword of judgment. He loves His people too much to let them persist in their sin indefinitely. The judgment that fell on Jerusalem was a severe mercy, a divine surgery intended to cut out the cancer of idolatry so that a remnant could be saved.
Second, we see that God is utterly sovereign over the malice of our enemies. He can use the most godless people to accomplish His holy will. This does not excuse their sin. The Babylonians were still culpable for their cruelty and pride, and they were judged for it. But it does mean that for the child of God, there are no accidents. Even the taunts and triumphs of our enemies are woven into the fabric of God's good and perfect plan for our purification and ultimate salvation.
Finally, and most importantly, this scene drives us to the cross. On the cross, all the enemies of God gathered to have their day. The Roman soldiers, the Jewish leaders, the mocking crowd, and the demonic powers behind them all opened their mouths wide. They hissed and gnashed their teeth. They said, in effect, "We have swallowed Him up! Surely this is the day for which we have hoped." They sealed the tomb and thought they had seen the end of Jesus of Nazareth.
But that was not the end. On the third day, God had His day. It was the ultimate day of the Lord, the day of resurrection. God took the man whom they had swallowed up and made Him the Lord of heaven and earth. And in doing so, He turned the tables for all time. Because of Christ's victory, the day is coming when death itself will be swallowed up forever (Isaiah 25:8, 1 Corinthians 15:54). The day is coming when every enemy will be made His footstool.
Therefore, when we face the scorn of the world, when our enemies seem to triumph, we do not despair. We lament, as Jeremiah did, because the pain is real. But we do not lament as those who have no hope. We know that God's strange work of judgment is always for the purpose of His ultimate work of salvation. The enemies may have their day, but God has all the days, and He has given the final day to His Son.