Jeremiah 20:11-12 – A Requested Rout
11
But the Lord is with me as a mighty, awesome One.
Therefore my persecutors will stumble, and will not prevail.
They will be greatly ashamed, for they will not prosper.
Their everlasting confusion will never be forgotten.
12
But, O Lord of hosts,
You who test the righteous,
And see the mind and heart,
Let me see Your vengeance on them;
For I have pleaded my cause before You.
"For the first few years of his life," compares Glen Weldon in Superman: The Unauthorized Biography, on the hero's being matched against petty criminals, "Superman was the ballistic missile brought to a knife fight."
That is Jeremiah's realization and argument as Jeremiah 20:11-12 unfolds. He pivots from admitting in the previous verse that men's words hurt. He salves those scrapes with the unction of his calling, but he renders them truly light and momentary with his turn toward theology. What are men's side swiping jibes compared to the mighty, awesome One Who hears Jeremiah's pleas?
With a little footing, with a chance to catch his breath, Jeremiah is building up to a roar of assured identity in the God who called him. At least a stalemate is certain, Jeremiah realizes and confesses. Persecutors are not going to win, marks Jeremiah 20:11. Futility is their lot. Jeremiah assures himself that his God can frustrate the plans of Jeremiah's accusers until God's plan for them is finished.
Once his heart rate has slowed, less in the grip of panic and indignation, it quickens again, this time to a holy cause. As Jeremiah's audience with the Lord extends into verse 12, so does the expansiveness of what he asks for by faith.
Why ask for a stalemate, a truce, a gradual war of attrition when one's God is capable of so much more? God need not, asserts Jeremiah, delay His verdict. You are sure of Yourself and Your ability to judge hearts, Lord. Bring Your vindication now, says the plucky prophet. Yours is the ballistic missile versus petty criminals. I want to see You win NOW.
This is a good place for the redeemed believer to be. We already know of Christ's ultimate victory on the cross. He is, if possible, more powerful than Jeremiah could have calibrated even in this chesty moment. Why would we, then, ask small? Given what we know of Him, His heart, and His work, we can pray with Jeremiah and Jon Hauser in ways that overflow into our identity and ministry. "Help us to not be survivalists. Help us to be restorers."
God is able to win. God is able to actively rescue. He is willing, as with Moses, to reveal His glory to those who hunger to see more of Him in action. As we grow, as we are less likely to put up with panic and self-pity, perhaps we will ask more of Him. Even where His answer for temporal, visible victories is no, or not yet, we would not have it that His works are limited by our paltry faith and resignation to life's habitual struggles. He is able to prevail!
That is Jeremiah's realization and argument as Jeremiah 20:11-12 unfold. He pivots from admitting in the previous verse that men's words hurt. He salves those scrapes with the unction of his calling, but he renders them truly light and momentary with his turn toward theology. What are men's side swiping jibes compared to the mighty, awesome One Who hears Jeremiah's pleas?
With a little footing, with a chance to catch his breath, Jeremiah is building up to a roar of assured identity in the God who called him. At least a stalemate is certain, Jeremiah realizes and confesses. Persecutors are not going to win, marks Jeremiah 20:11. Futility is their lot. Jeremiah assures himself that his God can frustrate the plans of Jeremiah's accusers until God's plan for them is finished.
Once his heart rate has slowed, less in the grip of panic and indignation, it quickens again, this time to a holy cause. As Jeremiah's audience with the Lord extends into verse 12, so does the expansiveness of what he asks for by faith.
Why ask for a stalemate, a truce, a continuing war of attrition when one's God is capable of so much more? God need not, asserts plucky Jeremiah, delay His verdict. You are sure of Yourself and Your ability to judge hearts, Lord. Bring Your vindication now, says the plucky prophet. Yours is the ballistic missile versus petty criminals. I want to see You win NOW.
This is a good place for the redeemed believer to be. We already know of Christ's ultimate victory on the cross. He is, if possible, more powerful than Jeremiah could have calibrated even in this chesty moment. Why would we, then, ask small. Given what we know of Him, His heart, and His work, we can pray with Jeremiah and Jon Hauser in ways that overflow into our identity and ministry. "Help us to not be survivalists. Help us to be restorers."
God is able to win. God is able to actively rescue. He is willing, as with Moses, to reveal His glory to those who hunger to see more of Him in action. As we grow, as we abide less of panic and self-pity, perhaps we will ask more of Him. Even where His answer for temporal, visible victories is no, or not yet, we would not have it that His works are limited in any sense by our paltry faith and resignation to life's habitual struggles. He is able to prevail!
But the Lord is with me as a mighty, awesome One.
Therefore my persecutors will stumble, and will not prevail.
They will be greatly ashamed, for they will not prosper.
Their everlasting confusion will never be forgotten.
12
But, O Lord of hosts,
You who test the righteous,
And see the mind and heart,
Let me see Your vengeance on them;
For I have pleaded my cause before You.
"For the first few years of his life," compares Glen Weldon in Superman: The Unauthorized Biography, on the hero's being matched against petty criminals, "Superman was the ballistic missile brought to a knife fight."
That is Jeremiah's realization and argument as Jeremiah 20:11-12 unfolds. He pivots from admitting in the previous verse that men's words hurt. He salves those scrapes with the unction of his calling, but he renders them truly light and momentary with his turn toward theology. What are men's side swiping jibes compared to the mighty, awesome One Who hears Jeremiah's pleas?
With a little footing, with a chance to catch his breath, Jeremiah is building up to a roar of assured identity in the God who called him. At least a stalemate is certain, Jeremiah realizes and confesses. Persecutors are not going to win, marks Jeremiah 20:11. Futility is their lot. Jeremiah assures himself that his God can frustrate the plans of Jeremiah's accusers until God's plan for them is finished.
Once his heart rate has slowed, less in the grip of panic and indignation, it quickens again, this time to a holy cause. As Jeremiah's audience with the Lord extends into verse 12, so does the expansiveness of what he asks for by faith.
Why ask for a stalemate, a truce, a gradual war of attrition when one's God is capable of so much more? God need not, asserts Jeremiah, delay His verdict. You are sure of Yourself and Your ability to judge hearts, Lord. Bring Your vindication now, says the plucky prophet. Yours is the ballistic missile versus petty criminals. I want to see You win NOW.
This is a good place for the redeemed believer to be. We already know of Christ's ultimate victory on the cross. He is, if possible, more powerful than Jeremiah could have calibrated even in this chesty moment. Why would we, then, ask small? Given what we know of Him, His heart, and His work, we can pray with Jeremiah and Jon Hauser in ways that overflow into our identity and ministry. "Help us to not be survivalists. Help us to be restorers."
God is able to win. God is able to actively rescue. He is willing, as with Moses, to reveal His glory to those who hunger to see more of Him in action. As we grow, as we are less likely to put up with panic and self-pity, perhaps we will ask more of Him. Even where His answer for temporal, visible victories is no, or not yet, we would not have it that His works are limited by our paltry faith and resignation to life's habitual struggles. He is able to prevail!
That is Jeremiah's realization and argument as Jeremiah 20:11-12 unfold. He pivots from admitting in the previous verse that men's words hurt. He salves those scrapes with the unction of his calling, but he renders them truly light and momentary with his turn toward theology. What are men's side swiping jibes compared to the mighty, awesome One Who hears Jeremiah's pleas?
With a little footing, with a chance to catch his breath, Jeremiah is building up to a roar of assured identity in the God who called him. At least a stalemate is certain, Jeremiah realizes and confesses. Persecutors are not going to win, marks Jeremiah 20:11. Futility is their lot. Jeremiah assures himself that his God can frustrate the plans of Jeremiah's accusers until God's plan for them is finished.
Once his heart rate has slowed, less in the grip of panic and indignation, it quickens again, this time to a holy cause. As Jeremiah's audience with the Lord extends into verse 12, so does the expansiveness of what he asks for by faith.
Why ask for a stalemate, a truce, a continuing war of attrition when one's God is capable of so much more? God need not, asserts plucky Jeremiah, delay His verdict. You are sure of Yourself and Your ability to judge hearts, Lord. Bring Your vindication now, says the plucky prophet. Yours is the ballistic missile versus petty criminals. I want to see You win NOW.
This is a good place for the redeemed believer to be. We already know of Christ's ultimate victory on the cross. He is, if possible, more powerful than Jeremiah could have calibrated even in this chesty moment. Why would we, then, ask small. Given what we know of Him, His heart, and His work, we can pray with Jeremiah and Jon Hauser in ways that overflow into our identity and ministry. "Help us to not be survivalists. Help us to be restorers."
God is able to win. God is able to actively rescue. He is willing, as with Moses, to reveal His glory to those who hunger to see more of Him in action. As we grow, as we abide less of panic and self-pity, perhaps we will ask more of Him. Even where His answer for temporal, visible victories is no, or not yet, we would not have it that His works are limited in any sense by our paltry faith and resignation to life's habitual struggles. He is able to prevail!
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