Jeremiah 1:4-10, Psalm 71:1-6, 1 Corinthians 13:1-13, Luke 4:21-30.
A). A COMMON CALL.
Jeremiah 1:4-10.
Throughout history both the Church in general, and churches in particular, have published books of Common Order, Common Worship, and Common Prayer; common lectionaries, common liturgies, and joint statements of faith and mission. This is not necessarily a bad thing, provided that we do not confuse uniformity with unity. What binds us together with other Christians is not outward conformity, but a faith held in common, based in a common Call and calling which is both universal and personal.
The LORD God called Noah to build a boat in a land that had known no rain. This was an action which both condemned sin and which, through his preaching, called to righteousness (2 Peter 2:5). Even Jesus was ‘set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel’ (Luke 2:34). This is remarkably similar to the proclamation of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 1:10).
The LORD called Abraham to leave his home and his moon-worshipping people to go to a place which he had never seen. There (against the expectations of nature) he would become the father of a new nation, with a view to recalling all nations back to God (Genesis 12:1-3). Jeremiah was also called to be a prophet to the nations (Jeremiah 1:5; Jeremiah 1:10).
When called to go and confront Pharaoh, Moses argued his unworthiness for such a cause. The LORD countered this with His promised presence for the task, and gave him visible signs of the authenticity of his calling (Exodus 3:12). A similar promise was made to Jeremiah (Jeremiah 1:8).
Moses complained of lack of eloquence, but the LORD overthrew this argument by putting His words into Moses’ mouth (Exodus 4:12). Jeremiah similarly had the words of the LORD put into his mouth (Jeremiah 1:9).
Called to deliver Israel from the Midianites, Gideon complained of his lack of standing in Israel. Again the LORD promised His presence (Judges 6:15-16). It is His work, but it is often only accomplished by human instrumentality. Jeremiah also complained of his youth, but the LORD promised him strength and eloquence enough for the task (Jeremiah 1:6-7).
Isaiah was confronted by the LORD, and was overcome by his sense of personal and corporate sinfulness. A seraph touched his lips with a live coal, and his sin was purged. When the LORD followed this with a general call, ‘Whom shall I send?’, Isaiah did not hesitate to volunteer: ‘Here am I, send me’ (Isaiah 6:8). Jeremiah’s mouth was similarly touched by the LORD, in order to equip him for the task (Jeremiah 1:9).
When the Apostle Paul waxed autobiographical, it usually served an apologetic purpose, verifying an Apostleship which was often questioned by his hearers (Galatians 1:15-16). The prophets’ occasional accounts of their calling also serve to authenticate their ministries. Micah speaks of the Word ‘happening’ to him (Micah 1:1). Jeremiah uses the same word to explain the unplanned spontaneity of his own calling (Jeremiah 1:4).
Without denying their historicity or particular relevance to the prophet’s own time and place, some of the personal words of the LORD to Jeremiah can be applied to our own situations. We were ‘chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world’ (Ephesians 1:4), and thus, with Jeremiah, the LORD knew each of us before we were born, set His seal upon us, and prepared us for His calling (Jeremiah 1:5).
The LORD knew His plans for Jeremiah, and had a particular end in view (Jeremiah 29:11). The same is true for us: both as Christian individuals, and as Church.
The Common Call of the Church is found in a mixed metaphor of gardening and building. It is, with Jeremiah, to declare bad what God has pronounced bad, and to proclaim something good in its place: the glorious gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ (Jeremiah 1:10).
B). A SAFE PLACE.
Psalms 71:1-6.
This short excerpt from Psalms 71 is a strong declaration of confidence in the LORD, based on long experience.
Psalms 71:1a. A declaration of present, personal trust in the Personal God. “In You, O LORD, I put my trust.”
We cannot trust in the impersonal. Neither can we rely on the faith of other people. We must respond to the overtures of the true and living God by putting our personal trust in Jesus. It is a temporally ‘present’ trust, in a spatially ‘present’ God.
Psalms 71:1b. Based in that trust, a prayer that, for the honour of His own Name, the LORD will not put me to shame for having believed in Him!
Psalms 71:2a. A plea that the LORD will “Deliver” - literally, snatch me out of the hands of the enemy, thereby vindicating His own “Righteousness”: being both ‘Just, and the Justifier of those who believe in Jesus’ (Romans 3:26).
Psalms 71:2b. An appeal to His all-hearing ear, and a request that He will “Save” me: bring me to the fulness of salvation in Jesus, deliver me from my present distress, save me from enemies, heal me, protect me from wrong thinking, and so on.
Psalms 71:3a. “Be my strong habitation, to which I may resort continually.”
A refuge is like a fort, to which we might run in distress: but when we turn that fort into a castle, and take up residence there, it becomes a home. Long years of reliance upon the sturdiness of the structure, and the Rock on which it is built, teaches us to rely continually on its worthiness, rather than just running there in a crisis. This is the voice of experience.
Psalms 71:3b. “You have given commandment to save me.”
Claim the promise. All things DO ‘work together for good’ to those who are your people (Romans 8:28). Even inanimate forces are compelled to obey! NOTHING ‘can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord’ (Romans 8:38-39).
Psalms 71:3c. There are songs here. On Christ the solid Rock I stand; all other ground is sinking sand. Jesus is my Rock, and He rolled my blues away.
And a verse: ‘The name of the LORD is a strong tower: the righteous runs into it and is safe’ (Proverbs 18:10).
Our personal security lies in our Personal LORD: He is “my” Rock and “my” Fortress (Psalms 71:3); “my” God (Psalms 71:4); “my” hope, “my” trust (Psalms 71:5); and the sole recipient of “my” praise (Psalms 71:6).
Psalms 71:4. The cry, “Deliver me” is reiterated. Pluck me, O my God, “out of the hand of the wicked, out of the hand of the unrighteous and cruel man.”
Mr. Spurgeon recognises two hands here, but ‘the finger of God’ (he says) more than matches them!
It is good that God is on the side of His afflicted people! ‘If God be for us, who can be against us?’ (Romans 8:31).
Psalms 71:5. Our present Hope, our present Trust is based in past experience: even “from my youth,” says the Psalmist.
Let us raise up our Ebenezer, our ‘stone of help’: for ‘Hitherto hath the LORD helped us’ (1 Samuel 7:12). He has always proved Himself to be ‘a very present help in time of need’ (Psalms 46:1). He will never let us down.
‘Behold I am with you always, even to the end of the age’ (Matthew 28:20); ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you’ (Hebrews 13:5). No, not, never!
Psalms 71:6a. In fact, not only does the LORD promise to be with us in all our tomorrows: He has already been with us in all our yesterdays - right back to birth, right back to the womb, asserts the Psalmist!
When we lean on Jesus, it is not just for a season, but for life. The LORD has determined our path, our appointment, and our destiny from time immemorial (cf. Jeremiah 1:5).
Psalms 71:6b. No wonder our Praise is constantly, and continually, of Him!
To quote Mr. Spurgeon again: ‘Where goodness has been unceasingly received, praise should be unceasingly offered.’
Amen.
C). THE GIDDY HEIGHTS OF AGAPE LOVE.
1 Corinthians 13:1-13.
At the end of the previous chapter Paul encouraged the Corinthians (church) to be, literally, ‘zealous’ for the best gifts (‘charismata’). ‘And yet,’ he said, ‘I show unto you a more excellent way’ (1 Corinthians 12:31). What is that ‘more excellent way?’ It is the ‘way’ of love (“agape”) (1 Corinthians 13:1-13).
This passage is a celebration of “agape” love, Christian love; a love rooted in God’s love for us (cf. 1 John 4:19). In that respect, it really starts with God: ‘God is love’ (READ 1 John 4:7-10). It is He with whom we will come “face to face,” He whom we shall “know, even as we are known” (1 Corinthians 13:12).
This hymn of “agape” love clearly belongs in a church context - for example, in the context of the church in Corinth. The counterpart to the rhetorical questions of the previous chapter is found here. Instead of ‘are all?’ ‘have all?’ ‘do all?’ (1 Corinthians 12:29-30), we have “If I” do this, “have” this, “know” this, do this or that other thing “but have not love” then “I am nothing” and “it profits me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).
If we read this chapter honestly, we have to concede that it is well-nigh impossible to keep (1 Corinthians 13:4-7). That is our problem: we tend to treat a passage like this as if it were attainable on a human level. Like Israel of old, we imagine ‘all that the LORD has spoken we will do’ (Exodus 19:8).
If any person, any couple, any church imagines that they have perfectly kept ‘the royal law of love’ (James 2:8) they will find, sooner rather than later, just how wrong they are. Thankfully, we are not under law, but under grace. The law condemns, but grace empowers.
‘Love one another,’ said Jesus, ‘AS I HAVE LOVED YOU’ (John 13:34). ‘Husbands love your wives,’ teaches Paul, ‘as Christ loved the Church, AND GAVE HIMSELF FOR IT’ (Ephesians 5:25). The path of “agape” love is a path of SACRIFICE.
Even the Spirit given, Spirit distributed, Spirit empowered spiritual gifts will cease once they have fulfilled their purpose (1 Corinthians 13:8-12). That purpose is to prove and to demonstrate what the church has been saying all along: that ‘Jesus is Lord’ (cf. 1 Corinthians 12:3).
When “prophecies,” “tongues,” and even “knowledge” will cease (1 Corinthians 13:8), then only that other triad of “faith,” “hope,” and “love” will remain (1 Corinthians 13:13).
“The greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13). So ‘pursue love’ (1 Corinthians 14:1). ‘Let all your things be done with love’ (1 Corinthians 16:14).
D). THE INCLUSIVE NATURE OF THE MISSION OF GOD.
Luke 4:21-30.
In a synagogue in Nazareth, a young man is reading aloud from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He stops mid-sentence at “the acceptable year of the LORD” without mentioning “the day of vengeance of our God” (Isaiah 61:2). As He sits down to preach, all eyes are upon Him (Luke 4:20): whatever is He going to say?
His voice echoes forth as clear as any trumpet: “This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears” (Luke 4:21). There is a stir in the congregation. They wonder at the gracious words that fall from His mouth (Luke 4:22).
We can almost hear them: ‘We know this young man. He is the son of the carpenter (or so they think). Whatever is He saying?’ Those same words pierce their own hearts, but they cannot bring themselves to accept His message.
Although no question had been asked by the congregation, nor challenge laid down, the Lord anticipated the reaction which He was going to receive. He knows the minds and hearts of each one of us. Familiarity breeds contempt, and they are now offended that He has manifested His glory elsewhere, but has done no miracles in their midst (Luke 4:23).
It has ever been the same, and drew forth the observation of Jesus that a prophet is not without honour - except in his own country, and amongst his own people (Luke 4:24). We read elsewhere that Jesus ‘did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief’ (Matthew 13:57-58). When we have a heart of unbelief, and depart from the living God, we are hardened by the deceitfulness of sin (Hebrews 3:12-13).
Perhaps the turning point of this dialogue is when Jesus says, “but in Truth I say to you…” (Luke 4:25). The examples speak for themselves: (Luke 4:25-26; cf. 1 Kings 17:9) and (Luke 4:27; cf. 2 Kings 5:1; 2 Kings 5:14).
The LORD has always been reaching out towards the people on the wrong side of the tracks. That was the plan all along (Genesis 12:3). It is sad, then, when His own people cannot find it in their hearts to accept the inclusive nature of God’s mission to mankind: [See the reaction to Paul's defence before an angry mob in Jerusalem (Acts 22:21-22).]
The people of Jesus’ hometown missed their great day of opportunity. They attempted instead to cast Him headlong from the “Brow of the Hill” upon which their city was built (Luke 4:28-29)! Thus these self-professing ‘people of God’ were aligning themselves with the devil - who had already failed to get Jesus to cast Himself down from the “Pinnacle of the Temple” (Luke 4:9-13).
Jesus’ time was not yet (John 2:4; John 7:6; John 7:30; John 8:20). When the time came, no-one took Jesus’ life from Him: He lay it down Himself (John 10:18). For the time being, He “passed through the midst of them” - unscathed - and “went on” with His mission (Luke 4:30).
