Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
The text this morning is from the prophet Jeremiah, the 15th chapter:
O Lord, you know; remember me and visit me, and take vengeance for me on my persecutors… Your words were found, and I ate them, and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart, for I am called by your name… Why is my pain unceasing, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? …Thus says the Lord: “If you return, I will restore you, and you shall stand before me. If you utter what is precious, and not what is worthless, you shall be as my mouth. They shall turn to you, but you shall not turn to them. And I will make you to this people a fortified wall of bronze; they will fight against you, but they shall not prevail over you, for I am with you to save you and deliver you, declares the Lord.”
Thus far the text.
Dear friends in Christ,
I feel sorry for Jeremiah. Really, I do. Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! Those are the words of Jesus, some 600 years after Jeremiah lived. Yet, I’m pretty sure that Jeremiah knew the track record for prophets prophesying against Jerusalem, and Israel. It didn’t go well. There were only a handful of prophets who seemed to have died naturally, that is, without the quote-unquote assistance of another. Jeremiah knew that all too well.
And so, he complains. YHWH is sending Jeremiah to prophesy against Jerusalem for the sacrifice of their children to the foreign God, Molech. He is to call all of Judah to repentance, he announces the ever-so-popular Babylonian exile, and he’ll prophesy over the new covenant that would come in Jesus Christ. But, do you think people like to hear that? Do you like it when someone tells you you’ve done something wrong?
If someone walked into this church and told me that I had been a faithless shepherd, as Jeremiah had to tell so many, I sure wouldn’t like it. If someone came right up to your face and accused you of worshipping false gods, which, truly, we all do, we wouldn’t like that very much. If your life was compared to Sodom in every which way, I guarantee you, we’d have a revolt.
But that’s what Jeremiah was told to tell God’s people. And, quite honestly, that’s still a preacher’s job, to tell God’s people when and how they sin, and how to find forgiveness in repentance or pronounce condemnation for unrepented sin. That’s the preacher’s task. But we don’t like it very much. It makes us uncomfortable, or we deny it, or we run away from it, or we lash out.
And that’s what the people around Jeremiah did. They lashed out. They verbally, and, perhaps worse, perhaps not, physically, beat him. And why? Because they didn’t like the words that he was saying. Yet every single one of them came to pass. Every single one. That’s how we’re supposed to recognize a prophet. If his words come to pass and they square with Scripture, then good, he has been sent by God. If they square with Scripture but don’t come to pass, you stone them. Or they don’t square with Scripture and then it doesn’t matter if they happen or not, you stone them. You stone the false prophet.
But that’s not what God’s people were doing. They were stoning the prophets because they didn’t like them. They were stoning the prophets because they didn’t like their words. They were stoning the prophets, ultimately, because they refused to come to grips with their own sin, the words of YHWH were against them.
And so I feel sorry for Jeremiah. He is attacked on all sides, knowing that, really, at any moment, that may be his last. And it’s not because he didn’t have hope in the resurrection of Jesus Christ that I feel sorry, but life is good. I like living; I assume Jeremiah did as well.
After all, he does say that when the Lord gave Jeremiah the words to say, they were delight and joy in his heart. The words of YHWH, even words of condemnation, are a delight and joy to Jeremiah, and if the Israelites weren’t so busy rejecting the Holy Spirit, they would have been a delight to them, too. For the words of condemnation of YHWH never come without words of good Gospel in repentance. Look at our Gospel lesson today: Jesus condemns Peter, calling him and his words Satan, and then proceeds to tell his disciples how losing one’s life is a good thing in Christ.
In Christ, there is nothing to fear in losing your life. There is nothing to fear in persecution. There is nothing to fear for being attacked for doing what is right, even if everyone else thinks it is wrong. In Christ, these are not things to fear, because no matter what, our Lord returns, bringing His recompense for those who love Him.
And Jeremiah loves the Son of God, the one who has been giving him the words to speak. And the Son of God loves Jeremiah, just as He loves each and every one of you. So, Christ will bring His recompense, His compensation, His vengeance upon evildoers and persecutors just as He promised. And Jeremiah wants it. He wants it soon.
As we’ve talked about before, this recompense is not just Jesus wailing around with a sword, cutting people’s heads off. The recompense of God is more along the lines of resurrection and eternal life, all which Christ won for you when He died upon the cross, taking the punishment that you deserve. Christ died for you, so that you might live in Him. And Jeremiah wants this. The prophets, all the prophets, longed to see the day that you are living in, for you even now have the recompense of God, the resurrection, for you have His promise.
You have been bathed in the waters of baptism, you eat and drink Christ’s body and blood, you hear His Word. And what happens? What happens when all this happens to you?
Actually, Jeremiah tells us what God says to this. If you return, or if you turn back, I will restore you. I will repent you. I will make you whole. This is what happens. Because in the waters of baptism, we turn to our sinful self, the Old Adam, and scream at him to die. And die he does, for Christ Himself drowns that Old Adam. In the Lord’s Supper, we find there is nothing worthy in ourselves that we should be honored to come to this feast, but we eat and drink Christ, He putting Himself in us. And in hearing God’s Word, we are always convicted of our sin, or we should be, and we desire no longer to do it. Why is all this?
Is it because you have the power to turn yourself into an amazing human being? Is it because you are so good you turn yourself to God? Is it because you have decided to follow Jesus? Is it because you have given yourself faith to believe? Is it because you are a perfect, omnipotent being that can deliver yourself up to be saved?
Of course not. When you repent, when you confess your sins, it’s because the Holy Spirit has led you there. You can’t even repent on your own; you need the Lord’s power and promise. And where is this promise? Where can you go to find the Words of eternal life?
Go to your baptism. For just as Jeremiah is called by the name of the Lord, so, too, are you called by the name of the Lord, Christian, Lewis, Judy, Mark, Agnes, you are called by the name of the Lord, the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. You have the name of God, notice it’s singular, the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, it’s singular, one name, placed upon you in your baptism.
In this, you find strength to persevere. In this you find joy in the words of Christ. In this, you find delight in your heart as you feel Christ enter your mouth, throat, and belly. Do you find this strength even when you have a complaint against God? Yes, you may.
These complaints are not too big for God to deal with. God listens to Jeremiah’s complaint, and does what? Does God just leave him to languish? No, God gives to Jeremiah promises. He gives him the promise of His name, the promise of repentance, the promise of His Word.
God’s Word is precious, and not worthless. We are called to mediate, eat, God’s Word and find it the most precious thing in the world. But, notice, it’s not just that the Word of God exists that it does anything. The Word alone does nothing. The Word preached, shared, spoken, uttered, the Word does exactly what God says it will do.
And in Jeremiah’s case, the Word that he speaks on behalf of Christ, a word of repentance, and a word of forgiveness, this Word will go to the people and turn the hearts of the people towards Jeremiah, who is the mouth of the Lord. Jeremiah may not turn toward their wicked ways, but they will turn to the way of God. And what is this way?
Salvation and deliverance. Help and rescue. God’s way is the way of life. This is what was won for us. We don’t do anything to earn it. We don’t do anything to deserve it. We don’t do anything for this salvation except sin, sin, sin. And yet, in the love of God, He sent His Son for us. He sent His Son to take our punishment. He sent His Son to bring us peace. When we hear God’s Word, when it is read, when it is preached, when it is eaten, when it bathes us, God’s Word brings us back to the way of the Lord. It turns us back. We may fight against it, but we will not prevail. Christ’s Word prevails. Christ’s Word wins.
Christ’s Word taught in Christ’s Church fed with Christ’s body and blood and washed in Christ’s water, it shall stand. It is a fortified wall. There is salvation only in the Church, behind the wall of bronze. Fire, siege, persecution, arrows, swords, they will not prevail against the wall of the Church. For in this Church stands Christ, and Christ has already taken the blows of this war. The blows of the world have no power over the Church.
We may be scared. We may be like Jeremiah and be taunted, we may be persecuted, we may have lies told about us, people talking about us behind our backs, liars, cheats, and those who are disgruntled in our midst. But, if we are in the Word, if we hear the Word, if we eat the Word, if we are bathed in the Word, and if we are doing the work of salvation and everlasting life, which is only to believe in Jesus, we need not fear forever.
God promised Jeremiah He would save Him. And so God did in Christ. Christ brought Jeremiah to Himself when Jeremiah was stoned to death. Jeremiah was saved. Jeremiah didn’t have a happy life, perhaps. But Jeremiah was washed. Jeremiah ate. Jeremiah preached. And Jeremiah did what was right, even when everyone thought he was wrong, even when everyone hated him. And so are we called to do. Not because it earns us anything, but when you have Jesus, Jesus prevails, and not the works of this world. And Jesus has and will prevail also for you. He shall bring His recompense, His resurrection, for you, and for me, and for Jeremiah, and He shall raise us all from the dead to be with Him forever. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
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