Jeremiah 29:27-28 – Our Guilt Filter
27 Now therefore, why have you not rebuked Jeremiah of Anathoth who makes himself a prophet to you? 28 For he has sent to us in Babylon, saying, ‘This captivity is long; build houses and dwell in them, and plant gardens and eat their fruit.’ ”Jeremiah 29:27-28, New King James Version
Considering for The Last Dance documentary what made Michael Jordan exceptional, David Aldridge explains, "Most people live in fear because they project the past into the present. Michael was a mystic. He was ALWAYS PRESENT."
We can see how rare that is, and how easily we slide from it, in Jeremiah 29:27-28. The people of Judah are operating under conviction, although they would rather not name and it may not be able to. Their consciences are warped by guilt, and their discernment is wearied from trying to block out Jeremiah's warnings. Absorbing the prophet's message has happened only as part of an effort to resist and counter it.
Thus, they missed out on being present in the present. Even Jeremiah's words BLESSING this season of correction as one in which God's grace will still be evident are reported as so much evidence of Jeremiah's subversion. They are so accustomed to hearing bad news that they are now filtering for it. They have, step-by-step, unwittingly rewired their brains to expect bad things from God and to take out their defensiveness on His servants.
Does not our pessimism run about that deep? Have we not become so accustomed to our weariness that we see each opportunity, each new word, each possible relationship or conversation as one in which our load will grow heavier? Have we drained the good from the Good News just because we are, rightly, beginning to get the idea that we don't deserve it?
Biblically, as we mature and as God continues to slather His recalcitrant people with grace, we begin to understand that God works simultaneously in multiple dimensions. He can correct us, yes, can remove some significant familiarity and comfort we deem essential. Yet, He can do this deftly with His ends in mind, all the while providing to a gratuitous degree, insistently enthusiastic in His particular goodness TO US that even our sins cannot obscure.
He fed the Exodus, beloved, on a forty-year journey through His correction. He did it so expertly that their feet
did not swell. As a manifestation that His patience would not wear out, neither did their garments. If He cared for these masses as He instructed them through life's long way, shall He not care for you? Can He not deliver reproof and tender care simultaneously?
Would we exclude the one in fear or resentment of the other? Dallas Willard pulls no punches. "The humility that cringes in order that reproof may be escaped or favor obtained is as unchristian as it is profoundly immoral." We for whom Christ died, beloved, can withstand the chastening love of the Father's correction, to which James pointed, because we know He will finish what he started.
The goal, even of uprooting our prideful assumptions, is a closer, more bountiful walk with Him. Paul said it in Romans 8. Will He Who gave us Christ on the cross pull back in the provision of lesser blessings?
Considering for The Last Dance documentary what made Michael Jordan exceptional, David Aldridge explains, "Most people live in fear because they project the past into the present. Michael was a mystic. He was ALWAYS PRESENT."
We can see how rare that is, and how easily we slide from it, in Jeremiah 29:27-28. The people of Judah are operating under conviction, although they would rather not name and it may not be able to. Their consciences are warped by guilt, and their discernment is wearied from trying to block out Jeremiah's warnings. Absorbing the prophet's message has happened only as part of an effort to resist and counter it.
Thus, they missed out on being present in the present. Even Jeremiah's words BLESSING this season of correction as one in which God's grace will still be evident are reported as so much evidence of Jeremiah's subversion. They are so accustomed to hearing bad news that they are now filtering for it. They have, step-by-step, unwittingly rewired their brains to expect bad things from God and to take out their defensiveness on His servants.
Does not our pessimism run about that deep? Have we not become so accustomed to our weariness that we see each opportunity, each new word, each possible relationship or conversation as one in which our load will grow heavier? Have we drained the good from the Good News just because we are, rightly, beginning to get the idea that we don't deserve it?
Biblically, as we mature and as God continues to slather His recalcitrant people with grace, we begin to understand that God works simultaneously in multiple dimensions. He can correct us, yes, can remove some significant familiarity and comfort we deem essential. Yet, He can do this deftly with His ends in mind, all the while providing to a gratuitous degree, insistently enthusiastic in His particular goodness TO US that even our sins cannot obscure.
He fed the Exodus, beloved, on a forty-year journey through His correction. He did it so expertly that their feet
did not swell. As a manifestation that His patience would not wear out, neither did their garments. If He cared for these masses as He instructed them through life's long way, shall He not care for you? Can He not deliver reproof and tender care simultaneously?
Would we exclude the one in fear or resentment of the other? Dallas Willard pulls no punches. "The humility that cringes in order that reproof may be escaped or favor obtained is as unchristian as it is profoundly immoral." We for whom Christ died, beloved, can withstand the chastening love of the Father's correction, to which James pointed, because we know He will finish what he started.
The goal, even of uprooting our prideful assumptions, is a closer, more bountiful walk with Him. Paul said it in Romans 8. Will He Who gave us Christ on the cross pull back in the provision of lesser blessings?
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