CHAPTER 12 GOD CALLS JEREMIAH
It is interesting when you read the dialogue between God and those he calls in the Old Testament, that there is normally a frankness and honesty in the exchanges that take place. Jeremiah is very close to my own heart because reading his call and life was very influential in my own call to the ministry! Read the following remarkable words in chapter 1:
4 The word of the LORD came to me, saying,
5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”
6 “Alas, Sovereign LORD,” I said, “I do not know how to speak; I am too young.”
7 But the LORD said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am too young.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you.
8 Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the LORD.
9 Then the LORD reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “I have put my words in your mouth.”
That remarkable passage is the key to understanding the call of Jeremiah and I want to look at in some detail, but first I want to home in on the circumstances that Jeremiah found himself in and into which he was called to speak God’s word:
1 The word of the LORD came to me: 2 “Go and proclaim in the hearing of Jerusalem:
“This is what the LORD says:
“‘I remember the devotion of your youth,
how as a bride you loved me
and followed me through the wilderness,
through a land not sown.
3 Israel was holy to the LORD,
the firstfruits of his harvest;
all who devoured her were held guilty,
and disaster overtook them,’”
declares the LORD.
4 Hear the word of the LORD, you descendants of Jacob,
all you clans of Israel.
5 This is what the LORD says:
“What fault did your ancestors find in me,
that they strayed so far from me?
They followed worthless idols
and became worthless themselves.
9 “Therefore I bring charges against you again,”
declares the LORD.
“And I will bring charges against your children’s children.
10 Cross over to the coasts of Cyprus and look,
send to Kedar and observe closely;
see if there has ever been anything like this:
11 Has a nation ever changed its gods?
(Yet they are not gods at all.)
But my people have exchanged their glorious God
for worthless idols.
12 Be appalled at this, you heavens,
and shudder with great horror,”
declares the LORD.
13 “My people have committed two sins:
They have forsaken me,
the spring of living water,
and have dug their own cisterns,
broken cisterns that cannot hold water.
These verses come from chapter 2 and are the essence of God’s complaint against his people – one that will lead to them going into captivity and exile in Babylon for 70 years and where Jerusalem and the temple will lie in ruins all of that time. Jeremiah has some hard things to say to the people, but just in case we think that he himself is a bit of a hard-nosed preacher, listen to his heart:
“Since my people are crushed, I am crushed;
I mourn, and horror grips me.
Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then is there no healing
for the wound of my people?
Oh, that my head were a spring of water
and my eyes a fountain of tears!
I would weep day and night
for the slain of my people.”
These words are found at the end of chapter 8 and the very beginning of chapter 9. Jeremiah is called to speak hard things to hard hearts but it always comes from a deeply sensitive heart in both God and Jeremiah.
With the above background in mind [Jeremiah is dated around 600BC] let’s return to the call and see how God speaks to his prophet and how the dialogue progresses.
“I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb!”
That is an astonishing statement. Notice that the Lord does not say “I knew you when you were formed in your mother’s womb”, or “I knew you as you were formed in your mother’s womb”; he says “I knew you before you were formed in your mother’s womb.” Before even the first embryonic cells existed, God knew Jeremiah!! This is even different from Psalm 139:
“13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed body;”
Wonderfully in the Psalm the Lord is spoken of in his watchful care over the growing child inside the mother’s womb. In this passage in Jeremiah, the Lord is referred to as “knowing” the prophet before he was even in this embryonic condition. When the Bible speaks of “knowing” it is normally referring to a most personal form of relationship. The incredible thing in this passage is that God is depicted as having a relationship with Jeremiah long before he existed physically – a relationship that existed before time itself. Paul describes this in Ephesians 1 when he says at the beginning of the chapter that before the world was created God, in his love for us, chose us to be his own – more than that, he chose us in Christ and planned our adoption into his family before a universe or star existed! Can you imagine this? God has quite simply always loved us! There has never been a time when he has not loved us. This is what God is saying to us through this call of Jeremiah, for what is true for him is true for all of us.
“When did you start to love us?” we might ask God.
“I have always loved you!”
“But you must have known what we would become and how bad our lives would become!”
“Yes, but my love for you is greater than anything – even your sin and rebellion. I have never thought of you in any other way than with the deepest, most perfect and eternal love!”
Do you hear that? Do you hear what God is saying to us through what he is telling Jeremiah? There is a beautiful song by Aaron Neville and I want to quote it in full because I think it can depict our relationship with God:
“Look at this face
I know the years are showing
Look at this life
I still don’t know where it’s going
Look at these eyes
They never see what matters
Look at these dreams
So beaten and so battered
So many questions
Still left unanswered
So much I’ve never broken through
And when I feel you near me
Sometimes I see so clearly
The only truth I’ve known
Is me and you
Look at this man
So blessed with inspiration
Look at this soul
Still searching for salvation
I don’t know much
But I know you love me
That may be all I need to know
I don’t know much
But I know you love me
That may be all there is to know.”
The man in this song is searching for meaning and as he does this he sees the incompleteness of his life – yet there is one thing that makes sense to him: He doesn’t know much but he knows he is loved and that may be all he needs to know. Then the final verse clarifies his thinking:
I don’t know much
But I know you love me
That may be all there is to know.”
Do you remember the story of the “Elephant Man?” John Merrick, was an English man with severe deformities who was exhibited as a human curiosity named the Elephant Man. He became well known in London society after he went to live at the London Hospital. Merrick was born in Leicester and began to develop abnormally during the first few years of his life. His skin appeared thick and lumpy, he developed an enlargement of his lips, and a bony lump grew on his forehead. One of his arms and both feet became enlarged and at some point during his childhood he fell and damaged his hip, resulting in permanent lameness. When he was 11, his mother died and his father soon remarried. Merrick left school at 12, and had difficulty finding employment. Rejected by his father and stepmother, he left home. In late 1879, aged 17, Merrick entered the Leicester Union Workhouse.
In 1884, after four years in the workhouse, Merrick contacted a showman named Sam Torr and proposed that Torr should exhibit him. Torr agreed, and arranged for a group of men to manage Merrick, whom they named the Elephant Man. After touring the East Midlands, Merrick travelled to London to be exhibited in a penny gaff shop on Whitechapel Road which was rented by showman Tom Norman. Norman's shop, directly across the street from the London Hospital, was visited by a surgeon named Frederick Treves, who invited Merrick to be examined and photographed. Soon after Merrick's visits to the hospital, Tom Norman's shop was closed by the police and Merrick's managers sent him to tour in Europe.
In Belgium, Merrick was robbed by his road manager and abandoned in Brussels. He eventually made his way back to London; unable to communicate, he was found by the police to have Frederick Treves' card on him. Treves came and took Merrick back to the London Hospital. Although his condition was incurable, Merrick was allowed to stay at the hospital for the remainder of his life. Treves visited him daily and the pair developed quite a close friendship. John Merrick’s abnormality meant that he could not sleep lying down because he would stop breathing. The film depicts Merrick finally experiencing human love and that enabled him to let go of life and die at peace. Love changed everything in this very emotional end to the film.
God is saying clearly to us that there has never, ever been a time when he has not loved us. God not only tells Jeremiah that he loves him but that he has a purpose for his life. There are only a few things that we need to know in life – perhaps Paul summed them up perfectly for us in 1 Corinthians 13:13, “These three remain, faith, hope and love, and the greatest of these is love.”
We have already looked at the supremacy of love. Faith too is fundamental. Trusting our life to God and trusting that our life with him has a purpose. I was speaking at length with a minister friend of mine who had to retire through ill health. He was no longer preaching or involved in the church and was quite obviously going through a time of profound and unsettling transition. God has a purpose for him and has yet to reveal what it is – he is being prepared for the next sphere of service but he is finding this period of transition difficult. What is God’s purpose for our lives?
To be part of a living organism called the body of Christ.
To play our part through developing in co-operation with the Holy Spirit, the graces of the Spirit so that our character is formed in accordance with the will of God – “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control.”
To be part of the body of Christ by understanding, exercising and maturing the gifts that the Spirit of God has given to us so that we might exercise them for the benefit of the rest of the Body. These gifts are many – hospitality, generosity, giving, faith, teaching, evangelism, administration, prayer and so the list goes on....
Whatever our gifting, this is something that God has planned from before our birth. My parents were not Christians though both of them were brought up in Christian homes. My mother’s maternal grandmother played a pivotal role in her life after my mother lost both her parents. Before my great grandmother died, she called my mother to come and see her. “The first child you shall bear will preach the gospel.” My mother was not even pregnant, though recently married. Before I was conceived God enabled this godly woman to know what my gifting would be. Why? Because, out of his great grace and mercy, he had already decided.
Is this not God speaking to us? When we realise what our gift is – what we are good at – is not this God speaking to us and saying – “Before you were even born, this was part of my plan for your life.” This is designed for our assurance.
Jeremiah is not too keen on the idea of being God’s prophetic mouthpiece. He tells God that he cannot speak for himself and that he is too young. Most of us may not be able to use the excuse of being too young but we can identify with Jeremiah when he says that he finds it difficult to speak for God. Why is this the case? Is it because we are afraid of potential mockery? Are we afraid that we might lose credibility and even social standing in the estimation of some people if we come right out and admit to the extent of our faith? Are we afraid of being branded as extremists? Or is the truth really that we do not have a deep and enduring love for God that begins to match the love that He has for us? Are we ashamed to speak about him in personal and emotional language? I don’t hear that same embarrassment when men in particular are speaking about their allegiance to their football team or indeed anything else that matters in people’s lives. Why is declaring our love for God such an issue? Are we being pressured by our secular society not to bring faith into the everyday experience of life? Have we swallowed the media and political propaganda that the practice of faith and religion belongs in the personal and private arena and has no place in the public arena and marketplace? Whatever, we have to ask God to give back to us a passion for the Son of God and help us to connect with the passionate love that Jesus had and still has for us. We need to revisit the Cross and see that despite the awful agonies, deprivation, degradation and humiliation of that place, he was so in love with us that he faced it all to save us – how can we be ashamed of love like this?
What is the Lord’s response to Jeremiah?
“Don’t say that!” Imagine you were responding to a child who had spoken out of turn, you might say something like, “I don’t ever want to hear you speaking like that again!” In other words there are times when God has to very firmly put us in our place! The next time you go into the Lord’s presence with excuses and complaints listen for that word from God that firmly answers us. That is not an unkind voice we are hearing – simply a fatherly response that cares enough about his child to want us to grow and mature!
“You must go wherever I send you..” God wants us to realise that we are not the masters of our own destiny. He wants to hear something like this from us: “What do you want me to do for you today?” He wants us to be available, open and responsive to his will. He does not want to see us acting selfishly with our lives – he needs to see the attitude of a servant – the same as was in Jesus.
“And say whatever I tell you..” What is it that we are commanded to say to people? Jesus tells us to go into the whole world with the gospel – to tell the story of the grace, forgiveness, love and salvation of Jesus Christ. We are to be the mouthpiece of God to the world in order that our world can hear and grasp the essence of the good, and lasting news there is in and for our world.
“And don’t be afraid of the people..” The Lord does not tell Jeremiah not to feel fear but rather not to be afraid. There is the world of difference between the two – to feel fear is perfectly normal, and in some cases entirely healthy and necessary. Jesus felt fear at least once, in the Garden of Gethsemane. To feel afraid means that we are nervous and apprehensive but it does not mean that we are incapacitated or prevented from action – it is simply an understandable emotion. To be afraid, on the other hand, often means that we are so incapacitated that we are prevented from action – we are in a condition of fear! As someone put it – “feel the fear and do it anyway” – this is what the Lord is saying to Jeremiah. What is he asked Jeremiah not to be afraid of? – the people! He is not to be so influenced by the opinions of people that he refuses to do what is right. It is the fear of people and what they might think of us that incapacitates the individual Christian [and whole churches] and prevents the Kingdom of God from advancing. Let’s be honest, the fear of people is not unfounded. Some people can be quite aggressively opposed to any statement of authentic faith – they do not want God interfering in their lives and actions. If the believer is to be true to God he or she very often has to swim against the tide of public opinion – an opinion that can be quite cutting and ungracious. Often there is such a cutting edge to faith and what it demands, the Christian cannot always be seen to be moderate – often the opposite.
Jeremiah’s problem was not that he had not clearly heard the voice of God but that he did not like what he was hearing! What lessons are there from us when we try and consider how God might be speaking to us today?
In Church today Gordon was preaching from Matthew 25 and the talents God gives us. God is a sending God – he sends us to people to be alongside them. He sends us to love people with a kind and compassionate heart. He sends us to speak to people about the hope we have as Christians. We are all “sent” people with different gifts, but the same aim and objective – to reach people and to speak to them about the Gospel! Our greatest problems are fear and complacency and so we hold back, hoping that others will do what we are reluctant to do. God is speaking to us. He is clearly asking us to speak to others and share our faith in word and action. He gives us no place to run because he tells us not to be afraid and that he will be with us. We have got to be willing vessels through which God can reach others – let us ask Him to do to us what he did to Jeremiah – touch our mouths and put his words into our mouths. He speaks to us in order that we might speak to the world.