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Showing posts from November, 2020

Jeremiah 31:34 – Interposed Iniquity

34 No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity… Jeremiah 31:34, New King James Version My friend Chuck took the bold step of denying his fears control over his course of action. He went to minister in a fearsome prison setting. He could sense effectiveness, but not peace. His own prison of pornography addiction still confined him. He recalls, "I could feel God's love flowing through me to other people, but I couldn't really feel it for myself." Thus the continuity, then, as God's fiat in Jeremiah 31:34 unfolds. As we know Him intimately rather than secondarily through someone else's experiences, brother or neighbor, conviction and misery is real. They cannot see within our hearts. Even where they may catch glimpses of that which binds us, like David who refrains from truly discipling hi

Jeremiah 31:34 – Don't Settle for Hand-Me-Downs.

 34 No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord… Jeremiah 31:34, New King James Version His name was Dr. Ronald Jones, and I encountered him in the University of South Carolina course "The Bible as Historical Literature." He seemed to work in previous pastoral experience as though he had transcended rather than followed the Lord to work in another vineyard. Working among the great Truths of God's Word, he managed to drop that he had come from Duke only on negotiated terms that included adding the titles he suggested to South Carolina's library. From his lofty perch, he offered us the assumptions of scholarly higher criticism. Accept these, he admonished, and you can know what the Bible writers were really telling their contemporaries about knowing God. God had every right, of course, to reveal Himself to the imminent, the learne

Jeremiah 31:34 – The Lord's Word and Persuasion

33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 34 No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ … Jeremiah 31:33-34a, New King James Version My brother, in a coma, was a heartbeat from Hell, and Saturday Night Live rather than something more profound helped me confess my awesome responsibility. There was a skit on the show back in the 90s in which the game show contestant had the considerable advantage of being able to tell the future. Yet, every time he buzzed in, all he could see and all he could say was that a big gray rock was coming. He was pummeled on the game show as his fellow contestants were able to focus on what was immediately relevant and score points. As the sketch unfolds, a big gray rock descends from the sky and crashes into the game show set. I had

Jeremiah 31:33 – God's Claimed People

33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. Jeremiah 31:33, New King James Version I befriended Yael when we cofounded a Facebook group in tribute to Aaron Sorkin's show of one-season wonder Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip . I described myself aspirationally and maybe ostentatiously for a first meeting as the Harriet of these kinds of groups. I aspire to be what the comedienne on the show was, a Christian living to shine light, in context but in unexpected places. Her frontier of faith was late-night comedy within the fictional framework of the show. Mine was to integrate the Gospel authentically into conversations on secular pop culture. Eyeing each other from across the Atlantic, we recognized that we shared a love for quality wording often missing in a culture of banality. We also shared a ferreting enthusi

Jeremiah 31:33d – Regeneration in Intimate Experience

33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God… Jeremiah 31:33d, New King James Version In his sermon "Elijah's Appeal to the Undecided," Spurgeon reflects on a differing conviction from that of his father and grandfather, in this case on infant baptism. I love them and revere them," he testifies. "Yet it is no reason why I should imitate them!" Such as the fork in the road we come to buy the sovereignty of God in Jeremiah 31:33. God has traced in the preceding verse His ways with the forefathers of the audience he forecasts. He has been faithful both parentally and intimately. They have been faithless. God takes them through this history that they might know His ways, His heart. Yet THEIR hearts, He says He will make new. Their minds He says He will renew. They will perceive and receive His Word, described overall

Jeremiah 31:33c – Sanctifying Syncopation

 33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts… Jeremiah 31:33c, New King James Version My wife was wondering what was wrong. At the other end of the house from her, I was so caught up in the worship course I was listening to that I shouted with joy. I was, in the phrasing of Bethel Music's "Let the Redeemed," pouring out my thankfulness, letting it overflow. Or, in the sort of transformation Rend Collective pleads to God for in "Free As a Bird," ""Take us beyond our horizons, leading us into Your wildness." Rend Collective, "Free As a Bird" She hadn't known this to be my way. Yet, even past midlife, it was evidence of Christ's faithfulness to impart new affections as He promises in the progression of Jeremiah 31:33. She was familiar with the incorporation of His Law into my thinking and could be mystified as I,

Jeremiah 31:33b – The Maker's Mind Makeover

33 But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds… Jeremiah 31:33b, New King James Version My church recently held a prayer service in place of the usual Sunday order. My wife and I participated over the Internet from our living room. When directed to pray for a particular manifestation of God's glory, I started to speak to the Lord out loud. My wife seemed to shrink a little, to withdraw within herself. With at least as much defensiveness as deftness of discipleship, I asked why. "You're overwhelming," she confessed. My demonstrativeness was smothering her quieter considerations nurtured in the Church of Christ in which women did not pray out loud in the presence of men. Honest, she connected this particular expression of my zeal-as-leadership to my habitually unilateral selection of the scriptural passages we read each day.    Her subtext, if not her exact words, revealed that she

Jeremiah 31:33a – Waiting Worshipfully

But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days… Jeremiah 31:33a, New King James Version This Friday was the first day off I remember as a "professional student," and I was determined to seize it. I was 29, and already the student had become the teacher had become the student yet again. Jarred by and unready for the transition from dutiful recipient of instruction to being the decision-maker and tone-setter, I wanted to make up for years of delayed maturity all at once. I showed up at the government office where I wanted to work at the end of my two-year masters program to lay claim to an internship. The kindly bureaucrat I confronted was startled. The faculty does that for you, you know, she allowed. As I got to know her over time, her name was Jimmie, again and again she had to assure me as my mind leaped ahead months and years to overcompensate for past unresponsiveness, "Trust your program." That's something of the transit

Jeremiah 31:32f – Surpassing Spousal Love

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord. Jeremiah 31:31-32, New King James Version The reality of being fired was still ringing in my ears. My boss's euphemistic expression, "Today's your last day with us," didn't soften the reverberation. I snapped to the duty of looking for new work, but my heart was still wounded, subsisting on the gruel of the old identity and script. Sensing this, my wife stepped in. At that moment, she was the only one earning an income, but she was more than the begrudging subsidizer of my subsistence. Gifted in her spirit with his sense of hospitality, she knew how sight and feel change what we experience within. She took me out to

Jeremiah 31:32e – Covenant Conviction

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke… Jeremiah 31:31-32e, New King James Version I had lunch with my friend Billy yesterday. Billy's theology is being burned upon his heart by this moment in history, and his speech flowed from the fullness of his heart. Billy is Black, and he is realizing a different, deeper, more personal connection to the Bible. He told me that the research he has been doing reveals Exodus entirely excised from the Bible proclaimed to his enslaved ancestors. He is putting in perspective the righteous indignation that men taught the parts of the Bible they found useful to uphold the unjust order at one point in time, piously proclaiming other-world Truths in order to distract from their accountabilit

Jeremiah 31:32d – Desperate for Real Rescue

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, Jeremiah 31:31-32d, New King James Version I was about nine, and I had a lot to look forward to in a hotel room gearing up for another day at Disney World. Rather than anticipating this grace from my parents, I was looking backward in pride. I was taking another opportunity to recount to my brother, three years younger, how worldly wise I was. This must have gone on for too long, for my parents saw fit to interject. They saw fit to remind me how panicked I was just the day before when I thought I was lost. We reconstruct our back story that quickly. We make ourselves the star of it, and we immediately begin wielding it to our comparative advantage. Now, a child being lost in Disney World is not the equivalent of I

Jeremiah 31:32c – A Sometimes Subtle Change of Sovereigns

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt…" Jeremiah 31:31-32c, New King James Version My former pastor was born and deaf-mute. He is asked by the curious whether God healed him or whether he went to therapy. He says both. But at the time, as a child, he reflects that he didn't know about the process that was going on. He didn't know he was disabled, and he didn't know he was in speech therapy. He just thought he was following along, playing games with the nice lady who turned out to be a speech therapist. There is something of this in the Lord's overview of the deliverance of His people from Egypt in Jeremiah 31:32. Yes, he led them out of Egypt. Yes, they changed statuses and sovereigns as well as locations. These dramatic changes to

Jeremiah 31:32b – Telling of Tenderness

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand… Jeremiah 31:31-32b, New King James Version Uncharacteristically, Will Smith on The Fresh Prince of Bel Air is working himself into a frazzle. The character is growing into young manhood and, sporadically, a sense of responsibility and opportunity. Worn down and in a fixed, he confesses to his father figure, and usual nemesis, Uncle Phil that he wanted to be a man like Phil and show that he could make it on his own. Philip Banks is more given to sitcom putdowns than to tenderness, but he turns a different aspect toward Will – after a putdown of sorts. He corrects the record. "That's the biggest bunch of bull I've heard since I left the farm. He tells his nephew that Will's impression of Philip's rise from South Carolina poverty to

Jeremiah 31:31-32a – Fathering Tomorrow's Assumptions

“Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers… Jeremiah 31:31-32a, New King James Version Prevented by disability from driving, and, at least for now, from continuing my career, God has an interestingly individualistic way of keeping my questing sense of purpose kindled. He has given me an unusual memory for fragments of pop culture, supplemented by a dogged use of OneNote and cemented by a capacity to connect quotes and scenes to the Gospel. Writing on social media, I endeavor to present Christ to "secular" Facebook groups in their own vernacular. Even here, though, with lipservice to His sovereign purposes, the flesh's leadening of expectations can kick in. No doubt by the negative flipside of my ability to turn small details into a dramatic story, I've been roughed up a little by recent group responses. Some "secu

Jeremiah 31:31 – A Mutual Dependence Clears History's Hurdles

31 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah… Jeremiah 31:31, New King James Version My brother and I, as yet separated by the yawning biblical chasm between lost and saved, were watching his children swim. The two oldest were plunging from the side of the pool into its depths, delighted. The youngest, and on other fronts the bravest, wasn't so sure. I commented, and my brother was patiently philosophical. Even if, he said, the youngest waits another year before being ready to dive in, he's still ahead of the pace set by the other two. That my brother maintained such calm geniality in this conversation is remarkable, and not just because at the time he didn't know the Lord. Jesus said even the evil could be good parents. My brother's unwillingness to push or even come in critically was completely averse to the example he knew in me. I was the censorious, perpetually crabby older brot

Jeremiah 31:29-30 – Identity and Accountability in Christ

 29 In those days they shall say no more: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, And the children’s teeth are set on edge.’ 30 But every one shall die for his own iniquity; every man who eats the sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge. Jeremiah 31:29-30, New King James Version In the nineties sitcom Evening Shade , there's a scene in which Burt Reynolds as Wood Newton tells his TV son, "A man's not a man until his father tells him he is." August 1994 presented such an encounter for me. I was graduating from college the next day, and my parents were in town to celebrate the big event with me. In crowded Columbia, my father parked illegally on campus, and he and I were about town in my vehicle. Ever the rule-follower in my expectations of others, I fretted in adolescent fashion that they might ticket him and withhold my diploma. He reminded me, though, that although we were in the same car, although he supported my aspirations both practically and emotionally, that w

Jeremiah 31:28 – Missing the Cycle

And it shall come to pass, that as I have watched over them to pluck up, to break down, to throw down, to destroy, and to afflict, so I will watch over them to build and to plant, says the Lord. Jeremiah 31:28, New King James Version When my brother and I were very small, we wanted to present a gift to our mother. We yanked something small she had planted out of the ground. Over the course of the afternoon, we were convinced we could see it grow. She had to explain that nature doesn't work that way. Even grown, even as Christians, we still need similar instruction in growth even more important than plant life. God therefore provides Jeremiah 31:28. We otherwise miss how adept He is at replanting that which has been uprooted and fostering growth which was once interrupted. Like my brother and myself, we want to see growth immediately. When we don't, we project it out of self-will, or we get frustrated that it isn't happening at all. Lane Adams in the appropriately titled The

Jeremiah 31:27 – A Tangible Testimony

27 “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and the seed of beast. Jeremiah 31:27, New King James Version I suddenly had a following. My barrage of musings on Facebook was constant as I sought to grab friends, acquaintances, and strangers by the sleeve, so to speak, and show them the wonder of some selection from theology, literature, or history. Usually most scrollers-by wriggled loose or went benignly indifferent about their business. Growth of our household, though, put a rounded, lit-up face to my thoughts. In my speculations, it seems men and women could hear our foster child's laughter, root with her undaunted joy and determination to accomplish the next stage of growth and delight. So God ordains attention in passages like Jeremiah 31:27. Previously, He saw fit to chastise His people before the nations. Then, as Jeremiah has pointed out, their fate was a watchword of passersby. How could a pe