A Promise for all Time

Today we begin a 6 week series on the book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah is one of what we call the major prophets of the Old Testament. The other two are Isaiah and Ezekiel and sometimes Daniel is included in that list as well. Jeremiah as we hear became a prophet during the reign of King Josiah who was the king that became a king when he was a boy and in his young adulthood began a reform of Israel to bring the people back to a right relationship with the LORD. So he was alive during the 7th and 6th century BCE, and witnessed the destruction of the temple and the exile of the upper class of Israel and Judah by the Babylonian Empire in 586 BCE. I think this is all helpful information for us to know as we explore this book for the next 6 weeks. Contrary to popular belief Jeremiah was not a bullfrog but was actually known as the weeping prophet for the words he had to speak on behalf of the LORD.

We begin our series on Jeremiah with the opening of the book which is the call of Jeremiah. Since Jeremiah protests his call to God, because he is a boy, it is believed that God called Jeremiah between the ages of 12-20. Can you imagine being so young and being called to serve God as a prophet? The Bible also says that it was Josiah’s 13th year when Jeremiah was called which means that King Josiah was only 21. We have a young prophet and a young king. Not only were these two figures young and being asked to lead God’s people in remarkable ways, but they also both bore the burdens of knowing that there was not going to be a pleasant future for the people of Israel. Once again, can you imagine the immense pressure that Jeremiah must have felt to do his best to bring people to repentance when they had strayed so far from their relationship with God?

One of the many tasks that Jeremiah had to carry out was his temple sermon that we see in Jeremiah 7:1-11 as our second text for today. Jeremiah stands at the gate of Solomon’s Temple so that all people who came for worship and/or sacrifice would hear what the LORD had to say. And there is a lot that Jeremiah says in this short sermon.

The very first thing he does is call for the people of Judah, and for all of Israel is for them to amend their ways. If we were to jump back to Jeremiah 5 then we would see that there is a call to find a single person who would act justly and that if a single person like that is found then the LORD would pardon Jerusalem. It goes on to list the iniquities of the people and how they say they trust God because the kingdom is secure but in everything they do they follow other gods and do things contrary to God’s will. Basically saying that that person does not exist.

And the words from Jeremiah 5 and what we see Jeremiah say next in

Jeremiah 7:4 NRSV

4 Do not trust in these deceptive words: “This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.”

show this kind of false sense of security that the people of Jerusalem and Israel had. This was the promised land and the temple that was built by Solomon and they believed that the LORD would protect them no matter what. That somehow coming to the temple when it was required of them and yet ignoring everything else would somehow appease God and keep that covenant between them and God.

I think just as the people of Israel trusted so heavily on the land and the temple as a symbol of God’s approval without their feeling they needed to do anything, we Christians, also have a tendency to rely too heavily on grace. Now I don’t mean grace in general, but Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer who died at the hands of Nazi’s in World War II said this about what he called cheap grace.

Bonhoeffer says, “Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession...Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.” It’s like the person who says they believe in Jesus and know they are forgiven and so they go out and do all the bad and evil they want because God will forgive them. That is cheap grace. Just as going through the motions of following God by going to the temple was not actually following the commands of God.

Jeremiah also goes on to another list of what looks like they come straight from the ten commandments and says that if you do all those things during the week instead of keeping them, then come to the house of the LORD and say that they are safe is not at all what devotion to the LORD is about.

Between those two lists of things that the people are doing wrong Jeremiah does tell them what they should be doing and how to stop the impending destruction. To make it true that they are safe and that the land is theirs and that nothing will get in their way of the covenant between them and God. It is a list that we have seen before in the Old Testament and it is a list we have seen people like Paul bring up in his letters which he carries over from the Old Testament. The way to amend all of this is by acting justly with one another. To do it with a genuine heart which means that we need to care for the alien aka the immigrants, the orphans, the widows and to avoid shedding blood of innocent people. And don’t go after and worship other gods because it seems convenient or trendy at the time.

Bonhoeffer would call this costly grace. “Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: 'Ye were bought at a price', and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. Costly grace is the Incarnation of God.”

Jeremiah’s call to follow the LORD and Christ’s call to follow him are very similar if not the same. God gives us so much as we basically confess and pray at least once a week in worship in the Lord’s prayer. We have our daily bread and so much more given to us through grace. Grace that came at the price of the second part of the Trinity, the Son, God’s one and only son, a price God gladly paid for our sake. A price that we then gladly live out through our care for the poor, the widow, the immigrant, and all those who are the least of these in society and through our care of the land God lovingly created for us. We do that not just once a week when we walk in these walls but every day of our lives as a way to give thanks for the greatest gift of love and grace ever given. For that we give thanks to God. Amen.