The human Jeremiah

Jeremiah by Rembrandt

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Jeremiah 20:7-18

TO CHEW ON: "Then I said, 'I will not make mention of Him,
Nor speak anymore in His name!'
But His word was in my heart like a burning fire
Shut up in my bones; I was weary of holding it back
And I could not." Jeremiah 20:9

Poor Jeremiah—he is not a happy prophet. In our reading today we see the human heart of this mouthpiece of God.

Putting his lament in context, the early verses of Jeremiah 20 describe how Pashur the priest and governor reacts to a previous negative prophecy. He puts Jeremiah in stocks in a gate near the temple. It sounds public and humiliating.

Jeremiah is released the next day, unbowed. He prophecies a future of Babylonian captivity on not only the nation but specifically on Pashur and his household. I'm sure that goes over well! And then he comes out with his complaint to God.

"You induced me, and I was persuaded," he says. But the result is that he becomes "A reproach and derision."

He decides to shut up—not speak God's prophecies any more. But they burn inside him; he can't keep silent. So he speaks again, enduring more of the same, feeling egged on and betrayed by "All my acquaintances." Family and friends too? It sounds like it.

The curious part of his monologue is the section where he breaks into sublime praise (Jeremiah 20:11-13). It's almost as if, in the middle of his rant, he gets a glimpse of reality:

"But the Lord is with me as a Mighty Awesome One.
Therefore my persecutors will stumble and not prevail…"

Alas, he doesn't stay there but slips even deeper into depression, wishing he'd never been born (Jeremiah 20:14-18).

Jeremiah's honesty here can instruct us:

- Even great prophets have a human side. Jeremiah longed to be accepted and liked, not unlike most of us. Maybe we need to remind ourselves of him when we're tempted to criticize our teachers, pastors and "prophets."

- Jeremiah didn't keep quenching the Holy Spirit within him. Under the Spirit's compulsion he kept speaking, despite how his listeners responded or didn't. Let's not let the negative reaction to the gospel in our time silence us either.

- When he looked at the big eternal picture his tune changed to praise:

"Sing to the Lord! Praise the Lord!
For He has delivered the life of the poor
From the hand of evildoers" - Jeremiah 20:11.

The same can be true for us.

- But he allowed himself to slip back into the dumps. I wish he had kept his focus on God—that he had ended with verse 13 (Jeremiah 20:13) instead of verse 18 (Jeremiah 20:18).

Jeremiah's slip-slide into gloom reminds me of something Joyce Meyer teaches: "We have to purposely choose right thinking. After we have finally decided to be like-minded with God, then we will need to choose and continue to choose right thoughts" - Joyce Meyer, Battlefield of the Mind, p. 26).

PRAYER:
Dear God, thank You for using flawed human instruments like Jeremiah. Remind me of him and his humanness when I'm tempted to criticize the pastors and prophets in my life. Help me to overcome depressing thoughts with thoughts of the eternal truths of Your word. Amen.

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Offended, turned off, turning back

"Jesus Preaching In the Temple"
-Pierre Louis Van Schuppen

TODAY'S SPECIAL: John 6:52-71

TO CHEW ON: "Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this said, 'This is a hard saying; who can understand it?' .... From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more." John 6:60,66

The disciples' offense arose out of Jesus' controversial statements about eating His flesh and drinking His blood. They couldn't understand it and it turned them off Jesus - John 6:53-59.

We are not immune from being offended by Jesus and what the Bible teaches. Though it may be a different set of concepts that give offense, people are turned off and turn back as much as ever. Even us so-called believers.

Who of us, for example, hasn't felt a twinge of offense when we envision Jesus' teachings fleshed out in our lives in the areas of:
- non-resistance to an evil person - Matthew 5:39-42.
- loving our enemies - Matthew 5:44.
- the exclusivity of "the way" - Matthew 7:13-14.

Jesus' clear teaching about hell, a place of eternal torment (Matthew 18:9, 25:30; Luke 16:24) is in disfavor among some Christians these days.

So is the Bible's stance on some issues of morality. I recently became aware of the Episcopal Church's rejection of the English Standard Version of the Bible because of its plain speech condemning homosexuality in 1 Corinthians 6:9. (Trouble is, they've already approved the RSV, NIV, CEV and other versions where the language is just as clear - article here)

Jesus' reported words and the teachings of the early church's apostles leave lots of room for faith and trust in areas that we can't make sense of with our minds or that don't fit with our current culture. Let's not let a lack of cerebral understanding or the fear of being politically incorrect cause us to go back and walk with Him no more, as it did some of Jesus' first century disciples.

PRAYER: Dear God, please develop in me spiritual understanding that is not offended by things I must take by faith. Amen. 

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Our setting according to God

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Genesis 2:4-25

TO CHEW ON: "This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created; in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens." Genesis 2:4

When a science fiction writer sets out to spin her tale, she describes early on in the story the setting, letting us observe her made-up universe and explaining its rules. In some ways our reading today does that for our home — the earth. We find at least seven foundational pillars that hold up and explain, according to God, the way life on earth came about and functions best:

1. God created the heaven and the earth (Genesis 2:4).

2. God formed man and gave him life (Genesis 2:7). Out of the lowliest, commonest part of creation — dust — God shaped him and intimately "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being."

3. God gave man work — a purpose for living as the keeper of a garden (Genesis 2:15).

4. God set boundaries for human behaviour — an opportunity for man to exercise his will to obey and live or disobey and die (Genesis 2:17).

5. God created animals and charged Adam with the task of naming them (Genesis 2:19,20). This implies a human precedence over the animal kingdom. We're not the same. For example, killing an animal is not murder, like killing a human being is.

6. God made woman and Adam recognized her as his "comparable" (Genesis 2:22, 23). "'Comparable to him' denotes complementarity. The needed help is for daily work, procreation, and mutual support through companionship" - Russell Bixler, notes on Genesis,  New Spirit-Filled Life Bible, p. 7.

7. God established marriage (vs. 24).
"Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother..." Leave tells us there is a change of priorities here. Mom and Dad (Mom-in-law, Dad-in-law) are no longer the focus of this relationship.
"...and be joined to his wife..." They are to be joined in passion and permanence.
"...and they shall become one flesh." One flesh implies sexual union, conceiving children, being spiritually and emotionally intimate, and living with each other in the same way one does with one's blood family of birth.

These pillars have been under attack from the first Eden days ("Then the serpent said to the woman, 'You shall not surely die.'" - Genesis 3:4) till now. However, ignoring or flaunting any one of them in belief and behaviour does, I think, put us on a wrong track and cause our lives to be out-of-kilter with the way God designed us to work best.

The challenge for us is to stand firm on God's order of things in spite of society's clamouring against aspects of it, like the questioning of God's existence, the fact that He is the creator, the existence of an objective moral standard, the eternal implications of disobeying God, and the sanctity of marriage, to name a few.

PRAYER: Dear God, thank You for laying out our setting so clearly. Help me to stay focused on the way You say things are and not be distracted or swayed by the world's arguments against Your order. Amen.


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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Unpopular prophets

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Amos 7:1-17

TO CHEW ON: "Then Amaziah said to Amos, 'Go you seer! Flee to the land of Judah. There eat bread and there prophesy. But never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king's sanctuary and it is the royal residence.'" Amos 7:12-13

We should probably not find it surprising that Amaziah, King Jeroboam's high priest, reacted to Amos's negative prophecies by telling him to shut up and leave. It is not comfortable to have an outsider come onto your territory and tell you that your country is prey for locusts, in danger of being burned and not plumb with God's standards.

However, the uncomfortable assignment of delivering unpopular pronouncements from God has always been part of a prophet's job description. The Bible is full of examples: Elijah, Jeremiah, John the Baptist, Jesus.

Like a true prophet, Amos was not intimidated. I'm not a prophet by profession or birth, he told Amaziah. But my message is from the Lord. Then, not backing down an inch, he told the man in plain words what would happen: "Israel shall surely be led away captive" (7:13).

The assignment for modern prophets* is no easier. People in our society who speak against the way we as a people and culture are violating God's standards may well find themselves in similar hot water, banned from speaking publicly, reading or quoting the Bible, and in Canada hauled in front of Human Rights Commissions.

As our society drifts farther and farther away from biblical standards, what we as Christians stand for becomes less and less mainstream and popular. And so we may find ourselves tempted to alter the message to make it more politically correct. For telling it straight will probably mean having to pay the price of being an unpopular prophet. Am I up for that? Are you?

PRAYER: Dear God, please help me be bold and unafraid to tell and uphold Your standards. Amen

MORE: Human Rights Commissions

In Canada we have a system in place to gag people who dare express ideas that aren't politically correct. Human Rights Commissions are quasi legal bodies active in each province. Most were first formed to help people get fair treatment when they faced things like racial and sexual discrimination at work or in regard to housing. In recent years HRC rulings have frequently come down against Christians who have attempted to uphold biblical morality especially in their positions against homosexuality.

Here, for example, is a case in Alberta from a few years ago, described by Ezra Levant:

"An even more terrifying precedent recently was set in Alberta. The case involved a letter to the editor written by a Christian pastor and published in the Red Deer Advocate newspaper. The letter was a zealous, even rude, expression of the pastor's belief that homosexuality was a sin, and that there was a homosexual political "agenda" that had to be stopped. But instead of joining the debate by writing a letter to the editor, a local teacher complained to the human rights commission.

The commission's one-woman panel—a divorce lawyer with no expertise in constitutional rights—ruled that "the publication's exposure of homosexuals to hatred and contempt trumps the freedom of speech afforded in the Charter." That was it: Freedom of speech, and of the press, and religion, all of which are called "fundamental freedoms" in our Constitution, now come second to the newly discovered right of a thin-skinned bystander not to be offended."

Read entire...

Jesus told us these kinds of things would happen. Instead of worrying about them, He assures us He will be with us when they do; we can face them with  carefree trust:  Matthew 10:16-19

¹⁶"Stay  alert. This is hazardous work I'm assigning you. You're going to be  like sheep running through a wolf pack, so don't call attention to  yourselves. Be as cunning as a snake, inoffensive as a dove.

 ^17-20"Don't  be naive. Some people will impugn your motives, others will smear your  reputation—just because you believe in me. Don't be upset when they haul  you before the civil authorities. Without knowing it, they've done  you—and me—a favor, given you a platform for preaching the kingdom news!  And don't worry about what you'll say or how you'll say it. The right  words will be there; the Spirit of your Father will supply the words.- Message

*prophet = nabiy

In the modern sense I'm thinking of the prophet as person who delivers God's message as revealed in the Bible (versus someone who foretells the future).

(From the archives)

Unpopular prophets

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Amos 7:1-17

TO CHEW ON: "Then Amaziah said to Amos, 'Go you seer! Flee to the land of Judah. There eat bread and there prophesy. But never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king's sanctuary and it is the royal residence.'" Amos 7:12-13

We should probably not find it surprising that Amaziah, King Jeroboam's high priest, reacted to Amos's negative prophecies by telling him to shut up and leave. It is not comfortable to have an outsider come onto your territory and tell you that your country is prey for locusts, in danger of being burned and not plumb with God's standards.

However, the uncomfortable assignment of delivering unpopular pronouncements from God has always been part of a prophet's job description. The Bible is full of examples: Elijah, Jeremiah, John the Baptist, Jesus.

Like a true prophet, Amos was not intimidated. I'm not a prophet by profession or birth, he told Amaziah. But my message is from the Lord. Then, not backing down an inch, he told the man in plain words what would happen: "Israel shall surely be led away captive" (7:13).

The assignment for modern prophets* is no easier. People in our society who speak against the way we as a people and culture are violating God's standards may well find themselves in similar hot water, banned from speaking publicly, reading or quoting the Bible, and in Canada hauled in front of Human Rights Commissions.

As our society drifts farther and farther away from biblical standards, what we as Christians stand for becomes less and less mainstream and popular. And so we may find ourselves tempted to alter the message to make it more politically correct. For telling it straight will probably mean having to pay the price of being an unpopular prophet. Am I up for that? Are you?

PRAYER: Dear God, please help me be bold and unafraid to tell and uphold Your standards. Amen

MORE: Human Rights Commissions

In Canada we have a powerful system in place to gag people who dare express ideas that don't conform to Canadian society's current norms. Human Rights Commissions are quasi legal bodies active in each province. Most were first formed to help people get fair treatment when they faced things like racial and sexual discrimination at work or in regard to housing. In recent years HRC rulings have frequently come down against Christians who have attempted to uphold biblical morality especially in their positions against homosexuality.

Here, for example, is a case in Alberta from a few years ago, described by Ezra Levant:

"An even more terrifying precedent recently was set in Alberta. The case involved a letter to the editor written by a Christian pastor and published in the Red Deer Advocate newspaper. The letter was a zealous, even rude, expression of the pastor's belief that homosexuality was a sin, and that there was a homosexual political "agenda" that had to be stopped. But instead of joining the debate by writing a letter to the editor, a local teacher complained to the human rights commission.


The commission's one-woman panel--a divorce lawyer with no expertise in constitutional rights -- ruled that "the publication's exposure of homosexuals to hatred and contempt trumps the freedom of speech afforded in the Charter." That was it: Freedom of speech, and of the press, and religion, all of which are called "fundamental freedoms" in our Constitution, now come second to the newly discovered right of a thin-skinned bystander not to be offended.

Read entire...

Jesus told us these kinds of things would happen. Instead of worrying about them, He assures us He will be with us when they do; we can face them with carefree trust: Matthew 10:16-19

¹⁶"Stay alert. This is hazardous work I'm assigning you. You're going to be like sheep running through a wolf pack, so don't call attention to yourselves. Be as cunning as a snake, inoffensive as a dove.
 ^17-20"Don't be naive. Some people will impugn your motives, others will smear your reputation—just because you believe in me. Don't be upset when they haul you before the civil authorities. Without knowing it, they've done you—and me—a favor, given you a platform for preaching the kingdom news! And don't worry about what you'll say or how you'll say it. The right words will be there; the Spirit of your Father will supply the words.- Message

*prophet = nabiy
In the modern sense I'm thinking of the prophet as person who delivers God's message as revealed in the Bible (versus someone who foretells the future).

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