Lamentations

Lamentations is a set of five carefully crafted poems mourning the destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple in 586 BC — traditionally the tears of Jeremiah over the city he had warned. It stares directly at the horror of the siege, the famine and the exile, and dares to bring the grief honestly before God.

At its very centre, however, stands one of Scripture's greatest affirmations of hope: 'The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning' (3:22–23). Lamentations models how faith can grieve without letting go of God.