23^rd Sabbath after Pentecost

All Saints’ Sabbath

November 2/4, 2007

Victor H. Nixon

NEED FORGIVENESS?

Jeremiah 31:31-34

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Jeremiah was the son of Hilkiah, a priest of Anathoth, a village just north of Jerusalem in Judah, the southern kingdom. His ministry probably began in 627 B.C. in Jerusalem, when he was quite young, extending through the kingships of Josiah, Jehoiakim and Zedekiah and into the Babylonian Captivity. He died in Egypt sometime after 586 B.C.

At an early age, Jeremiah was called by God "to be a prophet to the nations"(1:5). He resisted, saying, "I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy."(1:6) He wasn’t the first or the last person who felt ill-prepared for such a task, but he was told not to be afraid, that God was with him and would tell him what to say.

Jeremiah’s reservations were understandable. God gave him a message of judgment, forgiveness and hope in an age of political disaster and immense human suffering that resulted in diaspora, a Greek term meaning the "scattering or sewing of seeds," referring to the forced dispersion of the Judeans from their homeland.(1)

The Book of Jeremiah is primarily a series of oracles, or messages from God, given to the prophet to deliver to Judah and other nations. Most are written in verse and recorded by Jeremiah’s scribe, Baruch, beginning with the phrases "The word of the Lord came to me, saying . . . " or "Thus says the Lord . . ."

Like most prophets, ancient and modern, Jeremiah’s ministry required immense personal sacrifice. He did not marry or have children, was destined to be lonely, cut off from friends and relatives, often agonizing over his beloved Jerusalem and troubled country.(2) He was tormented, laughed at, imprisoned and even thrown in a cistern; but worse, his preaching was ignored.

Doubtless, he would have preferred a comforting word, but felt compelled to deliver the difficult message that God had given him, like any of us who speak the truth because it is right when we know that it will not be received and will likely be met with resentment or hostility. How do you tell someone they need to repent and ask forgiveness?

Unfaithfulness was the issue in Judah, resulting in paganism, greed, injustice and evil that infiltrated the traditional religion and government. Jeremiah, filled with despair over moral and spiritual decline, warned rulers, priests and people that, although God loved them, God would not tolerate such a lifestyle and the entire nation would suffer the consequences in defeat and captivity.

"Have you not brought this upon yourself

by forsaking the Lord your God,

while [God] led you in the way?"(2:17)

"Your wickedness will punish you,

and your apostasies will convict you.

Know and see that it is evil and bitter

For you to forsake the Lord your God."(2:19)

More than any other prophet, Jeremiah cries out for repentance, "Return, O faithless children, says the Lord."(3:14)

Nothing less than a change of heart would do, but the people’s ears are closed and their eyes are shut.(5:21) Jeremiah believed that God was trying to get people to change before it was too late.

He once stood at the temple gate in Jerusalem and proclaimed: "Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah, you that enter these gates to worship the Lord. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Amend your ways and your doings, and let me dwell with you in this place. . . . For if you truly amend your ways and your doings, if you truly act justly with one another, if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own hurt, then I will dwell with you in this place, in the land I gave of old to your ancestors forever and ever."(7:1-7) God asked, "Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your sight?"—a description Jesus adopts when chasing the moneychangers and vendors from the Jerusalem temple.(Matt. 21:12-13; Mark 11:15-17; Luke 19:45-46)

Still, they did not listen to him. He said, "They acted shamefully, they committed abomination; yet they were not at all ashamed, they did not know how to blush."(8:12) The same could be said of our own culture where pornography, greed, violence and injustice are so prevalent! Have we forgotten how to blush?

When he said such things, people wanted to kill him, but he was saved by a tradition allowing unpopular prophets to speak freely, a reminder of how important it is to protect freedom of speech even when we disagree with the message. Understandably, Jeremiah became weary, spiritually exhausted. Everyone was turning against him. He complained to God, but God said, "If you have raced with foot-runners and they have wearied you, how will you compete with horses?"(12:5) God’s love is tough!

Courageously, he continued preaching . Following God’s instruction, he purchased an earthenware jug to illustrate what was about to happen if Jerusalem and Judah continued to ignore God’s warning.(19:1ff) He said, "The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when . . . I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and will make them fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life." Before an assembly of leaders he was instructed to break the jug and to say: "Thus says the Lord of hosts: So will I break this people and this city, as one breaks a potter’s vessel, so that it can never be mended."

People despised him all the more for such prophesy. The chief officer of the temple arrested him and placed him in stocks. When he was finally released, Jeremiah told the officer that God would hand him and all Judah over to the king of Babylon who would carry them captive to Babylon and execute them.(20:16)

Jeremiah again complained to God. "I have become a laughingstock all day long; everyone mocks me."(20:7) Yet, he did not refrain from preaching and expressed confidence in God, saying "for to you I have committed my cause,"(20:12)

But all is not hopeless, God told Jeremiah: "I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer."(23:3-4) God also promised to establish a righteous member of David’s line to rule over the restored country.(23:5)

Believing that God was using Babylon to teach Judah a lesson and that it would be wiser to submit rather than resist, Jeremiah advised King Zedekiah to place the neck of Judah under the yoke of the king of Babylon, lest the nation be totally destroyed. God told Jeremiah to make a yoke and wear it on his own neck to demonstrate God’s will for the nation.(27:1-28:17)

Jeremiah was in Jerusalem in 588 when Babylon invaded under Nebuchadnezzar II and besieged Jerusalem. Rumor of the approach of Egyptians to aid Judah induced the Babylonians to withdraw. Jeremiah prophesied that they would return, take the city and "burn it with fire."(37:7-8) The people were angered by this prophecy and Jeremiah was thrown in prison where he remained until the city was taken in 586 B.C. and many were carried into exile.(37:15-38:13) The Babylonians released Jeremiah, however, and allowed him to choose whether to join exiles on the way to Babylon or remain in Judah. He chose to remain. Unfortunately, the Babylon appointed governor of Judah with whom he was staying was assassinated. The replacement governor refused to listen to Jeremiah’s counsel not to leave the country and fled to Egypt, taking Jeremiah and his faithful scribe, Baruch, with him (43:6) There, the prophet spent the remainder of his life seeking to turn expatriate Judeans to the Lord from whom they had so long been separated.(44)

Jeremiah preached the painful truth about the consequences of breaking covenant with God, about evil and injustice—words that are as true today as when he spoke them. But he also preached about God’s promise of forgiveness that comes from a new covenant, a new relationship with God, not written in books but upon human hearts, a relationship that comes from knowing God and having God in your life. Jeremiah knew that such a relationship transforms nations as well as individuals, enabling us to live faithfully, responsibly, justly, and to avoid the things that can carry us away, hold us captive, and harm us.

African-American Christians transformed Jeremiah’s question, "Is there no balm in Gilead?" into an exclamation in the familiar spiritual, "There is a balm in Gilead!"

There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole;

There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin-sick soul.

Sometimes I feel discouraged, and think my work’s in vain,

Need forgiveness? Listen to Jeremiah. Thanks be to God!

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