God never gives evil the last word! Jeremiah 31 points to the future hope of the return of God’s people after the Babylonian captivity. Bitter tears encourage us to long for the days when God will make all things right. As Jeremiah 31 comes to a close, God makes one of the most important promises in the entire Bible regarding the New Covenant, “Behold, days are coming,” declares the LORD, “When I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them” declares the LORD. “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the LORD, “I will put my law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” Thios helps us understand the value and purpose of the bitter tears. They motivate us to acknowledge the brokenness of our sin-cursed world and cause us to place our hope in the future the Lord has and is preparing for us. The bitterness of sin, grief, and misery are overshadowed by the cleansing power of the precious blood of Christ. The ultimate hope as we shed bitter tears is the salvation that comes through Christ’s death and resurrection. We rejoice as we contemplate Revelation 21:4, which tells us that “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.” Today, move your eyes from today, to the hope that God has promised in our future.
