Running with Horses

As you may remember, my Church has been studying Jeremiah for the past eight weeks, and we will continue studying it right up until Christmas. There are a lot of insights that I've gotten from the studies, and I wish that I had taken the time to share more about what we were studying. Still, I'll take a bit of time now to write some of my thoughts from our studies.

The first portion of Jeremiah is very dark and depressing. Israel has been destroyed, and the southern kingdom of Judah has fallen away from God. They have forsaken Yahweh and chosen instead to follow the gods of other nations around them. Jeremiah spends his life preaching to people that don't want to hear him call out their sin and proclaim God's judgment. It has really helped my perspective of the world to see how Jeremiah struggles with God. When Jeremiah pleads for God to restore Judah as an obedient, holy people, he gets the following response:

So do not pray for this people nor offer any plea or petition for them; do not plead with me, for I will not listen to you.
(Jeremiah 7:16)

How awful is that? Judah has become so sinful that God has to tell Jeremiah, "Don't even bother praying for them. My judgment is coming and it will not be held back." Later Jeremiah complains that God isn't doing anything about the sin and injustice in Judah:

You are always righteous, O LORD,
when I bring a case before you.
Yet I would speak with you about your justice:
Why does the way of the wicked prosper?
Why do all the faithless live at ease?
(Jeremiah 12:1)

When I'm upset about the evil I see in the world, usually I want to hear God's promise that He will take care of things and bring about justice. That isn't what Jeremiah gets. Instead God questions Jeremiah:

If you have raced with men on foot
and they have worn you out,
how can you compete with horses?
If you stumble in safe country,
how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?
(Jeremiah 12:5)

Paraphrase: "I'm telling you right now, things are going to get much worse. If you can't deal with problems as small as these, how will you deal with bigger problems?" That isn't exactly comforting to me, but it is telling of where I look for security. I look to the world for security and I want God to make the world secure. God never promises that. Rather he promises eternal security with no particular guarantees about my present life. When I remember that, and can start to change my focus accordingly, that does bring comfort from the evils of the world.