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Text: Jeremiah 24 ● I mentioned last week that in considering the writings of Jeremiah, I couldn’t help but notice some tendencies inherent in humanity… -- this ‘puzzling’ capacity which allows us to look squarely into truth (reality) and choose to believe something else. -- eventually, our stubbornness results in ‘delusion’…delusion so pervasive that we can no longer recognize the severity of our situation and we become deaf to the warnings [never underestimate the power of ‘delusion’]. -- then, having experienced the inevitable consequences of our decisions, we project ourselves as the ‘victims’, crying out for help, with no sense of personal responsibility and no real determination to adopt a new way of life. Maybe it’s our tendency to distinguish between our ‘beliefs’ and our ‘practices’. We seem to be able to function in such a way as to maintain practices which are inconsistent with our stated beliefs, when, in fact, our practices become the most telling expression/indicator of our beliefs. ● Why? Because even staring into the face of the consequences of our own self-destructive choices, we are really not convinced that the issue is the system itself (our beliefs), but simply our failure to properly execute the plan. So, rather than abandon our current system (belief) we choose to simply modify our plan. ● Jeremiah’s appeal was to a people not yet convinced that the picture was quite as dismal as he would have painted it; a people whose sensibilities had become so ‘dull’ that they were oblivious to their condition and the certain consequences they would face. ‘good fig’/ ‘bad fig’--- why are the exiles the good figs and the ones who remained in Judah the bad figs? Essentially, the ‘bad figs’ are the ones who still have a King, still have the Temple, still have the religious observances to fall back on--- all the trappings of God’s favor. They were the ones who trusted their ‘system’, or possessed at least some remnants of the system upon which they could continue to rely [ironically, it was that very ‘system’ that God had come to judge]. ● Jeremiah proved right and the nation and city of Jerusalem was devastated by the Babylonians. They would eventually level the Temple and obliterate the nation. In a couple of military campaigns, Israel finds themselves in “exile”. ►Exile is where you end up when you have ignored all the warning signs. Often as a people, the children of Israel would become so absorbed into the prevailing culture that instead of ‘identifying with’ the culture (in such a way as to be incarnational and restorative), they would become ‘identified by’ the culture and become virtually undetectable; they would lose their sense of identity. That condition was “exile”… It is an image that the Bible uses to help depict the effects that sin has had upon us. Exile is where the best of our abilities, energies and resources are offered toward promoting ‘empire’ (prevailing cultures; prevailing systems developed independent of God); rather than living as a contrasting culture in the midst of exile, we find ourselves ‘enslaved’ to the system itself. ● Historically, when that would occur (chose to live in a ‘different story’), God would bring to prominence prophets, people who would be entrusted with reminding the people of “their story”--- the uniqueness of their God; who they were and their sense of mission. ● But, contrary to our understanding of the prophets, exile was not inevitable; it was not some irreversible decree initiated by God and forwarded through the prophets. It was really more of an “if—then” proposition. Because, amidst the backdrop of injustice and rebellion was the wonder of repentance; that things did not have to continue on as they had been. ● Fortunately, God is especially sensitive to exiles; their cries always catch his attention; somehow their plight always rouses his compassion: it usually starts with a cry! [sign of new life] “Why does God love exiles?” -- Exile means the illusion of control has been shattered; exile means bankruptcy (you don’t have the resources and, in essence, you have managed your own demise). --- Exile means the loss of dependence upon your structures and strategies for making life work. -- Exiles are forced to admit that they have no potential to alter their circumstances; no hope without advocacy or intervention [no Temple, no land, no King, no resources… no chance]. -- Exiles finally have the capacity to see a future with no hope of returning to their past [It’s interesting how only when our present really stinks, that we become candidates for hope]. -- Most importantly, exiles are vulnerable--- capable of being wounded; broken. Exiles are hopeless… therein lies their hope! ►Broken-heartedness is often the appropriate response to life. Brokenness is what happens when you run out of energy and ideas--- but not until then [it’s not until we are ‘exhausted’ and ‘have exhausted’ our ideas and resources]. ● It is right, at times, to feel impoverished; it is right to experience the sensation of bondage; it is appropriate to declare your blindness because it makes you long for something else… only then will you cry out so that you might experience ‘exodus’ for yourself. But, as Jeremiah discovered, it’s hard to comfort people who won’t mourn; it’s hard to convince someone of the tragedy of bondage if they think they are free. It’s hard to convince someone of the damaging effects of the system when they’re so entrenched in and identified by it. ►It’s extremely difficult to maintain a voice/message which resonates with grace while upholding a sense of responsibility. In fact, the people could not ‘hear grace’ in Jeremiah’s message because they failed to see the need (“What did we do wrong?”) ● Jeremiah determined that the people had become so ‘numbed’ that the message of grace would be lost on them without first confronting them with the consequences of their choices. Only then would there be hope for repentance and a desire to see a better future. ● Here’s where we have to be cautioned… --- It would be tempting to withhold hope altogether and keep the focus on Israel’s failures in order to ‘ensure repentance!’ [this approach has been the most popular and potentially damaging amongst more legalistic religious expressions]. --- It would also be easy to present to them an image of a hopeful future which would be inevitable, despite their unfaithfulness. ● Have you ever noticed that it seems easier to return (repent) once your circumstances become ‘extreme’? That you can seemingly ‘not stray very far away’, but be overcome with indifference? [i.e. prodigal son: ‘moved to a distant land’]. Strange how it’s not until we are ‘eating with the pigs’ that we come to our senses? ● The Bible calls this condition “hardness of heart”. It depicts an unresponsiveness (ears but can’t hear, eyes but can’t see, etc.); possessing the proper faculties, but having lost all sensitivity. The irony is that the person being afflicted seems most often ‘unaware’ (either through denial or delusion), therefore, they fail to see any conflict. ● It seems sometimes that the only cure for willful hardness of the heart is to allow it to become ‘absolute’; ‘complete’. Only when hardness of the heart is complete does it produce despair (loss of hope); only out of despair comes the potential for the heart to consider another way--- to reach out to God. ● Imagine, God’s response… “Where did I go wrong?” (2:4): “What more could I have done?” (Isaiah 5:4). You sense this divine-tension within God; it’s almost as if God is awaiting even the slightest indication that the people are having a change of heart so that he might postpone or withhold judgment. ● God appears almost ‘desperate’ to be merciful (“Return… I am merciful” 3:11, “….if you wanted to return to me you could”. 4:1 [see also 25:5, 35:15). God seems almost melancholy; despondent (“My people have forgotten me…” (18:15), “…they have forsaken me”. (2:13). It’s quite a paradox. “I hurt with the hurt of my people. I mourn and am overcome with grief.” (8:21) Terrance Fretheim, in his work, “The Suffering God”, said, “God is not an executioner who can walk away from the judgment exacted, thinking: ‘I only did my duty’. Nor is there any satisfaction, let alone celebration, that justice has now been done. Nor any sense of punitiveness: ‘They deserved what they got!’… For God to mourn with those who mourn is to enter their situation; and where God is at work, mourning is not the end”. ►Jeremiah was confident that the only thing more resolute than man’s rebellion/stubbornness was God’s resolve to show mercy and offer restoration.
It was only the certainty of
God’s love that would allow the prophet to accept his anger, because he had come
to understand that it was not an arbitrary anger because we have ‘broken the
rules’, but the anger a loving-parent feels as they watch their children make
decisions which are sure to bring them pain: this anger is but another dimension
of love. |
