Readings for today: Lamentations 1-5, Hebrews 7:11-28
There is a debate raging in our culture today. Is sin systemic or is it personal? Is sin communal or is it individual? Are we guilty of sin as we participate and perhaps unwittingly perpetuate sinful systems of injustice and oppression or are we only guilty of the sin we personally commit? The Bible’s answer is “yes.” It’s not an either/or but a both/and.
We have to remember that while the Bible was written for us, it was not written to us. In the case of the Book of Lamentations, it was written to people living in an ancient near east, honor/shame culture where the group identity of a particular people was far more important than the individual identity. In fact, you would be hard-pressed to get an ancient Israelite to even understand what an “individual” identity might look like apart from his or her community. When God brings judgment on the nation for the sins they’ve committed, they would have understood it as the just punishment for their collective guilt. The righteous action of a holy God against His people for the sin that has been building up over generations. The author of Lamentations says as much when he writes, “Our fathers sinned, and are no more; and we bear their iniquities.” (Lamentations 5:7) He suggests as much when he personifies Jerusalem and gives her a collective voice in the narrative.
“How lonely sits the city that was full of people! How like a widow has she become, she who was great among the nations! She who was a princess among the provinces has become a slave…Jerusalem remembers in the days of her affliction and wandering all the precious things that were hers from days of old. When her people fell into the hand of the foe, and there was none to help her, her foes gloated over her; they mocked at her downfall. Jerusalem sinned grievously; therefore she became filthy; all who honored her despise her, for they have seen her nakedness; she herself groans and turns her face away…Look, O Lord, and see, for I am despised. Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow, which was brought upon me, which the Lord inflicted on the day of his fierce anger. From on high he sent fire; into my bones he made it descend; he spread a net for my feet; he turned me back; he has left me stunned, faint all the day long. My transgressions were bound into a yoke; by his hand they were fastened together; they were set upon my neck; he caused my strength to fail; the Lord gave me into the hands of those whom I cannot withstand.” (Lamentations 1:1, 7-8, 11-14)
Conversely, we live in a guilt/innocence culture where everything is viewed through a highly individualistic lens. As such, we believe each person must be held accountable for their own choices in life. They must be responsible for their own actions. Therefore any and all punishment - if it is to be just - must be leveled against individuals for the crimes they’ve personally committed. And, to be sure, this idea is also present throughout Lamentations. We see Jeremiah lifting his own lament in the pages of this book. Acknowledging his own sin, suffering, and pain. Chapter three, in particular, seems to reflect Jeremiah’s experience.
“I am the man who has seen affliction under the rod of his wrath; he has driven and brought me into darkness without any light; surely against me he turns his hand again and again the whole day long. He has made my flesh and my skin waste away; he has broken my bones; he has besieged and enveloped me with bitterness and tribulation; he has made me dwell in darkness like the dead of long ago. He has walled me about so that I cannot escape; he has made my chains heavy; though I call and cry for help, he shuts out my prayer; he has blocked my ways with blocks of stones; he has made my paths crooked…Remember my affliction and my wanderings, the wormwood and the gall! My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me.” (Lamentations 3:1-9, 19-20)
We get no sense from Jeremiah that he is innocent or that he should escape or be protected from God’s righteous judgment. Instead, Jeremiah suffers the penalty for his sin and that of his nation. He accepts God’s judgment as just and then looks to Him for hope even in the midst of all he is going though. “But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: 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.” The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord…For the Lord will not cast off forever, but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love; for he does not afflict from his heart or grieve the children of men.” (Lamentations 3:21-26, 31-33)
Now I know we struggle with God’s judgment. We struggle with it’s severity. We struggle with it’s seeming cruelty. We think to ourselves, “What about the innocent? Why do the righteous suffer alongside the unrighteous? What have the children or the poor or the outcast or the marginalized done who get caught up in this terrible holocaust?“ These are thoroughly modern and thoroughly western cultural questions. In the Bible’s view, no one is innocent. All are born into sin. All are born under judgment. All bear the guilt of our forefather and mother, Adam and Eve. We confirm our collective guilt each and every time we act in selfish and self-centered ways. As the Apostle Paul puts it, “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned…But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many…Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous. Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Romans 5:12, 15, 18-21)
You see, as much as we may want to deny the idea of collective guilt, we absolutely cling to the idea of collective righteousness. As much as we may want to deny the idea that we are held accountable for the sins of our fathers and mothers, we absolutely want to believe we are set free by the life, death, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. We can’t have one without the other and the great news of the gospel is the sacrifice of Christ is sufficient for all sin. Individual and collective. Personal and communal. Systemic and singular. When Christ died, He died once for all. He made atonement not just for our individual sins but for the sins of the whole world. (1 John 2:2)
Readings for tomorrow: Ezekiel 1-3, Hebrews 8