Year 6, Day 62: Jeremiah 9

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Ambition

• Ambition: We all need a goal to which we can strive.  When our ambition comes from God, we find fulfillment in our obedience into that for which we have been equipped because our Out is in proper focus.  But when our ambition comes from ourselves, we find ourselves chasing after our own dreams and trying to find fulfillment in accomplishments of our own making.

I find this chapter an interesting perspective on humanity.  God complains through Jeremiah that His people cannot be trusted.  They lie.  They deceive.  They are not trustworthy.  They weary their communities.  The heap oppression upon the oppressed.  We plan to take advantage of our neighbors even while we talk nicely to one another.  God gives a horrible condemnation at the end of the chapter when He claims that all the nations are uncircumcised and even His own people are uncircumcised in their hearts.

What do all of these things say?  Human beings are selfish.  We are self-centered.  We lie to get our own advantage.  We say one thing but do another when it is to our advantage.  We make nice with the people around us until we can take advantage of them.  In other words, our ambition reigns supreme.  We want what we want and we want it now.  We don’t consider who will have to do without, we only care what we can have.

What can we really learn?  If the problem is that we spend too much time focusing on ourselves, then the answer is focusing on ourselves less.  That’s why I love Jeremiah 9:23-24.  We should not boast in our own strength, our own wisdom, or our own wealth.  We should boast in that we know the Lord.  That’s the funny thing.  When we focus on God and God’s ways we also inherently focus on our neighbors, the poor, the unprivileged, the downtrodden, the orphans, the widows, and so forth.  The cure isn’t making ourselves better.  The cure is letting go of ourselves and focusing on God more.

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