Bible Strands
Lamentations 3:18
So I say, “My strength has perished, along with my hope from the LORD.”
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The speaker addresses God immediately after declaring his soul deprived of peace and prosperity, placing this utterance at the height of his personal and national devastation. He voices this realization in a moment of exhausted confession rather than petition.
The words — אָבַד ('a.Vad) translates literally as "it has perished," and נִצְחִי (nitz.Ch/i) means "my endurance" or "my strength." These terms ground the speaker’s statement that his vitality and expectation from Yahweh are completely gone.
The thread — The collapse of hope appears in Job 17:15 and Job 6:11, where the afflicted question where any remaining hope exists. It aligns with 1 Samuel 27:1, where David anticipates being swept away by Saul with no secure future.
Why it lands — The text records the factual loss of endurance and divine expectation before any resolution is offered. It requires the reader to acknowledge despair as a real stage of experience rather than a failure of faith.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And I said, My strength and my hope is perished from the Lord:
Cross-references
- Job 17:15 where then is my hope? Who can see any hope for me?
- 1 Samuel 27:1 David, however, said to himself, “One of these days now I will be swept away by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than to escape to the land of the Philistines. Then Saul will stop searching for me all over Israel, and I will slip out of his hand.”
- Job 6:11 What strength do I have, that I should still hope? What is my future, that I should be patient?
- Psalms 31:22 In my alarm I said, “I am cut off from Your sight!” But You heard my plea for mercy when I called to You for help.
- Psalms 116:11 In my alarm I said, “All men are liars!”
- Ezekiel 37:11 Then He said to me, “Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Look, they are saying, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope has perished; we are cut off.’