Jeremiah 29:18-20 – The Word Habit

18 And I will pursue them with the sword, with famine, and with pestilence; and I will deliver them to trouble among all the kingdoms of the earth—to be a curse, an astonishment, a hissing, and a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them, 19 because they have not heeded My words, says the Lord, which I sent to them by My servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them; neither would you heed, says the Lord. 20 Therefore hear the word of the Lord, all you of the captivity, whom I have sent from Jerusalem to Babylon. Jeremiah 29:18-20, New King James Version

Garcia Burnham in In the Presence of My Enemies mentions an irony that her captors fighting a guerrilla war against the Philippine Army insisted on carrying artillery as they moved. They never had time to set it up and utilize it, but they kept carrying it.

We treat the Word of God in much the same way, to our peril as Jeremiah 29:18-20 insists. It continues to offer to engage us, much as God marks, again, that the prophets, His servants, contended with His recalcitrant people morning by morning. He counts their getting up early to do so as a contrast between their faithfulness he engenders in the faithlessness of His nominal people.

There's a tolerance we build up to the Word, sadly. It's the artillery we carry around. We discount its power, merely considering ourselves strong because we lug along the habit. David Mathis in Habits of Grace warns us away from this stultifying pride. "As much as we want to master the habit of Bible intake, to trace the lines of cause and effect from some action we take to some resulting satisfaction of our soul, the Helper resists our efforts to objectify grace."

The Word, then, which we, in the phrasing of NT Wright begin to treat as verbal wallpaper, which we suppose, if we notice it at all, will still be there for us to examine more closely at some later time, asserts its power to bring down the stronghold of our arrogance. That same Word which contended with humans on human terms, through human proclaimers in a familiar environment, that same Word once said, "Let there be light." The perseverance of God's engagement does not diminish the power of His Word.

Therefore, that same Word from that same sovereign God one day, He warns, won't contend to persuade men. That same Word will judge them, unsettlingly familiar environment which they take as confirmation of their righteousness. That same authoritative Word, He reminds those in exile, put them where they are.

If we are used to considering ourselves magnanimous for allowing the Word to speak to us morning by morning but are accustomed, as James says, to going away unchanged, we are in danger. That Word which endeavors to plead and persuade also created, and can destroy. The Lord is not subservient to the means of grace He has used in our lives. He will remove them, or remove us from them, in order to show His supremacy.

Well advanced in the Word habit, David Brin gives cogent counsel. "The best time to act was decades ago. The second best time is now." It is our privilege as God's sun rises on His mercy yet again to yield before His Word, to ask God to use it to examine us for secret faults, that He would not leave our internal status quo unchanged. For, we know with Jeremiah 29:20 that He put us where we are in the midst of blessing and that He can remove these, that we would rely on Him alone.