Lamentations 2:20-3

New Living Translation

²⁰“O Lord, think about this!
    Should you treat your own people this way?
Should mothers eat their own children,
    those they once bounced on their knees?
Should priests and prophets be killed
    within the Lord’s Temple?

²¹“See them lying in the streets—
    young and old,
boys and girls,
    killed by the swords of the enemy.
You have killed them in your anger,
    slaughtering them without mercy.

²²“You have invited terrors from all around,
    as though you were calling them to a day of feasting.
In the day of the Lord’s anger,
    no one has escaped or survived.
The enemy has killed all the children
    whom I carried and raised.”

Hope in the Lord’s Faithfulness

3 I am the one who has seen the afflictions
    that come from the rod of the Lord’s anger.
²He has led me into darkness,
    shutting out all light.
³He has turned his hand against me
    again and again, all day long.

⁴He has made my skin and flesh grow old.
    He has broken my bones.
⁵He has besieged and surrounded me
    with anguish and distress.
⁶He has buried me in a dark place,
    like those long dead.

⁷He has walled me in, and I cannot escape.
    He has bound me in heavy chains.
⁸And though I cry and shout,
    he has shut out my prayers.
⁹He has blocked my way with a high stone wall;
    he has made my road crooked.

¹⁰He has hidden like a bear or a lion,
    waiting to attack me.
¹¹He has dragged me off the path and torn me in pieces,
    leaving me helpless and devastated.
¹²He has drawn his bow
    and made me the target for his arrows.

¹³He shot his arrows
    deep into my heart.
¹⁴My own people laugh at me.
    All day long they sing their mocking songs.
¹⁵He has filled me with bitterness
    and given me a bitter cup of sorrow to drink.

¹⁶He has made me chew on gravel.
    He has rolled me in the dust.
¹⁷Peace has been stripped away,
    and I have forgotten what prosperity is.
¹⁸I cry out, “My splendor is gone!
    Everything I had hoped for from the Lord is lost!”