Reading 76 | The Bible in 100 Passages

Saturday, November 29, 2025  

Today's Scripture
Lamentations 1:1–8

How lonely sits the city
that once was full of people!
How like a widow she has become,
she that was great among the nations!
She that was a princess among the provinces
has become a vassal.

She weeps bitterly in the night,
with tears on her cheeks;
among all her lovers
she has no one to comfort her;
all her friends have dealt treacherously with her,
they have become her enemies.

Judah has gone into exile with suffering
and hard servitude;
she lives now among the nations,
and finds no resting place;
her pursuers have all overtaken her
in the midst of her distress.

The roads to Zion mourn,
for no one comes to the festivals;
all her gates are desolate,
her priests groan;
her young girls grieve,
and her lot is bitter.

Her foes have become the masters,
her enemies prosper,
because the Lord has made her suffer
for the multitude of her transgressions;
her children have gone away,
captives before the foe.

From daughter Zion has departed
all her majesty.
Her princes have become like stags
that find no pasture;
they fled without strength
before the pursuer.
Jerusalem remembers,
in the days of her affliction and wandering,
all the precious things
that were hers in days of old.
When her people fell into the hand of the foe,
and there was no one to help her,
the foe looked on mocking
over her downfall.

Jerusalem sinned grievously,
so she has become a mockery;
all who honored her despise her,
for they have seen her nakedness;
she herself groans,
and turns her face away. (NRSV)

Reflection

Where are my pants?! We’ve all had that dream, right? The one where we show up at school or at work without pants. It’s a classic and one that’s often born out of feelings of vulnerability, weakness. No one likes having their weaknesses called out, let alone being broadcast loudly for an international audience.

And yet that’s exactly what happens in this passage. It not only describes Jerusalem’s sin, but it also describes the very public exposure of it. Her nakedness is seen, her shame is public, and those who once honored her now mock her. It paints a painful picture of Jerusalem’s fall from grace and describes a kind of reckoning of who she is, not who she was or who she wants to be.

I certainly know what it feels like to stand in the gap between who I am and who I want to be. Sometimes that gap is narrow, and sometimes it’s wide. Sometimes it’s well hidden, and sometimes it’s blatantly obvious — but it’s always there.

Fortunately God’s grace and mercy live in the gap. They support and comfort me while I learn and grow and work to overcome my weaknesses.

Prayer

Lord, for continuing to teach me as I stand in the gap between who I am and who I want to be, for the mercy you show me, and for the grace I depend on to sustain me, I give you thanks. You are my rock and my salvation. Amen.

Written by Nicole Spirgen, Member of Fourth Presbyterian Church

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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