Jeremiah 8a: Voices in the Wind.

 God returns to poetry to express his passion; because the people that God loves have become so certain of their view of the world, about what it means to know God and what are appropriate ways to treat one’s neighbor that they no longer question their own behavior. One should always be self-critical, examining all one’s beliefs and perceptions. Does knowing God mean knowing about God or does it mean having an ongoing relationsjhip with God? Is knowing the Law the same and fulfilling the Law? 

 How does a person or a community follow God if they don’t know which way God went? For us, how can we walk the path of discipleship and aspire to Christian maturity if we do not know how to recognize self-deception and if we are not willing to let God correct our ways? That is the persistent work of the Holy Spirit to bring nuance to our knowledge and to direction to our walk. Who is ready to be in close enough relationship with God to be pruned and shaped in order to become a mature follower? It hurts, but it is a good hurt.  

 The people of Judah needed this discipline; however, they would not submit to God. They heard bits and pieces of Scripture, then they decided to take a path that seemed best to them. They made their own decisions about what to do and what not to do. As if following God was like walking through a cafeteria; ‘I’ll have some of this, but I do not want any of that’. They were deceived by their own view of the world, as many are today. Bull-headed, they refuse to change even though what they do is both irrational and irreverent. Irrational because even animals know better and irreverent because their decisions are contrary to the covenant agreement God made with them. Yet, the people persist in their own way, and that path leads away from God directly toward destruction.

 God is pained and weeping, Jeremiah is pained and weeping, but the so-called ‘people of God’. That is, Jews at that time, and both Jews and Christians in our time who are blissfully ignorant about their own duplicity.   

Jeremiah 8: 4-7.  

You shall say to them, 'Thus says the LORD:

When people fall, 

do they not get up again?    

If they go astray, 

do they not turn back?

Why then has this people turned away   

in perpetual faithlessness?

They have held fast to deceit;   

they have refused to return.

I have given heed and listened,   

but they do not speak honestly;

no one repents of wickedness,   

saying, “What have I done!”

All of them turn to their own course   

like a horse plunging headlong into battle.

Even the stork in the heavens   

knows its times,

and the turtledove, swallow, and crane   

observe the time of their coming,

but my people do not know   

the ordinance of the LORD.

 Think about it, when you fall, do you not get up and say, ‘I better not do that again’? Recently, after finishing my work on the treadmill, I was  walking down the stairs at LA Fitness. Just before the landing, I turned my head to see if anyone was on the next weight machine that I wanted to use. Taking my eye off what I was doing, I stepped out for the landing, but I was two steps above the landing, not one. I fell hard on my face, and my left elbow took the shock. The bursa had burst and my elbow was swelled up like a baseball for months after that. What went through my mind? “I’d better not do that again. Pay attention to what is in front of me when I am walking. Don’t survey the weight room.”

 Do birds know when it is time to turn around and fly south again? In southern Indiana we always see Canada geese coming down in the fall and returning north in the spring. In Minnesota, birds of all kinds migrate north in spring and fly away south in the fall. Apparently not as smart as birds, God’s people do not recognize that the times they are a-changin’. Why don’t they know? Because they do not read Scripture nor do they know how to work with God to grasp the meaning!

 What are the foundations of God’s covenant with human beings? It is best for you to follow God’s commands and imitate God’s character. When you fail, it is best to own up to your sins, confess, and seek forgiveness. When you come back to God, pursue God’s help in transforming your life. If you refuse, God has said several times recently in our readings from Jeremiah: “You pursue false idols, ideals, and ideology to your own hurt” (Jeremiah 7: 6, 19).  

 The primary commands of both testaments (covenants) are to love God with all your heart, mind, and soul, and to love others as yourself. In society, seek justice not for yourself but for others. Care for the marginalized, such as the alien, the orphan, and the widow, and offer what is needed to uplift the poor and the needy. Work toward a balance so that the one who has much doesn’t have too much and the one who has little doesn’t have too little. 

 Do good even to those who hate you and pray for those who persecute you. Leave final judgment and retribution to God, it is above your pay scale. As you mature under the Holy Spirit’s guidance, let your character reflect love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. If you don’t see those godly traits in other people or in your leaders, then do not associate with them nor aspire to be like them but pray for them instead that they might find God and let God change them into godly people.  

Jeremiah 8: 8-9. 

How can you say,

“We are wise,   

and the law of the LORD is with us”?

when, in fact, the false pen of the scribes   

has made it into a lie?

The wise shall be put to shame;   

they shall be dismayed and taken;

since they have rejected the word of the LORD,   

what wisdom is in them?

 I just gave you a summary of the covenant that the Lord establishes with us. Every thought is straight out of Scripture, though I did not reference chapter and verse. What could be more obvious? Have we forgotten the central truths of the Bible? 

 Surely those deemed ‘wise’ have not forgotten, have they? Yet God through the prophet Jeremiah makes a very serious charge. God says that, at least for the kingdom of Judah in 600 BC, those who are called ‘wise’ in society are not living up to the honor of the name. Who would that be? Probably the king, priests, scribes, and prophets. They claim that God is with them, but is he? 

 During World War I the British went to war with the slogan “For God, King, and Country.” In the opposing trenches, the Germans arrived with a patch that said, “Gott mit uns und wir mit ihm.” Do you think that the wise in either country were right, or were they just broadcasting patriotic propaganda?

 In the hearing of the people of Judah, as well as officials who wanted him dead, Jeremiah proclaimed the news that what the scribes were writing was lies. What the king, priests, and other prophets were saying should put them to shame, if they had any honor at all. 

 Without the actual word of God, that is, the whole word of God, not just the good parts that promise that I will be blessed, we are lost. If the critical word of God is not read and understood, then the people are rejecting God. The prophet declares that they are far from him and getting farther with each step they take down that road. They reflect no wisdom after all, and they shall pay the price of their folly. 

 In their case, assuming that Jeremiah was preaching this around 600 BC, it was just another 14 years before the apocalypse came for the people of Judah and Jerusalem. What about our case now? How long, O Lord, how long?