¶Remember my misery and my homelessness, the wormwood and bitterness.
Parallel translations
- WEB Remember my affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.
- KJV Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.
- BSB Remember my affliction and wandering, the wormwood and the gall.
- NKJV Remember my affliction and roaming, The wormwood and the gall.
- NLT The thought of my suffering and homelessness is bitter beyond words.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
He asks God to remember his affliction, bitterness, and gall. It turns his suffering back toward God in prayer.
Overview
Rather than sinking into despair, the sufferer begins to pray, asking the LORD to 'remember' his wormwood and gall. To ask God to remember is to appeal to his covenant faithfulness. This turn from despair to prayer signals the dawning of hope, the same hope that rests securely on the God who remembers his promises and fulfills them in Christ (Luke 1:54).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Lam 3:15He has filled me with bitterness. He has sated me with wormwood.
- Lam 3:5He has built against me, and surrounded me with gall and travail.
- Neh 9:32Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness, don’t let all the travail seem little before you, that has come on us, on our kings, on our princes, on our priests, on our prophets, on our fathers, and on all your people, since the time of the kings of Assyria to this day.
- Job 7:7Oh remember that my life is a breath. My eye shall no more see good.
- Ps 89:50Remember, Lord, the reproach of your servants, how I bear in my heart the taunts of all the mighty peoples,
- Ps 132:1A Song of Ascents. Yahweh, remember David and all his affliction,
- Ps 89:47Remember how short my time is! For what vanity have you created all the children of men!
- Jer 9:15therefore Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, says, “Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The weeping over a ruined city and the steadfast mercies that are new every morning point to the man of sorrows who wept over Jerusalem and whose mercy rises new from the grave.
How Lamentations 3:19 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.