Life and Death

Thus says the Lord:

Notice please that in this first scripture Jeremiah is giving a statement of what God knows. How do we know this? Because of what he states in the messageJeremiah 17:5 (ESV)

5 Thus says the Lord:

“Cursed is the man who trusts in man

and makes flesh his strength,

whose heart turns away from the Lord. I also want all of us to notice how much this was like the that we read earlier. They are like trees planted by streams of water.

First of all, Jeremiah states a symbolic statement to help his reader to understand what he is talking about. (NRSV)

6 They shall be like a shrub in the desert,

and shall not see when relief comes.

They shall live in the parched places of the wilderness,

in an uninhabited salt land. So Jeremiah is giving the reader the image that if you trust in flesh-and we all understand-I hope-that flesh is not of God, that we will be cursed. Now please don’t get all defensive this is not directed at you but to you. What I mean by that is that I am just preaching to the people as Jeremiah did and his message was received by those who were convicted. I am not preaching to convict, that is not my job.

But in the next verse we see that there is hope for the shrub. It can be transplanted to a river where it never fails to produce green leaves. But what they need to do is, (NRSV)

7 Blessed are those who trust in the Lord,

whose trust is the Lord. And why are they blessed? (NRSV)

8 They shall be like a tree planted by water,

sending out its roots by the stream.

It shall not fear when heat comes,

and its leaves shall stay green;

in the year of drought it is not anxious,

and it does not cease to bear fruit. The actual verb used here in the Hebrew in (transplanted satal) This is perhaps why it says they shall be like. Something that will be like refers to change. It doesn’t say they are like-but that they shall be like.

In these conditions the tree always bears fruit even in dry times because they are planted close to the source of life. A tree that has been planted close to the source of life does not get anxious when dry weather comes.

Don’t all of us, at times, get anxious when tough times come? If you know that you are planted in the life giving source of the living water, you should not be anxious.

Now Jeremiah explains why we are deceived and live in the flesh. (NRSV)

9 The heart is devious above all else;

it is perverse—

who can understand it? A heart wants what a heart wants, right? So what does your heart want? Let the Spirit speak to what your heart desires. Open yourself to the Lord as he searches.

(NRSV)

10 I the Lord test the mind

and search the heart,

to give to all according to their ways,

according to the fruit of their doings.

The Lord looks to give life support from the river of life. Imagine if you will that you always have sustaining life in your body drawn directly from the vine of God.