Lamentations 2:8. "The Lord determined to lay in ruins the wall of the daughter of Zion; he marked it off by the line; he restrained not his hand from destroying; he caused rampart and wall to lament, they languished together."

I have been reading the Book of Heaven, the writings of Louisa Piccaretta describing her incredible relationship and conversations with Jesus. So often in these writings, Jesus indicates that His children must be chastised, His Justice demands it. In order to get Him to relent, Louisa pleads with Him, consoles Him, takes some of the suffering on herself, and reminds Him that we are His images, so when He strikes us, He is striking Himself. Sometimes He does relent and sometimes He does not, but He always assures her that her consolations were effective in some way. It may be that the chastisement was not as widespread, or as lengthy, as Justice originally demanded, because her prayers and sufferings satisfied some portion of it.

In my reading last night, Jesus says to Louisa "[Y]ou are right that I will be struck in my own members ... But believe me, the chastisements are necessary, and if you don't want to see me struck a little bit now, you will see me struck more terribly later, because they will offend me more." (Book of Heaven, Vol. 2, October 14th, 1899). This lends a hint as to when and why God "determines" to lay someone or someplace in ruin. God is merciful, He does not want us to suffer, and when we do, He does as well, but sometimes it gets to the point where the chastisement must be now, or it will be much worse later. Only God knows when this point is, but we know that He is all just and that He wants only good for us. Even here, in his lamentation over the destruction of Jerusalem, Jeremiah points out that God "marked it off by the line." His chastisements are never too much, they are always in the necessary places and times and within His limits.

God made the world and everything in it, He will not let us destroy it. He sometimes has to let us suffer the consequences of our actions in order to keep things from getting worse. When He does allow us to be chastised, when He “restrains not His hand,” we can be certain that it is only because without that chastisement, we would offend Him more, and be deserving of even greater chastisements. In the midst of our suffering, we can trust that it is what He knows is needed to bring us back before we go too far, and know that He is suffering right along with us.