A mostly unedited transcript of the sermon follows:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
The text this morning comes to us from Jeremiah, the twentieth chapter.
My dear friends in Christ,
Jeremiah is called the weeping prophet, and he is called that for a very simple reason. He seems to cry a lot. You might think that's strange for a profit. But that's the way it was for Jeremiah. He came and he spoke a harsh word to Israel a lot. In fact, he also wrote another book of the Scriptures, Lamentations. Well, the word Lamentations has the word
“lament” in it. And so you can kind of get a picture of what it is that Jeremiah is to do. He is lamenting over the state of Israel and what is to come for her in her Exile into Babylon, the harsh years which are ahead.
It's difficult for Jeremiah.
He's called to speak difficult words. He's called to speak to a people who don't want to hear him. He's called to speak to people instead who’d rather put him to death.
That's what he says in our text today, that even his close friends are waiting for his fall are waiting to discount his words, are waiting to show that Jeremiah is just another guy that we don't need to listen to, and, like all the prophets before him, are waiting to stone him.
Jeremiah has harsh words for God today, it seems: O Lord, you have deceived me and I was deceived. You might think that Jeremiah is stepping out of bounds here, that he's accusing God of doing something that seems so out of character for God and yet the truth is God will do what he will.
If he tells Jeremiah to go and preach the Jeremiah must go and preach. If he does it, even by what seems like deceptive means, Jeremiah will go and preach. What is it that Jeremiah is speaking here or even singing here. Not sure if this is really a straight-up writing or if it's a song that he's come up with and is written down. Either way you look at it. Jeremiah is looking at God and saying you are greater than I am.
It's a Wonderful confession of faith even in the midst of adversity. It's a Wonderful confession to say that God is stronger than I am and that in all things he must prevail. Even should we be a laughingstock before all those who would hear us, even if everyone should stand there and mock us, we are called to do what God would call us to do.
Jeremiah’s no different. The word of the Lord, he says, has become for him a reproach and a division all day long. That means that every time he speaks people are standing there, literally right in front of him, mocking him to his face and when he's done and he passes through the marketplace or he's going back on his way to his own home, people will stand there and mock him, too.
He's like ELisha going up the mountain and the kids come out of the city and mock him saying, “Go on up, you baldhead, go on up.”
The prophets of the Lord really don't have any honor do they?
And Jeremiah stands here then and says but you are still greater than I am. Though all these things are happening to me, though everyone is waiting for me to die, you are greater than I and if I were even to say I will not speak anymore a fire burns within me as if it as if it is shut up in my bones and I must get it out.
It's kind of that feeling if you've ever been stung by a bee. Or if you've ever been stung even by, if you've been out to the ocean, by a jellyfish and and you get that burn on your leg from either the stinger of the bee or from the tentacles of the jellyfish, and all you want to do is rip off your skin to get it out. That's what Jeremiah needs to do with the word of the Lord. It doesn't matter what he wants to do. It matters what he is called to do. Everyone is standing by waiting for him saying well, maybe he's going to be deceived. Maybe then we will overcome him, maybe then we'll take our revenge on him.
But Jeremiah knows something about God.
He knows that God is still greater than these. Though all people should plot to kill Jeremiah, God is a greater Warrior than any of them could imagine and because of that everyone will stumble and fall or everyone will be crushed.
It takes us to this idea that Jesus Christ is the stone that the builders rejected, the Chief Cornerstone, the stone which people will be cast upon and they will be broken to pieces or which will crush them and they shall be destroyed completely.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is this S?one. And he is for Jeremiah the dread warrior who comes to crush his enemies. And you think here when Jeremiah is speaking these words again, is this sin? Looking at God and saying I don't want to do it. You're tricking me into it. I'm going to but I don't want to.
And then we should look to Christ.
And say yes, maybe Jeremiah is sinning for Christ prayed in the garden, “I don't want this crucifixion Lord. If it be your will let this cup pass from me, yet not my will but yours be done,” which ultimately is where Jeremiah ends. “Not my will Lord, but yours be done. Not my word, O Lord, but yours be spoken.” And then of course he gets to this. Let me see your vengeance upon them.
Is this sin? I think not, for the Lord promises that he will have his vengeance upon all those who would do his people harm. He will have vengeance on all those who sin against his holy law. He will strike down all who sin without Christ.
And for this Jeremiah looks at the face of God and says, “Sing to the Lord, praise the Lord for he has delivered the life of the needy from the hands of the evil doers.”
Jeremiah looks at out vengeful God and Praises him for his vengeance.
Now, you might think all right, so Pastor has been going on about this and what is this have to do with anything, and I would save you this has everything to do with even today. As we sit here and we think of what the church is doing, we still sit in a city where religious entities, and specifically the church, are not viewed as essential. We’re viewed as something that just passes by. We are viewed as people who are to be mocked for wanting to meet together, to come together, to sing praise to God, to have our sins forgiven, still receive our Lord's body and blood, we’re mocked for this.
Going out and protesting is okay.
But how dare you even think of going to a church. We struggled and we fought to convince people that we are essential.
And right now we still have failed.
And the world mocks us.
It's not just here in Milwaukee, but it is all over this country and it is even all over the world that the world looks at us and says you're ridiculous. I cannot wait until you all catch this stupid virus and die, that'll teach you.
Has to do, too, with the word that God would speak in the midst of all of the angriness that we have in this country right now, this angriness over the mistreatment of others over against others.
It’s horrible and the church is out there speaking truth that we are all one race of people descended from Adam and Eve, descended even from Noah, our most recent ancestor. And the Church should speak to this and say this is wrong. We should not engage in such practices. We are people of justice and of mercy, we are people who walk humbly with God. We are people who don't see color when we come into the church for there is neither Jew nor Greek in this place, but we are all one in Jesus Christ. Come to the church. We have the solution for your problems.
And we’re mocked.
We’re mocked.
Surely it can't be as easy as going to church. We need systemic criminal justice reform. We need legal Reform. We need to get rid of racism. And those things are probably true.
But they will only come through the church.
We have the message that this world needs and we stand before the world proclaiming it. And we’re mocked for it. We're pitied for it and people are actively working to destroy us.
It would be so much easier, wouldn't it, to be like the weeping prophet and try to turn our minds and our hearts and our mouths off from God and to say, “Fine. I'm going to do what you say. We're going to go the way that you want to go and I will leave this all behind.”
Yet within us there should be a fire that would burn within our bones that would not let us be silent, but instead rip that off so that we can get that fire out of us, that fire which is the all consuming flame and get him out into the world.
The church is needed now more than ever and you know that it's needed now more than ever because the world is trying to shut us up and shut us down.
The church has the message of eternal life, the message that Jesus Christ has come to die and forgive the sins of the world, that Jesus Christ rose from the dead and he indeed will give eternal life to all who believe in him.
And yet for this message, brother turns against brother, father turns against son, and in this message the world is upended. Because they don't like it.
It can't be as easy as that. It won't be as easy as that. In fact, you are stupid for believing this.
While the world may call you stupid, the world may work to destroy you, the world may work to shut us down and shut us up, but we will not be silent until our throats are slit, and we are laying in the ground. And even then, our voice cries out under the altar of God, "How long O Lord until you take your vengeance?”
And he will.
Our Lord will take his Vengeance on the people who would do his church harm.
Because we have the message of Truth.
We have the message of reconciliation. Not only one with one another, but between God and man.
The message of reconciliation then God is not angry with us but has saved us through the blood of Christ, the message that God is indeed now pleased with those who believe in him and will welcome them into eternal life. Do not fear the ones, my friends, who can destroy your body, fear God who can destroy your body and soul in hell. That's the message. We need to be preaching. That's the message that we do peach. That is the message we take into the world for we don't want anyone to suffer those fires of Hell. Instead, we want them to face the fire of God, the refining fire which purifies them, which sanctifies them, which brings them to eternal life.
That message is mocked.
That message is jeered. For that message, you will be derided. For that message, you may even be killed.
But that message is the most important in all the world at any given time. There is nothing more important than Jesus Christ and him crucified for the forgiveness of your sins and for the sins of the whole world.
What else can we do?
For if we were to shut up, the fire rip out of our bodies and consume all who stand before us.
Let us not be silent, my friends, in this time of crisis, but let us speak confidently the word of God along with Jeremiah. Even though it may be difficult, even though it may be hard, even though we may not want to, let us go out into the wold with the message of reconciliation, the message of truth, the message of life, life which is found in Jesus CHrist. In His name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding, keep your hearts and your Mings in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.
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