Strays

I promise not to listen to you. 

If I said that to you, would you talk to me? If you were a glutton for punishment, maybe. If you had a lot to say and knew that simply saying it out loud would make you feel better, maybe. But most of the time, of course not. 

We don't want to talk to people when they aren't listening to us. 

For this reason, it's remarkable that God chose to use the prophet Jeremiah. Not because Jeremiah was a bad listener - no, he was pretty good. What's remarkable is that God choose to use Jeremiah at all, because the people to whom Jeremiah brought God's words were absolutely unwilling to listen.

Look at what is said about them in Jeremiah 5:

3    O Lord, do not your eyes look for truth? You struck them, but they felt no pain; you crushed them, but they refused correction. They made their faces harder than stone and refused to repent. 4 I thought, “These are only the poor; they are foolish, for they do not know the way of the Lord, the requirements of their God. 5 So I will go to the leaders and speak to them; surely they know the way of the Lord, the requirements of their God.” But with one accord they too had broken off the yoke and torn off the bonds. 

The fact that God chose, despite their behavior, to speak to his people through Jeremiah is exactly what we'll be focusing on in our upcoming sermon series (which is based entirely on readings from Jeremiah.) 

You see, God loves the strays, even as they stray. Not only that, he seeks them. 

So, go ahead. Promise God you won't listen. He's going to keep on speaking words of mercy and grace to you, every chance he gets.

- Pastor Kent Reeder

P.S. I hope you can join us for this series, which begins this Sunday, January 31st.