A Private Pity Party

Jeremiah 20:14-18

When Jan and I lived in Corpus Christi, Texas, we had a friend who often said; when the world gives you a lemon you have two choices, make lemonade or turn sour.  Over my lifetime I’ve used both options, and it became apparent that choosing to allow the bad thing to turn into something positive and healthy is the only plan that works.  

You may not have noticed, and we live in a time and culture of blaming others; I would not have done that but they did not let me suck my thumb as a child, and that is why I do the things I’m being accused of at this time.  Now on a personal note, as a child I was a thumb sucker, my thumb was this little boy’s blanket it was a private thing everywhere but home.  It was also a battleground for my mother; she did not want her son to be a thumb sucker, so she did things to her little thumb sucker that would get her put into jail today.  She rubbed red pepper on it, and when that did not work, she tried other remedies.  She tried bribes and punishment and yet she never got me to quit until one day I made a choice to leave my thumb and seek what did not bring conflict into my life.  Now to my defense, I was not 12 years of age when I made that decision, but I was in school.

Jeremiah is having a private pity party, and as we look at his life and the circumstances, you and I may have had a meltdown long before he did.  His private pity party is shared with us in verses 14-18, “Cursed be the day on which I was born!  The day when my mother bore me let it not be blessed!  Cursed be the man who brought the news to my father, “A son is born to you,” making him very glad.  Let that man be like the cities that the Lord overthrew without pity; let him hear a cry in the morning and an alarm at noon because he did not kill me in the womb; so my mother would have been my grave, and her womb forever great.  Why did I come out from the womb to see toil and sorrow, and spend my days in shame?”

The culture that Jeremiah was born into rewarded the person who brought the news of a son being born, but in Jeremiah’s case, he is saying that man should have been cursed.  Have you noticed Jeremiah never said his parents should be cursed for that was forbidden?  In fact, he wished that the man who carried the news, his end would be like Sodom and Gomorrah.  Now, this was not a battle anyone, but God and Jeremiah saw it was an inward struggle, but he always held to his mission.  You and I should learn that life brings lemons and yet our Lord has promised never more than we can bear.

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice