Jeremiah 49

Well not really this chapter alone.  But reading through Jeremiah.  In chapter 49 (and elsewhere) God is commenting on the great political events of the time.  He is predicting what will soon happen and commenting on the reasons.  God says these wars and famine and disasters are the result of people's sin and pride.  They refuse to take care of the poor and widow.  Instead they take advantage of them.  They are selfish.  So God sent prophets like Jeremiah to predict what is about to happen and give God's perspective.
What is about to happen is not all that well hidden.  But God's perspective is unique.  As we look at our world and think about what will happen in the future would it be nice now to have a prophet to tell us why?  (Perhaps not.)  But we mostly think there is no why.  I think this is a big mistake.  God still cares about his creation.  Why should it be any different than in Jeremiah's time.  Who has the bravery to speak in God's name?  How would we know if a prophet was self appointed or God appointed?  Certainly any real prophet would be reviled, ridiculed, even punished as Jeremiah was.  So most of us would never volunteer for the job.
But I believe God still loves his creation passionately.  He despairs when  he sees us so selfish and destructive of one another.  He longs to see us do righteously, love mercy, and walk humbly before our God.  That would be good for us, better for our world, and please God greatly.:
I said wouldn't it be nice to have a prophet like Jeremiah today?  Well the people of his time said "No!"   The demanded, "Don't say these horrible things about destruction and murder!"  They must have thought that by predicting these things they might be brought into existence.  They would much rather stay in denial.  But God sent Jeremiah so that there could not pretend everything was all right.  He told them they were sinners and they would see God's judgment.
Aren't we in denial too?  We want things to continue just as they are now.  Why can't we just continue as we are now?  Perhaps the terrible things that could happen with the world's economy can be put off, might not happen at all.  We can continue our selfishness and everything will stay as it is.
But if we are willing to look at the future we can see what is likely to happen done the road.  And perhaps it is not as far off as we'd like to hope.  We remember economic disasters of the past, panics, depressions, monetary collapse.  We hope they will not happen again.  We remember the last big world war.  We can see the power of the U.S. waning.  Who will take up the coming power vacuum in the world?
What we do not have and what we desperately need is God's perspective on all this.  Yes he does have one.  He is close.  He cares.  Whatever happens I trust in his care for me.  Those who do not have this trust should repent of their sins and ask God to enter their heart and take over their lives.  It would be nice if a prophet was here to explain all this for us.  But we do have the Bible and there are many examples that help us to see God's way of understanding.  Let us seek him for his view.

Jeremiah 32:1-15

Jeremiah 32 - In the midst of allowing destruction and chaos, God asked Jeremiah, now jailed for telling  the truth, to buy a piece of land.  I liken it to Peter being told beforehand that he is going to preach to Gentiles.  Peter would never have done it unless God had not spoken to him beforehand.  This is what happens in the case of Jeremiah in chapter 32.
So God tells Jeremiah that a man is going to visit him offering him land.  Because God tells him beforehand he feels God is asking him to buy it.  So Jeremiah takes a deed and gives good money with all the proper witnesses, while still in jail.  We are given all the legal details.  I guess the author wants us to see even with destruction looming business is still being carried out in normal ways.
Thus Jeremiah is saying and modelling that God will restore his people.  In the midst of a terrible judgment that is about to happen, God still sees beyond to recovery.  God says, "Houses and fields and vineyards shall again be bought in this land."
After the election I see a terrible judgment about to happen to this country.  No I am not a prophet.  I am just looking at the signs.  As a country we have chosen selfishness over responsibility.  We have chosen sexual license, fiscal license, abortion out of convenience and pronounced it all good in the public square.
I hope I am wrong.  A lot of terribly smart people are on board with voting for a socialist president.  How blind can smart people be?  Are they ignoring the obvious?  They don't want to see?
Yet God will be merciful to us too, as he was to the people of Israel in the time of Jeremiah.  But not, I fear, before a judgment.  I worry about my family, how they will survive.  Yet God says pray for daily bread.  He promises to give us our daily bread.  I believe it.  I pray for faith not to worry.  I do not want to give up, to retire from life.

Jeremiah 33 - confusing prophesies

As I read Jeremiah 33, he is speaking of God's faithfulness despite his people's great sin.  The first part of the chapter describes the great slaughter that will come at the hands of the Chaldeans.  But the whole tenor of the chapter is about God's restoration.  God will restore them as they were before.  Yet nothing really is said about their repentance.  Perhaps their condition is so weak, so dire, as to not even require repentance.  They have been brought to their knees.  But God promises, God vows to restore them.
Then the chapter takes a tangent.  In verse 33:15 Jeremiah speaks of the "righteous branch of David".  That can only refer to Jesus.  We see that now.  But Jesus has not really come yet to execute justice and righteousness in the earth.  Or has he?  Can we say that in his condemnation and death he judged us?  Is that what God is saying here?
Then is verse 33:17 he assets David shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of Israel.  Yet the kingdom did cease.  How can this be? Jeremiah adds, "There shall always be a Levitical priest to offer burnt offerings, to prepare sacrifices."  (That doesn't seem so important to us, but it did to them.)  Yet temple worship did cease.  How do we understand this claim?
From verses 19 to 26 the wording seems dense, hard to understand.  I do not clearly understand it.  Could that be intentional?
John Fieldsend picks up on 24.  "Have you not observed what this people have spoken, saying, the two families which the Lord has chosen, He has rejected them?"  What two families?
Fieldsend thinks this could refer to the two covenants that theologians has argued about since the church began:  Did God's covenant to the Jews fall away?  Did the church replace Israel as God's chosen people?  Fieldsend calls this thinking "triumphalism".  Or are there now two paths to God, one through Christ and one through the torah (old covenant)?
This discussion has been going on since the church began  Paul speaks to it at great length in Romans, especially chapters 9 - 11.
Perhaps Jeremiah's prophesy here presages all this.  Jeremiah is speaking to what happens when God's covenant is broken.  Christians see the Jews rejection of Jesus as a break of the covenant.  This is important to us  who break the covenant regularly.  Jeremiah concludes in 26, "I will restore their fortunes, I will have mercy on them."

downtown post office

I have been going to the downtown post office to pick up mail for over 30 years now.  There is the same professional postal guy who delivers people's mail.  He has been here for all these years.  And he has not aged a day.  He is a tradition, a fixture.  And every once in a while he become a barometer for the sentiment of the city.
He is a Dallas Cowboy fan, thought he usually does not flaunt it.  But he had some very good comments during the Luv Ya Blue days.
Today he and a fellow he knew (he knows everybody) were loudly lamenting last night's result, saying, "Well we just have to deal with it!"  I'm not sure I know exactly where he stands on the result but he made it clear, we don't have to like it.  But we cannot change it.  We have to deal with it.  We may not understand how it could have happened.  We may wonder the sanity of so many people voting for four more years of mismanagement and deficit spending.  But have to get up the next day and deal with it.
Some of us certainly are in a sort of mourning.  It is a bit like losing a football game.  It's over.  We have to look ahead.  We have to pick up the pieces.  We have to deal with it.  We have to move on as best we can.
He made mention of the fact that our children will be the ones to bear the brunt of all this.  We did what we could.  People seemed oblivious to the facts.  We will likely not be here to see all the ramifications.  But we get up and get on with our lives.