Jeremiah 14:1-16.  In yesterday’s reading we saw God using a foreign nation to deal with the unfaithfulness of the people of Judah.  It was going to be a serious event.  We also was that God is interested in change, God doesn’t want to discipline the people but if he lets them keep going away from him that is where they will spend eternity; not a good thing at all.  The fact that God sends prophets to warn and uses words like “listen” and asks questions like “how long…” tells me that God is giving the people extra chances.

In today’s reading we see another way God would get the attention of the people, through “natural” disasters.  It is true that God created a system in our world and that often the system just runs (See Ecclesiastes 1:6-7).  But that system is designed and runs by rules that God put into place.  The rules that it is currently running under also involve the fact that God “tweaked” the system back when Adam and Eve first disobeyed.  In it’s current form the system doesn’t run perfectly and that is a reminder to all of us that we God exists and that there are consequences for disobeying him and not showing him respect (sin).  We see this in the original story when God tells Adam that from now on he is going to have to fight the weeds in order to get his garden to grow (Genesis 3:17-18).  This reminder seems to have worked to some extent because in most of ancient times mankind has associated both the good and the bad in life with the actins of gods.  Unfortunately throughout most of that time they substituted manmade gods for the one true God, Yahweh, and pretty much missed the point and even making things worse.  In addition to using this tweaked system as a way to remind us that he exists and that we have offended him, God sometimes overrides the rule causing flooding (Genesis 7:4) or drought or other problems to get someone’s immediate attention.  We must remember though that God is using all of this to get us to move back toward him.  We also must remember that we need to work hard to overcome the consequences of this broken system.  We need to study the system and work hard to deal with weeds and disease and drought and flooding and whatever else has fallen apart.  We cannot just say, “Oh that storm was the will of god, too bad for those poor suffering people”.  We need to show God’s love for them by helping those in need and we need to understand and find ways to keep them out of need in the future (A wise man builds his house on a good foundation where the wind and rain and floods cannot hurt it (Matthew 7:24-27)).

So the people of Jeremiah’s day were experiencing a drought.  Whether it was just a part of the tweaked system of a specific action directly from God we don’t know.  What we do know is that the drought was serious.  Cisterns are sort of like storage tanks.  They were “pools” that often had “lids” on them where water would be captured and stored in the rainy season for use in the dry season.  Some of these pools were also fed by springs to collect the water from them in the same way.  In our story we see that the cisterns are dry, imagine turning on your water this morning and having nothing come out of the pipes, then you find out that there is no water in any of the pipes in your city, and no bottled water in the stores either.; very bad.  It seems like part of the problem was that there had been no rain.  The dirt was dry and cracking apart.  The situation was so bad that the deer (who would usually never do this) were abandoning their babies; Bambi was being left alone.  Even the wild donkeys who were used to living in the desert were panting like a dog longing for a little water and food.  Pretty bad when even the desert is becoming more wasted.

The response is that the people were “put to shame”, “humiliated”, and “covering their heads”.  Another way the word “shame” is translated in the Bible is “confounded”, the people had no answer; no solution, that is very humbling.  I don’t really have a good answer about what it means to cover your head.  Sometimes the idea of having your head covered is about protection and other times it is related to this idea of humility and shame.  Other times it is related to recognizing authority above you and sometimes it is associated with mourning and sadness.  I suppose most of those ideas could be at play here.  We have been told that the people were humiliated and in shame, they certainly should have been sad, too.  With no solution to their problem their only hope was for someone bigger that them who cared to be out there; someone who had authority over the physical universe; someone who might protect them.

In verse 7 it seems like the people were actually recognizing that they had offended God and needed his help.  They even seem to have the right motives; they don’t want Yahweh’s  (LORD) good name defamed.  But verses 8-9 show their real attitude both toward God and about him.  First of all they see God as a Savior, good right?  But they see him only as a savior “in times of distress”.  That’s a bad way to see God, it assumes that there are times when we are not in need and we can exist without God help; it ignores that we really are all in need physically and spiritually all the time.  Second they also accuse God of not really caring; they say he like a guy just spending the night and moving on in the morning.  I think that the fact that Jeremiah was consistently warning the people of Judah for something like 40 years shows that God was not just “passing through”.  In fact the time of Jeremiah is one of the greatest concentrations of prophetic activity that we have record of; Jeremiah overlaps with Nahum, Zephaniah, Habakkuk, Ezekiel, and Daniel.  Sounds like God was pretty involved to me.  The accusations get even worse in verse 9 when they say it’s like God is “astonished”; incapable of dealing with the situation.  They are either saying God can’t or God doesn’t care enough to help them.  At the end of verse 9 the do seem to recognize that God could help them, but they still have a pretty bad attitude toward him.

In verses 10-12 we learn what God thinks of their prayer.  Even if some of it is true they are following God half way.   God told them in the beginning of their existence as a nation that they were to have no other gods, but according to verse 10 (and history) they loved to wander.  Because of their repeated cheating on him God decided the time had come (“now”) to deal with their disobedience, disrespect, and rebellion.  God asked Jeremiah again not to pray for them and told Jeremiah that he was not gong to accept their offerings anymore.  In manmade religions the offerings were supposed to act like bribes to the gods; you would pay them off to stop disaster and to get favors.  In the relationship between the Israelites and the true God, Yahweh, the offerings were designed to be reminders; they were to help the Israelites (and by example the rest of us) remember the bad situation they (and us) are in with respect to our relationship with God.  The Israelites had started offering offerings to other (false) gods and had let their attitude about the offerings in the Law of Moses change; they thought they were paying off Yahweh too.

This is the third time God has told Jeremiah not to pray for the people (Jeremiah 7:16; 11:14) and Jeremiah clearly doesn’t like the idea.  Jeremiah makes sure that God know that the people are being misled by other “prophets’.  It’s like he is saying, “Wait a minute, these other guys have been tricking them, telling them that trouble is not coming!”  In verse 14 God tells Jeremiah that these other guys are a n of liars and that he did not send them.  Interestingly the very things that they said would not happen to the people of Judah God would cause to happen to them; they would die by the sword and famine.  In verse 16 though we find that the people also would suffer the same fate; they too would die by the sword and famine.  Not just the men either (who were basically in charge in that society) but their wives and children would die too.  Don’t make the mistake of accusing God of being unfair though, these people, all of them, would suffer because of their own actions.  Each of them individually had made the choice to cheat on God and each of them individually would suffer because of it.  This doesn’t mean that “innocent” (or should we say less guilty) people don’t suffer when others disobey God, because they do.  In this case though we see that most of the people are generally guilty of turning to false Gods and that God is going to bring trouble because of it.  Ultimately Jeremiah suffers along with the rest but he clearly doesn’t die in any of the invasions.  We have seen that God is very patient but that he does have standards and that there are consequences for breaking his rules.  The fact that he is so involved in trying to get us to turn back to him should give us comfort that he will do all that he can to bring us the best life (and eternity) possible.  And when all is said and done we are all guilty and deserve to be banished, it is only because of God’s mercy that there is nay way back at all.

We cannot blame others for our disobedience.  We are each responsible to see and hear God.  We each have to decide whether to live for God or for something else.  God works very hard at helping us see the truth about Him and about eternity.  God is slow to anger but he eventually will deal with disobedience and rebellion on our part.  We have an opportunity to be forgiven.  Jesus paid the price we owed for our sin.  Jesus was separated fro God the Father for some period of time in our place.  As the infinite God-man his sacrifice was big enough for all of us, but only those who turn to him will be called children of God (John 1:12).  Stop listening to the false prophets and your own selfish heart and turn to God today.  Give him your life and your eternity before he decides “now” is the time to deal more directly with you and your society.

God help me be a voice of truth about you to those around me.  Thank you for your mercy.  Help me help others see the bad situation we are in.  Help me show them the way to be right with you now and forever.  Thank you for Jesus.  Thank you that one day you will give us a fixed forever world to live in.  I hope there will still be tomatoes in that world because I’d love to see what they do in a perfect environment with not floods or drought, just the right amount of everything.  I look forward to seeing your loving provision at it’s fullest, the way you always wanted it to be.  Give me patience and endurance in the mean time to deal with the weeds.  Help them always remind me of my failure and your desire for me to return to you.  Thank you for the reminders.  Thank you for your love.

Jeremiah 13:15-27.  For the third day in a row, wow!  Or should I say woe?  In Bible language “woe” is what we here from angles and other messengers from God when something serious is happening.  It’s sort of a cry of sadness and emotional pain.  Jeremiah is one of those messengers (as all prophets are) and he certainly is suffering here, although he doesn’t use the typical “woe”.  As I read this I can feel his pain.  I also wonder if the prophets ever felt like total failures, how can you spend your whole life warning people who never listen and not feel like you have failed?  But Jeremiah was faithful in spite of the response of the people of Judah.

Today’s reading is a warning directly to the royal family.  We don’t know which king this was addressed to but it must have been one of the later ones because the exile is directly in mind here.  The principle though would apply to any one of the kings.  Jeremiah first encourages the king to be humble.  As I reread the “Intro to Jeremiah” I thought that this cold have been during the time of Jehoiakim.  He ruled for 12 years and during his time there was  domination by the Babylonians.  He also had a new palace built for himself, increased taxes (which in those days usually went to support the king), and eventually made an alliance with Egypt n an attempt to get rid of Babylonian domination.  He sounds pretty prideful; pretty into himself; and in need o little humility.

In verse 16 the history surrounding whatever king was in power is compared to a journey in the hills.  But it is getting dark and there is a danger of stumbling.  Jeremiah encourages the king to “give glory to the LORD (Yahweh) your God.”  The Hebrew word “God” is interesting because it is related to the word for strength.  I wonder if the king got that hint; Yahweh is your real strength.  Also the word “glory” has as part of it’s meaning the idea of “heavy” or “weighty”.  The idea is that something is very impressive.  When we give glory to God we are admitting how impressive he is.  Jeremiah is encouraging this king to be impressed with Yahweh (the personal name of the one true God) and be impressed with his power.  If he doesn’t then the darkness of the events surrounding the king are only going to get worse, much worse.

In Jeremiah 11:14 God told Jeremiah not to pray for the people of Judah.  The people had been warned from the beginning that if they got involved with false gods that the one true God would put them into the hands of the ones they were trusting in.  That is why Jeremiah was told not to ask God for help, he would not give it (at that time at least, because as we have seen God does not ultimately abandon all Israelites for all time) .  Here in Jeremiah 13:17 Jeremiah cries in secret because once again his message is being rejected.  The pride of the king has resulted in the captivity of his subjects.  Jeremiah does not just sit around having a pity party for himself though he gets right back up and keeps doing what a prophet is supposed to do, bugging people about God.  By this point in the story all of the people of Judah have been taken captive but there is still hope if the king will turn back to God and quit trying to be the boss.  It seems that the city of Jerusalem itself is still unconquered or that there is still some piece of the kingdom intact.  In those days it was not uncommon for a conqueror to leave people in a region sort of running their own lives but they would have to send tribute (a kind of tax honoring the conqueror) to him.  That was certainly going on in the later years of Jeremiah’s ministry.  Jehoiakim died and the kingdom was taken over by his son Jehoichin right before an invasion in response to a rebellion by his father.  That invasion resulted in he and his mother (the queen mother of verse 18?) being taken captive back to Babylon.  Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon appointed his uncle as the new “king” of the area.  It seems like his uncle would not fit the situation in verse 21 where the conqueror “appoints one you have taught” as head over them.  But the uncle was the ruler in Jerusalem while the king and his mother were captives in Babylon.  Nebuchadnezzar had a policy of keeping the Jewish people segregated in captivity; they lived separately.  We also know that Nebuchadnezzar took some very young but smart Israelites and made them leaders (Daniel was one of these along with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego (Daniel 1)).  It cold be that Jehoiachin was now being “ruled” by someone who had been a student in his “kingdom”.  The description of the invasion (from the North, v. 20) fits with the path Nebuchadnezzar took each time he invaded the area.

In verses 21-22 it is the king who is feeling the pain now, “Why has this happened to me?!”  The answer is because of his “iniquity”.  That word contains the idea of bent or twisted.  All of the talk about pride and humility in this section makes me think that this particular king had twisted reality by making himself the center of attention instead of God; he thought he was the powerful one to be honored instead of God.  But instead of honor his life becomes one of shame instead.  In verse 22 we see that he is stripped naked, publicly.  Although some people think there is some sort of honor in being naked in public I think most of us would agree that we would be very uncomfortable if all of the sudden at school or a restaurant we were stripped of all of our clothes and pushed out in front of everyone.

There seems to be a change in who Jeremiah is talking to somewhere around verse 20 or 21.  Although it looks like he is still talking to the ruler remember that he was taken into captivity in verses 18-19.  And he is definitely talking to an individual who had been trusted with the “flock” (the people of Judah) in verse 20-21.  But by verse 22 we see that there is more thatn one person being stripped naked (“skirts”).  We have seen in previous posts that we are each individually responsible before God.  Certainly the king is responsible for his actions but the people are responsible for theirs too.  And at this point in history the people were putting a lot of pressure on the king or other leaders to rebel against Babylon, make alliances with Egypt, and other things that God had told them not to do.  While these verse have a message for the leader I think we also see the people being scolded too.

In verse 23 Jeremiah uses two examples of things that are basically fixed, the color of a persons skin and the pattern of an animals fur, to show that the people and rules of Israel are not going to honor God.  Certainly people can change, but as we saw yesterday, it takes direct help from God for that to happen.  We also saw that we need to want God to help us, he will not force himself on us.  Here we see that the people and the leaders have rejected God.  So God is going to allow the winds of human events to carry them away; Nebuchadnezzar is going to invade and do what he wants with them.

In the last half of verse 25 and in verses 26-27 we see that the shame they are going to suffer is because they have trusted in lies.  The lies are specifically about God and gods.  The people have forgotten the true God and have cheated on him with false gods on every hill and in every field.

There are at least three things that impressed me in today’s reading.  First is that God will allow human events to run their course, sometimes.  Although he can always control events sometimes he lets us run our own path (and it usually means trouble when we do).  We certainly saw that idea in Isaiah when the Assyrians were “used” by God to deal with the Northern Kingdom but were later help accountable for their excessive brutality.  God did not force them to be brutal and then punish them, he allowed them to act and them help them accountable for their extremeness.  Second is that there are consequences for not recognizing God for who he is but god is also very giving and forgiving.  God constantly warns us and gives us opportunities to return to him.  It’s not one strike and you are out or even three, God give us many chances to turn back to him.  And as we saw yesterday he not only gives us chances but he want to help us have a good relationship with him.  Even in the “twilight” (dusky, v. 16) of their existence as a kingdom Jeremiah was bringing God’s message to turn back to God.  Finally I am impressed how it always seems to come back to people.  In the talk of kings and kingdoms it is the “sheep” that God is most concerned about.  It’s not the palaces and fields and lands that Jeremiah is weeping over but the captive flock, the missing sheep (vv. 17, 20).  In contrast there is going to be a time when the devil has a kingdom set up on earth.  Interestingly his capital will either be where Babylon was or will be compared to Babylon.  During the reign of Satan God will cause great trouble on the earth in order to get people to turn to Him (Revelation 9:20-21; 16:9-11), but they will not.  At one point God will destroy the center of Satan’s kingdom, Babylon the Great City.  Interestingly the language used to describe the attitude of the people represented by that city is a lot like the attitudes of the king and queen mother in today’s reading.  Also what interests me is that while Jeremiah creid for the sheep; the people, in that future world the people of the world will be sad because of all the stuff that is lost with the destruction of Satan’s capital.  We love stuff but God loves us, that is the thing I am most impressed with in today’s reading.

Just the other day I was talking with a young person who was being bugged by another young person.  The other person was constantly telling them that they were basically “trash”; useless junk.  I can’t even use the best word I have to reject that kind of talk but let’s just say that person’s attitude toward the other person should be coming out of the opposite end of their body not their mouth.  It is very clear to me that we are precious to God, in spite of the the fact that we are constantly being disrespectful and disobedient toward him.  God loves us!  That is why he created us (even knowing all the bad stuff each of us would do), and that is why he warns and warns and warns.  We are precious to God, each one of us, and he wants us, each one of us, in Heaven with him for eternity.  He will even do and allow extreme event in our lives to try to get our attention.  If you have given your life to Yahweh remember that you are precious to him and honor him with your lives each day.  If you have not given your life to Him, remember that you are precious to Him,  and there is nothing you have done that he is not willing to forgive.  Even if you are at the edge of darkness or fully in the night you can turn to God and he will forgive you and accept you back.  Don’t just hope for light but turn to Jesus.  He is the light of the world and if you turn to him you will no longer have to walk in darkness but see his path now and for eternity.

God help be a light giver.  Let me help the world see you and realize how much you love us and want us.  Help me show the people around me that Jesus is the one true path to a great forever with you.  Help me honor you and you alone.  Help me be concerned with people and not with stuff.  Help me honor you by loving what you love.  Thank you for loving me and giving yourself for me, help me love others and give myself for them.