What happens when our world falls apart? 
How do we find strength to keep going? 
Where does our faith truly reside?
What do we do when God seems absent? 
How do we find strength in community?

It is not hard to understand why the book of Lamentations in the Old Testament might be one of the most neglected books in all of the Bible. It is a book of poetry written about the most significant catastrophe of the Israelite people - the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BC.

In it, we find language - poetry, metaphor, imagery - for all the grief, pain and confusion the people of God felt. When their world fell apart. The poems use all the letters of the Hebrew alphabet to help fully plumb the depths of the people’s pain.

At the very center of this book, however, we find one of the fiercest statements of faith and trust in all of Scripture. A bedrock reminder that even when the bottom falls out, the center can hold, if the center is built on the right foundation.

We will each face hardship, pain, loss and despair. Lamentations teaches us to hold firmly to our faith while giving us grace-filled permission to pour out all of our grief, anger and confusion - from A to Z - to the God who loves us, whose faithfulness is great, and whose mercies are ever-new.