A Boy's Calling

Jeremiah 32:1-15

One must remember Jeremiah was just a young boy when God called him into the prophecy business.  Being a prophet of God is not a natural calling your job is to tell self-centered people, kings, leaders, and even the people you have grown up around what God is saying to them.  How tough is that job, I cannot imagine what that would be like, can you?  Have you returned to a high school reunion after 40 years of not seeing people, they do not want to know about what you have become, they talk as if you are still a teenager in High School, doing the same foolishness of your youth?

Can you understand Jeremiah’s predicament he is a prisoner of King Zedekiah of Judah, and held in the court of the guard that was in the palace of the king.  Now a lot is happening on the outside of the walls of Jerusalem, a Chaldean army has setup siege mounds and is about to enter the city and do great harm.

If you are wondering how did a man of God get into this mess, the Lord arranged it, and though the message was not heard at this time it would be at a later date, and it still is.  The message that brought about Jeremiah’s imprisonment was directed to the king.  “Why do you prophesy and say, ‘Thus says the Lord: Behold, I am giving this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall capture it; Zedekiah king of Judah shall not escape out of the hand of the Chaldeans, but shall surely be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and shall speak with him face to face and see him eye to eye. And he shall take Zedekiah to Babylon, and there he shall remain until I visit him, declares the Lord. Though you fight against the Chaldeans, you shall not succeed’?”

What happens when God does not make sense?  For the nominal prophet or church person, they begin to use reason and not obedience, and they will never proclaim what God has said.  But Jeremiah was not that kind of prophet when God spoke he not only listened, he was a compared to a recording; “Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel.”  In a land that was at any time going to fall into the hands of the king of Babylon, God tells Jeremiah to buy his uncle’s land in Anathoth.  Now using sound mind or common sense one would say, I’m not sure where that is coming from, but there is no way God is telling me to pay real money for a land that is about to be taken away.

But God, how I’ve learned to cherish those words, for this was such a moment in the life of Jeremiah.  For Jeremiah knew something many of us have yet to grasp, one who does not abide in the LORD will never be obedient to His voice, or His word.

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice