June 23, 2002 -- FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST -- Proper 7
Jeremiah 20:7-13
Color: Green
Title: “God’s Will”
Jeremiah Denounces His Persecutors
7 O LORD, you have enticed me,
and I was enticed;
you have overpowered me,
and you have prevailed.
I have become a laughingstock all day long;
everyone mocks me.
8 For whenever I speak, I must cry out,
I must shout, "Violence and destruction!"
For the word of the LORD has become for me
a reproach and derision all day long.
9 If I say, "I will not mention him,
or speak any more in his name,"
then within me there is something like a burning fire shut up in my bones;
I am weary with holding it in,
and I cannot.
10 For I hear many whispering:
"Terror is all around!
Denounce him! Let us denounce him!"
All my close friends
are watching for me to stumble.
"Perhaps he can be enticed,
and we can prevail against him,
and take our revenge on him."
11 But the LORD is with me like a dread warrior;
therefore my persecutors will stumble,
and they will not prevail.
They will be greatly shamed,
for they will not succeed.
Their eternal dishonor
will never be forgotten.
12 O LORD of hosts, you test the righteous,
you see the heart and the mind;
let me see your retribution upon them,
for to you I have committed my cause.
13 Sing to the LORD;
praise the LORD!
For he has delivered the life of the needy
from the hands of evildoers.
This text is best understood as a lament psalm, but a very personal one. While the lament psalms in the Psalter are based on personal experience of attack by enemies, be they human enemies or enemies of physical and psychic health, the travail is more or less generalized, allowing us to identify our own particular laments or complaints with those of the psalmist. This lament of Jeremiah is much more personal and we know more about the specific circumstances to which Jeremiah refers. He is being mocked and attacked for his message, a message mandated by Yahweh. There is a part of him that expects better treatment; after all, the message is not his, but Yahweh’s. He also expects, given the intensity of opposition, more help from Yahweh.
In verses seven to ten, we find the typical element of all lament psalms. Jeremiah lays out his gripes, his complaints, before Yahweh. In verse eleven, we find the typical reversal of course; he expresses confidence in Yahweh and reminds himself before Yahweh of Yahweh’s past fidelity. In verse twelve, we find the typical petition of a lament psalm: help me and let me see your help. In verse thirteen, there is the final element of lament psalms, praise of Yahweh, either in anticipation of the certainty of Yahweh’s help or in response to the help already given. In Jeremiah’s case, he anticipates what he knows will be Yahweh’s answer. Alone, he cannot withstand his, and Yahweh’s, enemies. With Yahweh’s help they cannot be defeated. The Hebrew yakal, “prevail, overcome, triumph,” occurs four times in verses 7, 9, 10, and 11. There is movement here from complaint to trust to petition to praise.
In verse seven, you duped me: The verb used here, Hebrew patah, does have sexual connotations of seduction, but the context is more one of persuasion. Jeremiah is saying, “My being your prophet was your idea, Lord, not mine. You talked me into it.” Jeremiah is implying that whatever Jeremiah is feeling it is Yahweh’s fault. And whatever he is suffering- derision, mockery, prison, even plots against him- is Yahweh’s fault.
In verse eight, violence and outrage is my message: Jeremiah reminds one of an actor who complains he has been “type cast,” must always play the bad guy, gets roles that make people hate him. Jeremiah does not like his lines. They are so negative that people identify him with the message and want to take out their anger on him. Yahweh had told him to tell the people that because of Judah’s sins she will be destroyed.
In verse nine, I will not mention him: Jeremiah hit upon a solution: “If I keep my mouth shut, do not speak of Yahweh or his message, the people will stop persecuting me and will like me again.” He is like the obsessive person who resolves not to even think of “alcohol or “pink elephants” or whatever, and cannot help but think of the forbidden topic.
I grow weary holding it in: Jeremiah cannot keep quiet. Yahweh is too powerful, too persuasive. Despite himself and his better judgment, he must speak. The message burns in his heart. He cannot put it out and cannot stop himself from mentioning it.
In verse ten, the whisperings of many: “Terror on every side!”: People, when they saw Jeremiah in action or even just passing by, would say, “There’s old “Terror On Every Side” Jeremiah. Their nickname for him, derived from his message of the imminent destruction of Jerusalem, was “whispered” loud enough for him to hear and feel derided. Actually, Jeremiah is responsible for the epithet, for that is what he dubbed Pashhur, the chief priest who had the prophet scourged and arrested for prophesying Jerusalem’s and the Temple’s doom.
Denounce him: Jeremiah’s claim to be speaking God’s interpretation of the human situation caused people to want to kill the messenger because they did not like the message. All the Psalms of Lament recognize this process whereby evil plots against good, tries to catch good in a mistake, blow it way out of proportion, and attempt to silence or kill anything or anyone who exposes their evil. Jeremiah is painfully aware that he is being scrutinized to find anything wrong with him that his enemies, the enemies of good and God as well, can pounce on, exploit, exaggerate, and ultimately execute Jeremiah for.
My friends are on the watch for any misstep: Jeremiah is probably being, typically, sarcastic here. The “friends” in question Lit, “ones who wish me well Hebrew shalom]” are probably those who feign concern for Jeremiah, but underneath are seething mad at him for causing them grief by such a negative and unpleasant message purportedly from Yahweh. One gets the impression that Jeremiah did not have very many real friends in any event.
Perhaps he will be trapped then we can prevail: Even though differently translated , these are the same words used in verse seven. There it is Yahweh who “deceives, seduces, persuades” Jeremiah and is the stronger of the two. Here it is Jeremiah’s enemies who want to overpower him. Yahweh’s purpose was to recruit Jeremiah into his service. Jeremiah’s enemies’ purpose is to punish and destroy him for having accepted Yahweh’s call and joined his service.
In verse eleven, the Lord is with me: Despite it all Jeremiah, minimizing none of the risk and cost of being a spokesperson for God, still trusts, no matter what, come what may, that the Lord is with him. Aware of his enemies’ plots and purposes, Jeremiah feels forearmed. He moves from lament/complaint to confession/praise. The God who would not let him go, despite all of his doubts and despite his enemies plots, will not let him down.
My persecutors will stumble: Jeremiah is at prayer here, using a psalm or several, meditating on a basic truth that the lament psalms repeat over and again, namely, that evil returns to its source. Enemies may dig a pit for others, but they fall into it themselves. There is no need for a person to seek revenge; the perpetrator of injustice is his or her own undoing. Jeremiah is confident that his enemies will not prevail because God has placed his law of justice- you reap what you sow- into the fabric of human society. Given time, it works out.
Mighty champion: In the Old Testament this is a description of an enemy who has overpowered his foe. This is the only passage where the word, Hebrew `ryts, is used of Yahweh. Yahweh has overcome, overpowered Jeremiah and might have seemed like an enemy at times, given all the grief that resulted from it. But Jeremiah shortly sees who the real enemy is and that that enemy will not prevail, precisely because God has.
In verse twelve, Let me witness the vengeance you take on them: Jeremiah’s prayer is in the spirit of the psalms. He is not looking to snicker and sneer at his enemies as they did to him, to have the last laugh. He wants to see God-in-action, see his justice, and thus praise him for it. Vengeance is really not God’s active intervention into the normal course of human affairs, so much as it is the normal working out of the consequences of evil actions, working eventually upon the very evil that caused them in the first place. Vengeance is really like a boomerang, which returns to its source. Jeremiah wants to see his hope and trust in God vindicated, worked out, more than he wants to seek vengeance.
In verse thirteen, Sing to the Lord, praise the Lord: Jeremiah has now moved to the hymns and psalms of praise to complete the process. The confidence he has gained by reflecting upon and praying the psalms of lament in verses 11-12, evolves into unmitigated, unmuted, praise of God.
For he had rescued the life of the poor from the power of the wicked: This does not have to have happened. The “prophetic perfect, “ using a past tense to indicate a future event, arises from the confidence that God will always deliver on his word. He always has in the past; he will in the future. Thus, a believer can speak of future events with the same surety as past ones.
Sermon
In response to Yahweh’s challenge Jeremiah says, “I give up.” His mood is not one of unwilling capitulation. He is half-willing and half-resigned, given the strength of God. It’s something like two friends wrestling to the ground and the more powerful one twisting an arm, with absolutely no intention of really or permanently hurting his friend, until the weaker one cries “Uncle.” It’s half in earnest, to show who is stronger, and half in fun, but all in love. It is a rather healthy way for boys to show their love for each other. The more powerful one will never really hurt the other; the weaker acquiesces but still keeps his dignity.
The stakes here in Jeremiah’s life are quite high, however. This is no game. It is life or death. While he may banter with God, there is no underestimating the grim seriousness of his, and God’s, enemies. Jeremiah represents everyone who stands on principle and everyone courageous enough to go against the tide and speak the truth, the unpleasant and unwelcome truth. Most times most of us want to hear good news, and there is never a good time for bad news. The time was particularly bad when Jeremiah was impelled to speak God’s interpretation of the events surrounding the Jewish people at the time. They were going to lose. Their confidence in Yahweh had moved into arrogance, kidding themselves that Yahweh would protect them no matter what they did and there would be peace at any price. When Yahweh did not deliver, they took it out on Jeremiah. They could have believed him and repented. Instead, they made fun of him and resented his message. They schemed behind the scenes to catch him in some error and use it as an excuse to shut him up, permanently. Of course, that solution would not remove or solve the real problem, which was their behavior not Jeremiah’s. Centuries later their prodigy would repeat the same mistake in the case of Jesus, a mistake repeated every day. Jesus, too, would have plots, schemes, trumped up and exaggerated minor charges leveled against him. He, too, would face the utter injustice and callousness of it all, the very people he was trying, indeed dying, to help were his persecutors, as did Jeremiah. He would consult the psalms and pray them. Even as he hung on the cross he would imitate Jeremiah by praying Psalm 22, beginning with lamenting his unjust condition and ending in praise of Yahweh. He would express his utter amazement at the injustice of it all and even chide God, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”, but would end, as does Jeremiah here, with utter trust in God and unmitigated praise of him. The parallels between what happened to Jeremiah and what happened to Jesus are many and eerie, as are the parallels between the complaints of Job and those of Jeremiah. The more we plumb the depths of Scripture, the deeper we go underneath the surface of the words, the more we see interconnectedness, links, not immediately apparent. Like our experiences of the Triune God himself, the variety on the outsides, the tops, the surfaces of our experiences, is but the outward expression, sign, of an inner unity.
The various facts on the ground tempted Jeremiah to think Yahweh fickle or even duplicitous, but prayer brought him back to the center, or underneath the surface, to see the really real reality. The facts on the ground have not changed and will not. Jeremiah will not “prevail” over them. But the facts underneath, awareness of Yahweh’s fidelity, presence, and being-with Jeremiah, cause him to know that he has “prevailed” in the arena where it really matters. It is only a matter of time before the facts on the ground change, but that is beyond Jeremiah’s power and he accepts that, even as he wishes it were otherwise. He and we can accept reality as it is because we know it will not stay that way. He and we, must wait until God changes it, however, and not try to play God by attempting to control things or people.
When we are on the side of truth and goodness, we should expect to come under attack from evil.
Just because we trust in God does not mean that we will not feel the pain of being opposed by those who feign friendship with us.
Truth and goodness will triumph, but not necessarily right away.
Prayer reinforces our trust in God.
Under Attack: By definition Christians are the enemies of evil and vice versa. Therefore, we are always under attack. Even getting sick or getting a disease is a form of attack from the side of evil. God does not will sickness, though he tolerates it. He sends us the power we need to combat sickness and disease. That does not mean that we will always be triumphant over the medical malady, but that it will not be triumphant over our trust in God. The same is true when we are under attack from our fellow human beings. Ostensibly, our enemies may seem to win. We might not, in fact, get that job or promotion. We might even lose the job or get demoted. From our vantage point we are tempted to feel that God has let us down. However, we know that is never true, so even the apparent defeat can be a grace, causing us to look at the situation from a different point of view. Only then, only when we look at a situation in the light and by the light of eternity, can we see the fuller picture. If we are truly on God’s side, then we know that we might have to be a casualty in his war against evil, but that he will see to it that we are not eternally destroyed, as will be our enemies, if they also be God’s enemies. God does not need to win every battle every time. He is content to sit back, so to speak, and watch the goodness and justice he has injected into his creation, unfold over time. He does that with plants, animals and humans, when it comes to their physical development. He also does that with humans when it comes to their personal development and their relationship to him. When we realize this truth we become more at peace with losing a particular battle, knowing that the war will end in our favor, if we are on God’s side. It is really no different from a competitive sport. During the game, one side might look like the winner at a given point because the score indicates such. However, it ain’t over till it’s over. No athlete would ever stop the game and quit just because in the third quarter his side was losing. God says to Jeremiah and to us that we should keep playing, keep trusting in him, for he, and only he, knows in advance the outcome. Fearing evil so much that we are too scared to oppose it is the only weapon evil really has, its only strength. In the final analysis evil only has the power over us that we give it. Evil can impose pain, admittedly only temporary pain, but it cannot impose victory. For that, it requires human acquiescence. The only way we can lose the war is by surrender.
Surrender: The only way we can win the war is by surrender. We can either surrender to evil or to good, to God. How do we prevent ourselves from surrendering to the wrong one? By prayer. That’s what Jeremiah did, what Job did, what Jesus did. Not just the prayer of lament or complaint. It is appropriate to review before God the reasons why we are surrendering to him, to tell him what is wrong, going wrong, and what it feels like. However, we should not overdo it. After all, God already knows all that. If we overdo it, we will also try to give God the solution. And although we might be so sure at the time that our solution is the right one, God sees into the future and has the better perspective. So, after lament should come praise. Praising God, recognizing his powerful presence, gives us the confidence we need to hang in there, knowing that he is with us, even if he disagrees with our “sure” solution. The Psalms and this psalm like prayer of Jeremiah provide us with templates for prayer. They ensure that we do not become so absorbed in our own pain that we fail to move to the next step- trust that God’s solution is always the best one. His track record has proven that and that record is a whole lot longer than our own. So, we surrender to his better judgment and avoid becoming bitter over the hand we have been dealt. God will coach us to play the cards we have to their maximum, so that when he ultimately wins, we win with him. Amen.
