The Prophet's Lamentations Over His People's Doom
Jeremiah 4:19-26
My bowels, my bowels! I am pained at my very heart; my heart makes a noise in me; I cannot hold my peace, because you have heard…


I. THE COMPLAINT OR LAMENTATION ITSELF.

1. The parts affected. The soul and inward man.

(1) The secrecy of it, the mind and soul being inward and hidden.

(2) The mind receives and digests the thoughts.

(3) The mind is the mother of thoughts, conceiving and generating them.

2. The grief of those parts.

(1) God need not go far for the punishment of wicked men; He can do it from within themselves; can punish a man with his own affections and thoughts.

(2) What good cause we have to regulate and control our affections, avoid passion and excess of emotion, take care to be pacific, and enjoy a sabbatic tranquillity in our spirits.

3. The passage or vent.

(1) The speech of discovery. He cannot help revealing these workings of his own spirit.

(2) The speech of lamentation. He must bewail and utter complaint, his anguish was so great (Job 7:11).

II. THE GROUND OR OCCASION OF HIS LAMENTATION.

1. The tidings or report itself.

(1)  The trumpet of providence.

(2)  The trumpet of the Word.

(3)  The trumpet of vision, or extraordinary prophetical revelation.

2. The conveyance of it to the prophet.

(1) The soul, through the corporeal organ of hearing.

(2) The soul immediately, as being that which had communion with God.

(3) The soul emphatically; that is heard, indeed, which is heard by the soul. Hence —

(a)  God's excellency: He speaks.

(b)  Man's duty: he hears.

3. The improvement or use he makes of it.

(1) His meditations aroused his affections.

(a)  This is the aim of a revelation.

(b)  We should endeavour to bring revelations for others to our own spiritual advancement and profit.

(2) What these affections were which the tidings aroused.

(a)  An or at his people's obstinacy.

(b)  Fear of the coming judgment.

(c)  Grief at his people's state and doom

(T. Herren, D. D.)



Parallel Verses
KJV: My bowels, my bowels! I am pained at my very heart; my heart maketh a noise in me; I cannot hold my peace, because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.

WEB: My anguish, my anguish! I am pained at my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I can't hold my peace; because you have heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.




The Alarm of War
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