Jeremiah, whose words we heard in our first reading, was a priest of the tribe of Benjamin, from a walled town a few miles northeast of Jerusalem.
After the fall of the northern Kingdom of Israel to Assyria in 721,
Judah, the southern Kingdom, was squeezed between Egypt to the south and Assyria to the north. They were afraid, assaulted by enemies closing in all around them.
As a prophet, Jeremiah was active from the 13th year of King Josiah of Judah around 626 BCE, through the rule of Jehoiakim and Zedekiah.
King Josiah has been called Judah’s last pious King.
During his reign, Judah stopped paying homage to Assyria,
and sought to reestablish the empire of David and Solomon that had
crumbled centuries earlier,
launching religious reforms that reaffirmed the covenant of Moses
and centralized worship of Yahweh in Jerusalem.
But those reforms died with King Josiah in 609 BCE.
When we hear Jeremiah’s words here, rebellions against Babylon by the subsequent kings have failed and the armies of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, are advancing on Jerusalem.
Jeremiah continues to urge Israelites to return to faithful obedience to the covenant they have with God, and in these verses, we hear the prophet’s description of what disobedience will look like and the contrasting vision of what obedience will look like.
As we hear elsewhere in Proverbs and in today’s psalm, Jeremiah
presents a clear choice to be made by humans,
a fork in the road,
where we can choose to draw near to God
or turn away from God.
Importantly, the choice does not change how God
responds.
God refuses to turn away from us and continues to offer God’s people new opportunities to choose to live in relationship with the One who created and loves us.
But there are consequences for turning away from what God offers, and we hear those described here. Jeremiah describes those who trust in mortals, instead of God, as parched shrubs in the arid desert, and the psalmist describes them as chaff that is blown away in the wind.
In contrast, Jeremiah describes those who trust in the Lord as trees planted by water, fortified against heat and drought, flourishing and bearing fruit, an image that echoes the psalm.
The descriptions of trees planted by streams of water, full of green leaves and fruit, recall the first garden - Eden - in Genesis and invite us to remember that in the beginning, God gave life to creation, and God continues to nurture us for life in community.
Of course, then, as now, humans choose to turn away from God.
While I expect most of us easily hear the Law in Jeremiah’s words where there is a clear choice between trusting in ourselves or others or trusting in the Lord, I hope we also hear the Gospel. While the Law convicts us of our sin and shows us where we fall short of God’s commands, the Gospel is what tells us about God’s actions for us.
There is a promise here that even in the desert, relief will come, and life, although it may be difficult, will continue in the places that appear forsaken.
And before anyone thinks that Jeremiah is promising a carefree life for
those who trust God, he tells us that even when we draw near to God,
there will be times of scorching heat and drought
–
times of challenge and even disaster.
The point isn’t that faithful people will be worry-free. The point is
that God will be faithful. As one writer put it,
We as Christians are like trees, watered at baptism and not branches broken off from the main trunk, which is the cross of Christ.[i]
As both the psalm and this passage in Jeremiah continue, we are reminded that judgment is not ours but God’s (Psalm 1:6 and Jeremiah 17:9-10). The Lord will search the minds and hearts of God’s people, and the Lord knows the difference between the righteous and the wicked.
That’s important for all of us who get distracted by the human sinfulness we witness around us, who experience the temptation to look first at others, and not ourselves. “If I believe that God loves me [so much that I am forgiven and saved by grace through faith], then I have to believe that God loves everyone else like that [too].”[ii]
It's God’s promises, known in God’s Word and actions for us, that sustain us each and every day.
Let us pray…
Holy God,
You created the world and all that live in it.
You called us to trust you, and to put down our roots
alongside the life-giving stream of your Word.
Help us follow Your Son Jesus faithfully,
and share the fruit of Your abundant mercy and love in the world.
We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
[i] Sundays
and Seasons, Day Resources
[ii] The Rev. Dr. Justin Nickel, Advanced Lay Ministry Intensive
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