Jeremiah 26:17-19 – Contemporary Conviction's Work
17 Then certain of the elders of the land rose up and spoke to all the assembly of the people, saying: 18 “Micah of Moresheth prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and spoke to all the people of Judah, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts:
“Zion shall be plowed like a field,
Jerusalem shall become heaps of ruins,
And the mountain of the temple
Like the bare hills of the forest.” ’
19 Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah ever put him to death? Did he not fear the Lord and seek the Lord’s favor? And the Lord relented concerning the doom which He had pronounced against them. But we are doing great evil against ourselves.” Jeremiah 26:17-19, New King James Version
My friend Kevin is honest. "I am constantly struggling with God's timelessness, specifically in Bible reading." He confronts both himself and his spiritual forbearers with the question, "I look at the apostles and say,' How could you do this or that when Jesus is right there in front of you?"
What I tend to forget," he admits, "is that Jesus is right here with me as well. Then I remember the undying need for repentance. The key is for me to remember that hope isn't this feeling or this concept out there but hope in the living person of Jesus Christ. Within that, I have hope in time of need and in my time of sin."
It might straighten Kevin's course from the pain of confrontational correction to eventual consolation to know that his forbearers within the Word of God itself go through the same thing. Witness Jeremiah 26:17-19.
They have already, while the Bible is being written, surrounded the corrections previous generations went through with the mist of nostalgia. They have already begun to assume that the anger they feel when confronted as their own special circumstance, their own rationale to lash out at the person God uses to correct them. Surely their forefathers didn't hurt like this.
The elders of Jeremiah's day speak up. They interrupt the moment's pity party about to boil over in the murder of Jeremiah. They have lived long enough, perhaps, to embody a similar reconsidered reaction to that we see in the New Testament in the adulterous woman's accusers. Reminded by Jesus not to cast stones unless they are without sin, they drop the stones and leave, beginning with the eldest.
They have been through the cycle of condemning others, realizing their own sin, and embracing God's forgiveness often enough to hear the hit of its refrain even in contemporary cacophony.
These elders are now brave enough, tenderized enough by their own painful, proving experience to wade into a swarm of indignation. This has happened before, they remind. Micah's words hurt too. They were hard on ears in real time. They went down uneasily in those stomachs. Treason lights went off, surely, as Micah, like Jeremiah, foretold national destruction in his day. Nevertheless, the elders point out that Micah's hearers work through pride's initial overreaction to hear the message rather than snuff the painful light the messenger glares painfully into their darkness.
Micah's audience, like Kevin confesses and consoles himself, the undying need for repentance. Feelings don't dictate an automatic response, as all-consuming as they can be at any given moment. Instead, they serve to point out conviction.
Others have been here before, allowed conviction to leave them to repentance, have survived, and have thrived by the grace of God made even more clear and inviting in the Person of Jesus Christ.
Will the Word complete this work in us? Perhaps even more challenging, will the Jeremiahs in our sphere whose words are in our faces rather than in black-and-white and first intended for OTHER people be received with the presumption of honorable intent?
Kevin's right. We can only cultivate a teachable spirit in such spots if, off the spot, as Dallas Willard puts it in Gary Moon's biography, we have prepared our hearts. Before the next correction, in the covers of the Bible or the contours of life, we can prepare our hearts to run to the righteousness of Christ as self, cure, and destination.
He will finish what He has started. When we see Him, we will be like Him. In that process, we agree, if reluctantly, the perfect Carpenter may use what means He will. He is free to cut down the tree of our deeply rooted self-righteousness. His is to sand off our rough edges. We, over time, embrace the prospect of being startled and humbled.
We learn to expect the prospect of the new coming at the expense of letting go of the old with which we have too readily identified. With John Dewey as quoted in Anti-Intellectualism in American Life by Richard Hofstadter, we prepare with the resolve, "The present is not just something that comes after the past. It is what life IS in leaving the past behind."
“Zion shall be plowed like a field,
Jerusalem shall become heaps of ruins,
And the mountain of the temple
Like the bare hills of the forest.” ’
19 Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah ever put him to death? Did he not fear the Lord and seek the Lord’s favor? And the Lord relented concerning the doom which He had pronounced against them. But we are doing great evil against ourselves.” Jeremiah 26:17-19, New King James Version
My friend Kevin is honest. "I am constantly struggling with God's timelessness, specifically in Bible reading." He confronts both himself and his spiritual forbearers with the question, "I look at the apostles and say,' How could you do this or that when Jesus is right there in front of you?"
What I tend to forget," he admits, "is that Jesus is right here with me as well. Then I remember the undying need for repentance. The key is for me to remember that hope isn't this feeling or this concept out there but hope in the living person of Jesus Christ. Within that, I have hope in time of need and in my time of sin."
It might straighten Kevin's course from the pain of confrontational correction to eventual consolation to know that his forbearers within the Word of God itself go through the same thing. Witness Jeremiah 26:17-19.
They have already, while the Bible is being written, surrounded the corrections previous generations went through with the mist of nostalgia. They have already begun to assume that the anger they feel when confronted as their own special circumstance, their own rationale to lash out at the person God uses to correct them. Surely their forefathers didn't hurt like this.
The elders of Jeremiah's day speak up. They interrupt the moment's pity party about to boil over in the murder of Jeremiah. They have lived long enough, perhaps, to embody a similar reconsidered reaction to that we see in the New Testament in the adulterous woman's accusers. Reminded by Jesus not to cast stones unless they are without sin, they drop the stones and leave, beginning with the eldest.
They have been through the cycle of condemning others, realizing their own sin, and embracing God's forgiveness often enough to hear the hit of its refrain even in contemporary cacophony.
These elders are now brave enough, tenderized enough by their own painful, proving experience to wade into a swarm of indignation. This has happened before, they remind. Micah's words hurt too. They were hard on ears in real time. They went down uneasily in those stomachs. Treason lights went off, surely, as Micah, like Jeremiah, foretold national destruction in his day. Nevertheless, the elders point out that Micah's hearers work through pride's initial overreaction to hear the message rather than snuff the painful light the messenger glares painfully into their darkness.
Micah's audience, like Kevin confesses and consoles himself, the undying need for repentance. Feelings don't dictate an automatic response, as all-consuming as they can be at any given moment. Instead, they serve to point out conviction.
Others have been here before, allowed conviction to leave them to repentance, have survived, and have thrived by the grace of God made even more clear and inviting in the Person of Jesus Christ.
Will the Word complete this work in us? Perhaps even more challenging, will the Jeremiahs in our sphere whose words are in our faces rather than in black-and-white and first intended for OTHER people be received with the presumption of honorable intent?
Kevin's right. We can only cultivate a teachable spirit in such spots if, off the spot, as Dallas Willard puts it in Gary Moon's biography, we have prepared our hearts. Before the next correction, in the covers of the Bible or the contours of life, we can prepare our hearts to run to the righteousness of Christ as self, cure, and destination.
He will finish what He has started. When we see Him, we will be like Him. In that process, we agree, if reluctantly, the perfect Carpenter may use what means He will. He is free to cut down the tree of our deeply rooted self-righteousness. His is to sand off our rough edges. We, over time, embrace the prospect of being startled and humbled.
We learn to expect the prospect of the new coming at the expense of letting go of the old with which we have too readily identified. With John Dewey as quoted in Anti-Intellectualism in American Life by Richard Hofstadter, we prepare with the resolve, "The present is not just something that comes after the past. It is what life IS in leaving the past behind."
Comments
Post a Comment