“With All Our Heart”                                                                    

Makemie Presbyterian Church                                                                        

October 10, 2010

Jeremiah 29: 1, 4 - 13

29These are the words of the letter that the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the remaining elders among the exiles & to the priests, the prophets & all the people, whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.

⁴Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: ⁵Build houses & live in them; plant gardens & eat what they produce. ⁶Take wives & have sons & daughters; take wives for your sons & give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons & daughters; multiply there & do not decrease. ⁷But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile & pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.

⁸For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let the prophets & the diviners who are among you deceive you & do not listen to the dreams that they dream, ⁹for it is a lie that they are prophesying to you in my name; I did not send them, says the Lord. ¹⁰For thus says the Lord: Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you & I will fulfill to you my promise & bring you back to this place. ¹¹For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare & not for harm, to give you a future with hope. ¹²Then when you call upon me & come & pray to me, I will hear you. ¹³When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart.

This ends the reading.

If I was a prophet other than Jeremiah, say Hananiah, I would consult multiple sources to predict the future, like the Magic 8 Ball. (Hold it up). Let’s see, what can we ask the Magic 8 ball? Who will win the College Football Conference? The Magic 8 ball answer, “Concentrate & ask later.” Or where is the mic stand that has been missing for two months? The 8 ball’s says, “You can rely on it.”

Or as the exiles ask, “How long will we be in Babylon?  Ohh, I can hardly wait to get the word. (Read, whatever it says.)

Many scholars say that this text that Lee just read is at least partly about the conflict between true & false prophecy. As always, the lectionary gives us just a little snapshot of the larger picture & all we get this week is a beautiful, if brief, instruction from the prophet about how the people should respond to their plight.

What we don’t know from this short passage, is that other prophets are also providing their opinions, consulting their own versions of the Magic 8 Ball & Jeremiah has no use for them. He calls them deceivers & liars. What Hananiah (in the previous chapter) & the other prophets are saying is that Babylon is about to collapse & that the whole nightmare will be over in as little as two years. But who can blame folks for hungering for a piece of good news? If we’re only here for two years, we can bear that, and we hardly have to unpack. Let’s just count the days and prepare for quick deliverance.

Jeremiah, the prophet of God, however, throws cold water on that kind of false optimism. He calls the people to a deeper kind of hope, a deeper faith which takes a much longer view of things. This isn’t going to be over in two years, he says, but will take seventy years. Don’t listen to these false prophets “whose religion is root-bound in Jerusalem & its temple, who are predicting a much shorter time. Because you see, fanatics are always in a hurry.”

Now whether the term “seventy years” is literal or just a way of saying “a long haul,” “a lifetime” perhaps,  Jeremiah is telling the people that “God is to be found in all this upheaval & is still the same God, who  seeks all that is best, shalom, for his people.” 
 

Seventy years instead of two may sound like bad news, Jeremiah says, but the good news is that God knows what God is doing. God keeps promises & God has promised us a future & a hope. In fact, one of the most beautiful verses in the Bible follows this passage & reverberates back to it. So I included it our reading this morning, thinking the lectionary scripture selection committee missed the boat, in my humble opinion. Just listen to this verse: “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare & not for harm, to give you a future with hope.”  With such a future & such a hope, in their hearts & minds, the people, are instructed by Jeremiah to live in a kind of extended “in-between” time, not just sitting around & waiting for something to happen, not rising up & trying to escape or overthrow their captors & not letting themselves be dragged down into depression & complaining. Nope. Jeremiah instead speaks poetically about houses & gardens & families that go on & on, even in a strange & inhospitable land, surrounded by pagans but flourishing nevertheless. The people of God can bloom where they are planted & there is an echo of something we’re hearing a lot these days, after almost ten years of living under the threat of terrorism & several years of economic “adjustments.” Jeremiah, instructs the people, to “create a new ‘normal’ as they learn to live into this reality, making it their home. Okay, so things may not be great right now, but, -- is it necessary for the news to be good in order for us to live out the good news -- to be blessed ourselves & be a blessing to those around us? 

Might these words fit the situation of a people living under the thumb of an ancient empire -- just as they fit our situation today, mired in different kinds of empires, including fear & suicide & materialism & consumerism, to mention only a few.
 

If faith is, at its heart, trust in God, then Jeremiah is telling the people to have faith in God & in the promises of God. Of course, things may look bad now, which Jeremiah interprets as God’s judgment on the people. What Jeremiah is doing is interpreting current events theologically reassuring the people that God, in spite of the help of the Magic 8 Ball, in spite of false prophets, in spite of appearances, is still in control. This must have been a source of great comfort to them, as they hungered for an understanding of their situation that would go “beyond a sort of whistling in the dark.” But Jeremiah goes even further: he tells them to “seek the welfare” of Babylon & to pray for it as well! Now he may have gone too far, telling the people of God to tie their own good to that of a pagan empire! If Jeremiah tells the people of God to pray for the Babylonians, their pagan conquerors & then the echo reverberates across the centuries to the time of Jesus – who tells us to pray for our enemies. If this instruction of Jeremiah does not at least jar us, perhaps we are not paying close enough attention to the words of Jesus either. After all, like the ancient Jewish people, we are being told to change our attitude, to live in a whole new way.

Sometimes we may get down in the dumps, perhaps feel sorry for ourselves & think that we’re living in exile & that God has abandoned us. At times we might feel like these exiles—foreigners in a foreign land. We might believe that we’ve got nothing much to do or live for in this exiled place. We may fight God by trying to convince ourselves that we want out of this foreign land, this place of exile. But maybe, God might be giving us Jeremiah’s message—”stay right where you are, make the best of your situation, hunker down, keep on living as faithfully as you can right where you are, serve me where I’ve put you.”

In this message from the Lord to those Babylonian exiles, there is something interesting: Jeremiah says, “keep your hope alive, it isn’t as bad as you might think or believe. Look, be thankful that the Babylonians are giving you enough freedom to own property, build your own homes & produce your own food. Compared with the life of your ancestors in Egyptian slavery, this exile is bearable for you—you can handle it with God’s help. See the hope for you & your children in these every day ordinary activities. God is with you.

This is the way the Message Bible translates this passage. “Make yourselves at home there & work for the country's welfare.”Pray for Babylon's well-being. If things go well for Babylon, things will go well for you." ^8-9Yes. Believe it or not, this is the Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, Israel's God: "Don't let all those so-called preachers & know-it-alls who are all over the place there take you in with their lies. Don't pay any attention to the fantasies they keep coming up with to please you. They're a bunch of liars preaching lies—and claiming I sent them! I never sent them, believe me." God's Decree! ^10-11This is God's Word on the subject: "As soon as Babylon's seventy years are up & not a day before, I'll show up & take care of you as I promised & bring you back home. I know what I'm doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for. ¹²"When you call on me, when you come & pray to me, I'll listen. ^13-14"When you come looking for me, you'll find me. "Yes, when you get serious about finding me & want it more than anything else, I'll make sure you won't be disappointed."

Now this is a radical, new message for those Babylonian exiles! They had believed that they were God’s Chosen People; thus God was with them; they were special; therefore entitled to receive special favors and blessings from God. Now Jeremiah was saying: “Have I got news for you! You are not the only people that God cares for & blesses. Those Babylonians, your enemies, are also God’s people; the Gentiles are also blessed by God.” This message underscores that God is the God of all people—Jew and Gentile. No single racial or ethnic group; no one nation can have a monopoly on the God of all creation. God loves all people and cares for their well being.

Many scholars of this passage say that this message of prayer for the welfare of one’s enemies should remind us of the New Testament teaching of the Golden Rule—”do to others as you would have them do to you;” and, going further than that: “love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you, bless those who curse you.”

But in my study of this scripture this week I keep coming to this verse in our text this morning. Jeremiah is relaying God’s words. So God is saying that “when you call upon me & come & pray to me, I will hear you. ¹³When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart.

And the echo for me is heard in our scripture from last Sunday, from the gospel of Luke,   ⁹“So I say to you, Ask & it will be given you; search & you will find; knock & the door will be opened for you. ¹⁰For everyone who asks receives, & everyone who searches, finds & for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.” Then Jeremiah adds, “if you seek me with all your heart.”

But how do we seek God with all our heart? Especially when we often feel like exiles in our own land, our own families, our own bodies? I think it is through prayer.

A few months back, I shift occurred in my universe. My best friend from our girlhood days took her life. And I grieve. I have had overwhelming moments, hours even of what if, what if? It will be the seventy years of exile, the long haul, my lifetime, and I wonder how do I seek God wandering in Babylon? How do I ask & which door do I knock upon?

So one day when John & Jaxon were gone on a driving trip -- I went down to the river; just sat. I went into my mind. It seems for me a refuge. And I said to my mind “This is your chance. Show me everything that is causing you sorrow. Let me see all of it. Don’t hold anything back.”

And, one by one, the thoughts & memories of sadness raise their hands, stand up & identify themselves. I acknowledge each thought, feel the horrible pain & then tell that sorrow, “It’s OK. I love you. I accept you. Come into my heart.” And as the next bit of grief surfaces, regard it, experience it, bless it, invite into my heart. Until nothing is left.

Then to my mind I say, “Show me your anger now.” One by one life’s every incident of anger rises & makes itself known. Every injustice, every betrayal, every loss, every rage.  I acknowledged their existence.  I feel the heat of each piece of anger, then the cooling as I say, “Come into my heart now. You can rest there. It’s safe now. It’s over. I love you.”

Then comes the most difficult part. “Show me your shame” I ask my mind. Dear God, the horrors I saw. A pitiful parade of all my failures, my lies, my selfishness, jealousy, arrogance. I didn’t blink from it, though. “Show me your worst” I said. When I tried to invite those units of shame into my heart, they each hesitated at the door, saying, “No – you don’t want me in there…don’t you know what I did? And I would say, “I do want you. Even you. I do. Even you are welcome here. It’s OK. You are forgiven. You are part of me. You can rest now. It’s over.”

When all this was finished, I was empty. Nothing was fighting in my mind anymore. I looked into my heart, at my own goodness, & I saw its capacity. I saw that my heart was not even nearly full, not even after having taken in & tended to all those calamitous urchins of sorrow & anger & shame; my heart could easily have received & forgiven even more. It’s love was infinite.

I knew then, that late morning that somehow became early evening, that this is how God loves us & receives us all. We are as transparent as dragonfly wings. And if one broken & limited human being could experience even one such episode of absolute forgiveness & acceptance of her own self, then imagine – just imagine! What God in all His eternal compassion can, will forgive & accept.  Now I reckon that this will be an ongoing process for me, that I will struggle for seventy years, with myself, the long haul.

   But as Lee read to us the words of the prophet Jeremiah, using the familiar of God, saying that, “When you call upon me & come & pray to me, I will hear you. ¹³When you search for me, you will find me; …if you seek me with all your heart. “

Because even in exile, especially in exile? God loves us, God will never leave us, God will always care for us, because God has a plan for us, for good & not for harm so that we may have a future filled with hope. Amen.