Jeremiah 7:1-15.  Finally a break, sort of.  In today’s reading Jeremiah starts out by challenging the people to change their ways.  If they do God will let them stay in their town.  So far no talk about invasion and destruction.

One dictionary defines religion as “the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power.” (Apple Dictionary).  A second part of the definition deals with the “system of faith and worship”.  The Jewish people definitely had a system by which they worshipped (remembered the deeds and promises of God and honored him for those things) Yahweh (the personal name of the one true God as revealed to Moses. Exodus 3:14).  From the time of King
Solomon through the time of Jesus that worship involved a temple in Jerusalem (though the Northern Kingdom had it’s own places of worship after the division of the nation).  Ancient people credited their gods with a lot of power but their also thought that they could control their gods through bribes; sacrifices, gifts, and “rituals”.   Those religions became more about what they could get out of their gods rather that being times of remembrance and thanks.  Of course since their gods were only imagined I suppose there was nothing to thank them for anyway.  The true God, Yahweh, on the other hand has communicated his plan and expectations to mankind since the days of Adam and Eve.  As we compare that plan with the work of God we see unfolding in history we have reason to honor him.  That is part of what the “religion” of the Jews was supposed to be about.  Also it was supposed to keep the situation (sin and separation) between us and God in our minds (See “The Old Testament Connection” and also Romans 3:19-20).  But to the Jewish people the rules and regulations had become the end of the story rather than just a reminder pointing to God.  We see this trust in the ‘system” rather than in God in verse 4 when god tells the people don’t say “this is the temple of Yahweh”.  The three time repetition shows that it was about the temple rather than God, it was a habit to them.

The contrast to just going to “church” is found in verses 5-6 where they are told to treat others well and to be faithful to the one true God.  If they will really honor God with their lives then he would let them stay in the land.  In the end of verse 7 God brings up one of the promises that I mentioned above; the land was to belong to descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Israel, see “What’s in a Name”) forever.  So the reality of Yahweh can be checked out by the promises he has made and their fulfillment.  But we must also understand that, although the land would belong to Jacob’s descendants forever, that doesn’t mean that every generation would necessarily live there.  In God’s words here in today’s reading we see that sometimes we can miss out on good things God has for us because of our own actions.

Verses 8-11 describe how dumb they were in thinking just going to “church” could protect them.  They thought it didn’t matter what they did with their lives if they just entered the temple from time to time and followed the “religion” that Moses had given them.  In verse 11 God tells them he is watching and makes it clear that he know how they are living.

The fact that just playing at living for God cannot protect us from trouble is seen in two examples in verses 12-15.  Also in these examples we see what I was talking about above.  God reveals his plan and then acts so that we can see that he is real and active in our world and lives.  The first example is a place called Shiloh.  In the history of Israel they didn’t always have a temple.  After they left Egypt they wound up spending quie a bit of time in the Sinai Desert.  It would have been pretty tough to carry around a stone temple so God instructed them to build a Tabernacle, a sort of portable church or temple that was like a tent.  They entered the land promised to them by God and originally set us that tent, or tabernacle, near a town named Shiloh.  In fact the tabernacle was there for most of the next 400 years.  At the end of the time of the judges (actually in the time of the last judge, Samuel) the Israelites found themselves at war with some other inhabitants of their land, the Philistines.  In one of the initial battles the Israelites were defeated by the Philistines and wondered why Yahweh let then lose (if you want to know why go back and read through the book of Judges).  They decided that he best way to win was to go to Shiloh, to the tabernacle, and bring the “Ark of the Covenant” to the place of the next battle.

The “Ark” was a specially decorated wooden box that contained stone tablets that God had personally engraved with the ten first commandments of the Law of Moses on them.  The box also contained a branch that belonged to Moses brother Aaron.  This branch miraculously budded and produced almonds overnight in a display of God’s power.  It was a symbol of God’s choice of Aaron and his descendants to be the “priests” or representatives between God and the Israelite people.  Finally the ark contained a jar full of manna, the special food that God produced each day while the Israelites spent 40 years in the wilderness. The ark was a reminder to the Israelite people of the presence of God in their lives and actually was the place where God actually was present in the lives of the Israelites for most of the 400 years.

When the Israelites took the ark to the battle with the Philistines they made two mistakes.  First they violate God’s rules about the ark.  Since the ark represented God’s presence it was kept in a part of the tabernacle separate and forbidden for anyone to enter with one exception.  On one day each year, Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) the high priest, a descendant of Aaron, could enter the special area of the tabernacle and place a special offering on the ark.  Also when the tabernacle was moved from place to place during the forty years in the desert it was to be carried with special poles by certain Israelites.  It was not to be touched upon penalty of death.  Second the Israelites mistook the ark for the actual presence of God.  At the battle the Israelites were again defeated and the Philistines captured the ark.  During the battle 30,000 Israelite soldiers died including the two sons of the then High Priest, Eli.  Upon hearing the news of the defeat and capture of the ark, eli fell down and died of a broken neck.  The widow of one of the sons, pregnant at the time, went into labor when she heard the news.  She died in childbirth.  Just before she died she named the new son, Ichabod.  His name means “the glory has departed” and was a recognition that God was no longer going to be a helping presence in the lives of the Israelite people (See “What’s in a Name”) (1 Samuel 4).

In today’s reading God applies the events at Shiloh to the situation in the time of Jeremiah.  The people in Jeremiah’s day thought of the temple as a sort of good luck charm that would protect them from any enemies.  They were failing to see that God was the real power.  So God was going to allow one of their enemies, Babylon, to conquer and destroy the temple.

The other example of true verses false honoring of God involved the Assyrian conquest of the Northern Kingdom.  Here Jeremiah calls them Ephraim.  Ephraim was one of the twelve sons of Israel and was the name of one of the ten tribes of the Northern Kingdom.  Perhaps Jeremiah uses the name of this tribe to describe the Northern Kingdom because Shiloh was within the territory of Ephraim.  If the people of Judah wanted to ignore their connection with the Northern Kingdom they would also have to ignore their connection with Shiloh and the Ark.  In 722 BC the people of the Northern Kingdom were conquered and dispersed throughout the Assyrian Empire.  It was a punishment by God for years of distorted worship of Him and also worship of other gods.  As we saw in Zephaniah 1:5 God will not share his people with other so called gods.  The people of Judah were about to suffer the same punishment as their unfaithful brothers from in the North.

Being a Jew was not some game in which a pretend god was lived for.  Being a Jew meant a real relationship with the one true God, Yahweh.  This relationship was to be instructive to the world around them.  In it’s best form this example could have shown the world the love and provision of God.  But is also would have shown his purity and specialness (holiness of God)) through the standards of the Law of Moses.  Unfortunately most of the time this second lesson was all that was seen as the Israelites suffered punishment for being untrue to God and his rules.  It wasn’t enough to be religious and pretend either, the point of the reality and presence of a real good loving and pure being was probably the most important part of the Israelite example, a point they failed to realize and live out.  For now the Israelite people are on the bench as God’s players in the world and the church is in the game.  In a very similar warning about our actions as God’s people Paul told the believers in Corinth not to make alliances with the world.  As followers of Jesus they were to be light to world, living right with God.  He then called them the Temple of the Living God.  People with who God would walk personally and encouraged them to live pure and separate lives for God.  We, like them, are the people of God and need to follow the encouragement that Paul gave them, we can’t just play at church or we run the same risk as the people of Judah in Jeremiahs day.  We need to learn the lesson from Shiloh and Ephraim and Judah and paint a true picture of a relationship with the one true God, Yahweh or risk the same sort of punishment.

God help me paint a true picture of you to the world.  Help me be serious about our relationship.  Let our relationship show the world that you are the one true living God, a god with standards and a God who loves and provides.  Let my trust be in you and not in worldly alliances nor in my own ideas and inventions.  Thank you for your patience when I fail.  Help me succeed with you and for you.

Jeremiah 6:16-30.  Today’s reading continues the warning to Jerusalem and Judah that has been a major part of the book so far.  In the first two verses God challenges the people to follow the way that has been shown to them for centuries, but they refuse.  Then he challenges them to listen to the message they have been told for centuries, and again they refuse.  Notice that the “path” they were to follow is called “the good way” and it is a path that leads to rest.  Notice too that the “rest” is for their “soul” that is their inner being, the part of you that is really you.  In Ecclesiastes the last king of the united nation of Israel informs us that we have “eternity in our hearts” (Ecclesiastes 3:11).  The point is that we know we are eternal, we know that we are made to relate to God, and that is why all through human history mankind has made up gods and ways to honor them.  Our inner being will not allow us to deny God’s existence and it seems to realize there is a problem in the relationship.  Our souls want rest with respect to God.  The problem is we are rebellious and disrespectful in our being as well.  That is how the relationship with God got broken to begin with and tht is how it stays broken.  The only rest is to follow god path back to him, and we need help doing it.  Jesus is that path (John 14:6) and the holy Spirit is that help (John 14-16).

In verses 18-19 god addresses the whole earth.  The Israelites were to be an example to the rest of the people groups on the earth, if they had followed God then the earth would have come to understand that Yahweh was the one true person that they needed to get right with, that Yahweh was the God they were longing to be with in eternity.  But Israel’s defection meant a different type of lesson, this lesson would also make the reality of which God was the one true God clear.  But it would be a hard and painful lesson for Israel (see “The Old Testament Connection”), a disaster according to the words of verse 19.  Also you might want to notice that the trouble was deserved, it is called the “fruit” of their plans or schemes; the coming trouble was brought on by their own actions.  Verse 19 also makes it very clear that the actions are rebellion and disobedience against God (they didn’t listen to his words or obey his rules).  The actions in verse 20 are about honoring God; making offerings to him, but he doesn’t want them.  According to Psalm 51:17 the sacrifices that God wants are a broken and crushed heart.  The offerings in the Law Of Moses were there to make things right between us and God they were there to show us how wrong things were.  First of all the Israelites never were faithful to the rules; that was lesson one.  But the Psalm 51:16 tells us that God is not pleased ‘burnt offerings”, the kind of offering s Jeremiah is talking about in today’s reading, but also burned animal offerings described in the Law of Moses.  Of course god doesn’t delight in them, they are disgusting reminders of the consequence of Adam and Eve’s rebellion against him.  On the day they broke the rule death came into human existence; spiritual death (or separation from God) and physical death (the eventual separation of our soul or spirit from our bodies).  The spiritual death is seen in the fact that God was asking Adam where he was later that fateful day, physical death was seen in the example of the clothes God made for them.  Can you imagine the horror as God ripped the skin from a dead animal and put that bloody coat onto Adam and Eve?  The disgusting reality of what they had done (and what each of us does every day) should have broken and crushed their hearts.  Unfortunately we have become good at ignoring the truth, the death and suffering in our world today should be constant reminders of our broken relationship with God.  We need to respond not with some bits of tree bark in a fire but with a bits of a broken heart offered to God.  In verse 21 we see God making the people fall down.  It’s more of the same idea, getting our attention, making us realize our brokenness.  The point of pain and suffering in our world, and how much it offends us, is that we should cause us to look back to God and be internally broken about our relationship with him.

Verses 22-26 describe harsh destruction that is coming.  Big pride requires big pain to break it.  The Israelites, and especially the people of Judah and Jerusalem, somehow felt that they were immune to trouble, they were God’s chosen people and God had made them promises.  But they were enemies of God just like you and me and needed to realize it.  So the trouble would come.  Notice though that God calls them his daughter.  Also notice that there are warnings in the passage not just about what is coming but about what not to do when it does.  Also this “daughter” is encouraged to be sad, mourn, it’s a lot like the attitude David described in that Psalm, a broken and crushed heart.

The fact that God is interested in progress and not just pain is seen in how he describes Jeremiah.  The message Jeremiah is bringing and the eventual “fire” of the invasion are designed to purify.  An assayer in our day is a person who tests metal to see what kind and how pure it is.  In these verses the person seems to have the job of purifying the metal as well as inspecting it, we might call him an assayer and smelter.  The words used mean tester or inspector and gatherer so the idea fits.  We are told the results of the test, the people are stubborn and rebellious; their lives are like a soap opera or wild story.  Their lives are corrupt, spoiled like useless rotten fruit.  God keeps working on them but they just aren’t getting pure the wickedness stays in these people who are like bronze and iron (two very strong metals in those days).  It is unfortunate because God is looking for silver and he finds none so they are rejected.

Metals are what they are, but is clear from Jeremiah so far that people can change or be changed.  There is no silver in iron or Bronze but God is the creator of the universe and he can transform us.  In Romans 12:1-2 Paul tells the believers not to be conformed to the world but to be transformed by the renewing of their mind.  In Ephesians 4:17-24 language very similar to that of Romans 12, Psalm 51, and today’s reading we learn that we are renewed when we submit our lives to God through who Jesus is and what he has done for us.  In Romans 12:2 that word “transformed” is the Greek word we get our word metamorphosis from.  When we allow God to take control of or live we can be transformed from a slim little larva into the beautiful butterfly that God wants us to be.  When there is fire in our lives we need to see if God is telling us something and respond.

God as you refine me and transform me let me be cooperative.  Change me from prideful iron and bronze in to beautiful silver.  Let my life be conformed to your plan for me and when the nations look at me let them not see the seriousness of your wrath but the beauty of your love and mercy.  Thank you for taking the time to purify me, let me be ready for an eternity with you when it comes.