Year 3, Day 59: Jeremiah 6

Keeping Evil Rusty

The opening eight verses of Jeremiah are more gloom and destruction.  Once more God sends word to the Hebrew people that they will be destroyed.  Again we can hear this as a counterpoint to the false prophets.  As they declared that the Lord would not bring judgment against Jerusalem, God declares even more fervently that He would.

What is interesting, though, is why.  We’ve spoken earlier about their idolatry.  In fact, we’ve even spoken of their idolatry with respect to calling it infidelity.  Clearly the people are adulterous in their pursuits of other gods.  Of course, the Hebrew people of this time period are not alone in that.

But there is more to God’s anger than just their idolatry.  God is also displeased at their love for evil.  In verse 7 God accuses the Hebrew people of “keeping their evil fresh.”  I think there is a difference here between “being evil” and “keeping your evil fresh.”  On one level, we are all evil.  You can’t show me any good person aside from Jesus Christ.

But on the other hand, there is a difference between understanding our evil nature and keeping that nature fresh.  We might all have evil tendencies within us, but we do not need to continue to find ways to bring them to the fore of our being.  We might all be guilty, but we can also be repentant.  We may have evil within us, but we should strive to keep that evil rusty, not fresh.

Uncircumcised Ears

This is one of my favorite descriptions used in the Bible.  Uncircumcised ears.  We don’t usually think of the ear as the location for circumcision to happen, do we?  But yet, that is indeed what God says here.

So it makes me ask.  What is circumcision?  I mean that as more of a spiritual question than a physical one.  Circumcision is an act of obedience.  It is an act of separation.  It is an act that takes one’s personal private self and gives it in full obedience to God.  {Among more obvious other things, of course.}

So what is God saying?  The Hebrew people did not listen with any intent on having obedience.  They did not listen with any knowledge of how they were called to be separate {or holy} from the world.  They were not willing to give themselves in full obedience to the Lord even externally – much less internally.

Shame

Again in Jeremiah 6 we run across this concept of shame.  Jeremiah 6:15 asks, “Were they ashamed when they committed abomination?  So we return to the point found in Jeremiah 3.  The Hebrew people refused to be shamed when they committed abominable acts before the Lord.  They lost their fear of the Lord.  They truly did not feel any inclination for repentance when they acted against the Lord’s ways.

So the Lord will take them away into slavery.  He will drag their young and their old into bondage.  But here’s the somewhat scary part.  Jeremiah will be dragged into slavery, too.  No doubt Jeremiah had some followers and people who still genuinely feared God.  They would be dragged into slavery, too.  Jeremiah and his faithful and repentant friends will go down with the ship, so to speak.  Sometimes when a country goes bad and refuses to humble itself, God will let that country go down into captivity – even the good people among them.

What’s really the scary part?  How many people would read that paragraph above and say, “God could never do that to my country.  He wouldn’t let us go down.”  Yeah.  Now you understand Jeremiah’s issue with the false prophets.  It’s far too easy to believe God would never judge our own country because we don’t want it to happen.  It is far easier to listen to peace and joy rather than true reality.

Bachun

Jeremiah 6:27 is a neat verse.  Literally, it says, “I have made you a siege tower among fortifications of my people, so that you may be aware and assay their ways.”  However, the word for siege tower is rooted in the word for examine – which in a strange militaristic sense makes sense.  Thus, the verse is often translated as “I have made you an examiner …”  Whatever the case, God’s point to Jeremiah is that God has put Jeremiah among the Hebrew people to study them and see their true colors.

I really like the original language of the Hebrew, though.  In many respects, comparing the stubbornness of the Hebrew people to fortifications is a wonderful idea.  The sin and wickedness in their life was locked up tightly.  They would not release it.  So, God makes Jeremiah a siege tower so that Jeremiah can get past the barriers of the Hebrew people and gaze upon the sin that they protect so valuably in their life.

Jeremiah is a bachun.  He is a siege tower.  He can examine into the fortified areas of people’s lives.  He is exactly what we should want for a role model and a spiritual guide.

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