From a Rocky Hillside

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
Jeremiah 8:18-9:3
October 13, 2019

 

 

        I’d ridden my bicycle down to the marina to meet with some friends late Friday. It was after dark when I left. With a rather bright LED light on my handlebars, I wasn’t worried. But about halfway home something flew into my right ear. The bug dug down deep and as it fluttered its wings. I stopped. I’d always thought the saying, “a bug in your ear,” was a metaphor. Now I was shaking my head and pounding it, in an attempt to free the bug. I was going insane. I rode on home and about every 15 seconds the insect would have saved enough energy to flutter again for a few seconds. Coming into the house, I called out that I needed help. Donna, after checking with the Mayo Clinic website, warmed up some oil and poured it into my ear. It was supposed to flush the bug out, but it never came out. Eventually the bug stopped fluttering. I assumed it drowned. Yesterday morning (which is why I wasn’t in Bible Study), I went to urgent care. They were able to remove the bug. It was a big bug and counting its antenna was over an inch long. That may not sound big until you consider the size of your ear canal.

As a good Calvinist, I’m glad that’s over. That constant fluttering drove me crazy. It forced me into action. I felt a bit like those in Jerusalem did about Jeremiah. This man with his rants drove them crazy, only they didn’t heed his words. But, unlike that bug, Jeremiah had an important message to share.

Today we continue our walk through the book of Jeremiah in our series titled “Prophecies and Pottery.” Listen carefully to our text, for we’ll hear the line of scripture from where the familiar spiritual that we just sang, “There is a Balm in Gilead” comes. The unknown writer of this spiritual answers a question that Jeremiah asks, “Is there no balm in Gilead?” Yes, the Spiritual answer, there is balm and it’s found in the work of the Holy Spirit and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. This song gives hope to people who had little hope.

         Professor James Cone, writing about the African American musical tradition, said that spirituals do not deny history. They don’t deny that there’s a lot wrong in our world. Instead, spirituals see history leading toward divine fulfillment.[1] Or, as Martin Luther King was fond of saying, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.

Our faith does not automatically replace all that’s wrong in our lives or our world. Instead, it’s a hope that is ground in the goodness of the Almighty who, in time, will make all things right. Many of us have had to deal with disappointment. Jeremiah is a poet for such a time. Jeremiah reminds us that sometimes it takes tough love for us to be molded and fired into a vessel that’s useful. Let’s listen to God’s word to us today: Jeremiah 8:18-9:3.

         Let’s imagine ourselves in the 6^th Century before the Common Era and join Jeremiah. Having left the city, the prophet walks alone, across what should be a grain field. With each step he kicks up dust. The immature stalks of grain, long dried under the desert sun, crunch under his feet. This should be the time of the harvest, but there are no men out swinging sickles nor women gathering sheaves. The grapes and the figs and the olives area also shrivel on the vine. The harvest has failed. There’s going to be hunger. And with Nebuchadnezzar’s army on the loose, there won’t be a chance to trade for food. Jeremiah’s heart is heavy. As he looks back toward the walls of the city, he cries. He images the bloated bellies of the young and the riots when there is no more bread in the market.

The sentry assigned to the tower on the West Wall had just come on duty as Jeremiah left the city. He follows the dust of the prophet. Squinting under the hot sun, he notices Jeremiah’s glance back at the city. “What a crazy man,” he thinks, as he wipes the sweat beading up on his forehead. “It’s good he’s gone.” Unlike Jeremiah, the sentry feels secure behind the strong walls surrounding the city. Yes, he worries about the drought, but the religious leaders have things under control. “Don’t they?” “The gods will provide, won’t they?”

Kicking the barren ground, Jeremiah recalls the promise of the harvest. All the work that went into it, was the plowing and sowing were all in vain? Dust is the only crop that’s in abundance and Jeremiah tastes it with every step. He continues walking. When the city’s walls are finally out of sight, he rips his robe, falls to his knees, beats his chest, and cries out to the heavens. “The harvest is past, the summer is over, and we are not saved.”

          “We are not saved.” What painful words. It’s tough being a prophet, bearing the burdens of a people. Yet, as he cries, he hears something. A voice? Can it be God’s voice? “I’m disappointed. Why have they provoked me to anger with their images and foreign idols?” Yes, it’s God, speaking judgment on the Hebrew people.

It must have been in late August or September when Jeremiah issued the prophecy. In Israel, the grain would have been harvested in late spring or early summer. If that failed, there was still hope for in July and August, the grapes, figs and olives were harvested. If that, too, failed, the people were in a pickle, for there would not be a chance for another harvest until the next spring.[2] “The summer is over, and we’re not saved,” implies the hopelessness of Jerusalem.

Our passage shows us how Jeremiah’s emotions are tied up with God. His joy is gone. He is in grief, as is God who we are shown grieving as a spurned spouse might grieve upon the divorce. Ezekiel, who was a contemporary of Jeremiah, has a vision of God leaving Jerusalem and allowing the Hebrew people to reap the fruits of their idolatry.[3] Essentially this is what Jeremiah envisioned. God has become so flustered with his people, that God abandons them. What we see here is a harsh example of tough love.

 

         Jesus told those in the synagogue in Nazareth that a prophet is never accepted in his hometown.[4] Certainly, this was the case with Jeremiah, who cried bowls of tears as his people not only continued to ignore God, they also abused him. At the beginning of chapter 9, he wishes that his head was filled with water and that his eyes were a fountain for he could cry day and night. What an image of a prophet who loved his people and who, yet, feels so helpless.

During his life, Jeremiah was considered a traitor. He challenged the king, the ruling authorities, the priests, and the military leaders. He was a thorn in their side, always speaking out for justice and for true worship of the one true God. In Scripture, we are not told what happened to Jeremiah, except that he was taken to Egypt with some who escaped there after the fall of Jerusalem.[5] One legend has it that Jeremiah kept on with his prophecies and rants and finally people had enough, like I did with that bug, and they stoned him.[6]

        While Jeremiah was considered a traitor in his life, looking back we cannot help but to see that he was a true patriot. God’s people are not called to be loyal to a king or even to a nation. Our first loyalty always belongs to God and when we fail to put God first, we risk hardship, judgment, and perhaps even defeat. Do we have the faith and the perseverance of Jeremiah? Are their Jeremiahs in our society today? If so, do we listen? Or do we tune him or her out, or worse, mock and abuse?

         You know, on the 22^nd, we’re going to have our first community forum to discuss civility. If we want to build a better society, which is one of the goals of the church as we are to be a part of building God’s kingdom, we must listen to others. I hope you plan to attend and to tell others about the forum. Go to our church’s Facebook page and like the event and share it with others on your page. We have got to get our community and our nation on a new direction. We need to be about listening to all voices, even the voice of a Jeremiah, crying a fountain of tears. Only by listening to others who challenge us, like Jeremiah challenged Jerusalem, will we be able to build a better society.

         Let’s go back to that day, some 2500 years ago, and join Jeremiah once more… The heat of the day is over when Jeremiah starts back toward the city. Having wrestled with God through lament, Jeremiah is more assured than ever of God. Ahead, the city David claimed his capital, is magnificently lighted by the setting sun. As the even breeze picks up, Jeremiah picks up his pace.

The sentry, near the end of his shift, can’t believe his eyes. Emerging from a cloud of dust he’s been watching on the horizon is the prophet. He’s coming back. Why? He’d expected Jeremiah to have fled to another land. But as much as Jeremiah wants to, he cannot abandon his people. They may lack faith. They may be adulterers and traitors and idolaters, but they are still his people. And they are still God’s people. And he’s God’s prophet.

Jeremiah’s presence in a decaying society reminds Jerusalem of God’s judgment. Although the Almighty is disappointed and deeply hurt by his people’s idolatry, God never forgets Israel. God’s faithfulness once saw the nation through slavery. God will see them through defeat and exile and eventually restoration.

Jeremiah’s beat by the time he reaches the wall. The sun has set, and the stars are popping out. The air is more humid. “There will be dew in the morning,” the sentry remarks as he allows Jeremiah to enter through the locked gate. “Yes, Yes, I think you’re right,” Jeremiah responds. “The dew will be welcomed. It will remind us of how Almighty God, the God of Abraham, faithfully fed our ancestors in the wilderness.” Amen.

 

 

If any would like to be anointed with oil, as a reminder of our faith in Jesus Christ, come forward during the closing hymn and Elder Laurel McKeith or I will be glad to make the sign of the cross on your forehead.

 

©2019

[1] James Cone, The Spirituals and the Blues (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1972), 86 as quoted by LindaJo H. McKim, The Presbyterian Hymnal Companion, (Louisville: W/JKP, 1993), 393.

[2] J. A. Thompson, The Book of Jeremiah: The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1980), 306, n. 9.

[3] Ezekiel 10. While Jeremiah and Ezekiel are contemporaries, their ministry was to different groups of God’s people. While Jeremiah remained in Jerusalem, Ezekiel was called to be a prophet to the first wave of those exiled in Babylon.

[4] Luke 4:24.

[5] Jeremiah 43.

[6] Frederick Buechner, Peculiar Treasures: A Biblical Who’s Who (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1979), 61.

Jeff Garrison 
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
Jeremiah 4:5-31
October 6, 2019

 

 

We’re back working through sections of Jeremiah in our series titled Prophecies and Pottery. And we’re moving backwards in Jeremiah. Two Sundays ago, we looked at what is probably the most popular passage in book, from the 18^th chapter, Jeremiah in the potter’s house. If you remember, there was hope that Israel would repent and change her ways. But in this passage, in the fourth chapter, there is little hope. One of the overall themes of Jeremiah is survival.[1] How do God’s people survive when there is a collapse of the nation and religion? How do you survive when everything is lost?

Theologically, Jeremiah’s task is to defend God in the face of catastrophe.[2] The people have not trusted in God. They have placed their trust in other gods. They have sought out political alliances to save them. They’ve turned everywhere except to their God. Because of their insolence toward the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the book is rather grim. God’s people are like broken shards.

         Beautiful pottery breaks. Today, during the sermon, hold on to the shard you’ve been given, and ponder God’s judgment. Think about what it means to be broken, unfixable. But don’t throw away the shard. When the service is over, take it over to Liston hall, where we’ll attempt to put it back together and see what kind of design Sue Jones created for us.

Let me say a little more about Jeremiah. The book is not laid out chronologically. The timeline seems to jump back and forth. Was this because the scrolls got mixed up at one point? Or, were they assembled this way for a reason? We don’t know. But it’s clear that while in the potter’s house, as we saw two weeks ago, there was still hope for God’s people. There is much less hope in this passage. Storm clouds are building. Today, I’m reading a just a selection of a larger passage that begin with the 5^th verse in chapter 4 and runs to the end of the chapter. I encourage you to read the passage in its entirety, but I will only read verses 11-12, and 22-28.     

 

(choir members sing first verse and refrain of Ghost Riders in the Sky)

 

        For the people of Jeremiah’s day, storm clouds are gathering. It’s not looking good. It’s kind of like that vision we get from the song “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” those wayward cowpokes who are eternally damned to chase the Devil’s herd. Storm clouds are always frightening. But let’s think about ourselves.

          You know, we have blessed as a nation in that no foreign army has invaded us for over 200 years. The last was during the War of 1812. It’s been a century and a half since those of us who are from the South experienced the horrors of having towns and cities burned, armies destroyed, and people suffering. We can only image what it was like for the people in Savannah during that Civil War, hearing the distant bombardments of Fort Pulaski and Fort MaAllister, and then, in 1864, the rumors building fear as Sherman’s army approaches.

          In this section of Jeremiah, the approaching Babylonian army is described as a hot wind blowing up a frightful dust cloud off the desert. This could be like the dust clouds off Africa that eventually turn into hurricanes that threaten our coastline. In the part I skipped, we hear how the rumors begin to filter down to Judah and Jerusalem, starting way to the north, above the Sea of Galilee, in the territories of Dan. We know a similar drill with hurricanes as they approach the Leeward Island and the Lesser Antilles and the Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Cuba, and the Bahamas as the storm makes its way across the South Atlantic. Sometimes these storms are like Jeremiah’s vision, bringing total destruction. Just as we hurt seeing the damage Dorian caused the Bahamas, we also worry what might happen to us if the storm doesn’t turn, Jeremiah is bothered by his vision. He can see it happening and cries out in anguish. But despite the heartache of what he sees, he faithfully proclaims God’s word.

         The second part of my reading describes the aftermath. Destruction is total. Starting with verse 23, the poem recalls the “dismantling of creation.”[3] The land is depopulated and void and without light. There is little hope in this passage for judgment is total… well, almost total. At the end of verse 27, we get a glimpse of hope. After God promises to make the land desolate, we read that God “will not make a full end.” In other words, a remnant will survive. God will continue to have a few to survive, after all they are God’s chosen people, in order to re-populate the land. So, there is hope, just not much. And everyone, including Jeremiah, will suffer.

          For Christians living in America, we may have a hard time relating to Jeremiah’s vision. But many Christians, those living around the globe in places where it’s dangerous to worship Jesus, recognize Jeremiah’s anguish as their own. For them, gathered around this table on World Communion Sunday, they are in danger. They know what it means to worship in fear, to experience the loss of jobs, of their homes and their land because of their faith. They know what it means to be locked up, to be tortured, and to watch loved ones be taken away and never return because of their faith. Christians are suffering in China, in Eritrea, in North Korea, in Iran and Iraq, in Syria and parts of India. We must stand by those who do not enjoy the freedom to worship as we enjoy it.

We must also realize as bad as life gets on earth, there is always hope. It may be just a glimpse. Jeremiah’s vision of destruction was so troubling that it affected him physically.[4] He knew what was coming was terrible, yet he never gave up on God. For as bad as things were get, he trusted that God was present and, eventually, things would change for the better.

          Remember, we have an insight Jeremiah didn’t have. We know about the resurrection, how the grave is not the end. Jeremiah knew that somehow God’s destruction wasn’t going to quite be total. We know that even if it appears total, as it does at death, as when we peer down into the grave, God is still God and the end is not the end.

Yesterday I did the funeral for Gerry Baumgardner. We heard about how Gerry was a reader and instilled her love for books into her children and grandchildren. I’m not sure she read horror, and I’ve only read a few such books. But when you read a good horror book, you are excited to finish and find out what’s happens, but you also don’t want it to end. But it must end. Sooner or later we have must put it down and be done with it. In a way, life is like that, except that when it’s over, God is waiting with a sequel. But, unlike with a horror book, the sequel will be beautiful.

         The center of the gospel is the hope we have in the resurrection to eternal life. And for that reason, we can face those storm clouds. We can face the stampede of Satan’s herd and the cowboys running roughshod across the skies, and know that as bad as things are, there’s hope. We may feel like we’re just broken shards of pottery, but God has the power to make what’s broken new and whole. Believe in God. Hold on to such hope. Amen.

 

©2019

[1] Kathleen M. O’Conner, “Jeremiah Introduction” in the New Interpreter’s Study Bible (NRSV with Apocrypha) Nashville: Abingdon, 2003), 1051.

[2] Ibid, 1052.

[3] Walter Brueggeman, To Pluck Up, To Tear Down: Jeremiah 1-25,  (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, International Theological Commentary, 1988), 56.

[4] Verse 19, which is translated in the NRSV as “My anguish, my anguish! I write in pain!” is an attempt to capture the vivid description of the Hebrew in which Jeremiah cries of pain in his bowels. See J. A. Thompson, NICOT: The Book of Jeremiah, (Grands Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980), 227-228.

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
September 22, 2019
Jeremiah 18:1-12

 

How many of you have a cabinet at home filled with Tupperware and other such plastic containers? (Raise your hands. Be honest). If your home is like mine, there are a variety of plastic stuff of all sizes. When it comes time to save left-overs, or to pack a lunch for the office, I can always find the size I need. Of course, I then struggle to find the matching lid, but that’s another story. Ponder for a moment what would our lives be like without such containers? How would we get by? Now let’s go back 2500 years.

        You might be wondering about all this emphasis on pottery as we look at the Prophet Jeremiah. Pottery was a revolutionary technology in the ancient world. It allowed more movement as people could store things in pots, such as water and grain.[1] It provided a better way for cooking. No longer did our ancestors have to roast things over a fire like cavemen. They could make something tasty, adding herbs and spices and making broth. The pottery revolution was one of the great steps in human history that devolved to Tupperware. It allowed our ancestors to settle down. No longer did they have to wander from one source of water and food to another. They could stop and build cities. The potter played an important role in the ancient world. God often uses examples from everyday life to make a point, and with Jeremiah, it was the potter and his work. This morning, we’re visiting the potter’s house.  Read Jeremiah 18:1-12.

 

Show Video of Lee Hyong-Gu, Ceramic Master                      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxpyG6ClIDU  (3 minutes 20 seconds)

 

I love watching a potter shape clay. Don’t you?

         About twenty-five miles northwest of where I was born, where the Carolina Sandhills turn into clay hills, is a dot on the map known as Jugtown. It’s a place I like to visit when I am back in that part of the world. Today, the area around Jugtown and Seagrove is dotted with crafty potters who turn muck into beautiful and useful art. It’s a treat, as we’ve just seen on the video, to watch a potter turn a lump of clay on the wheel into something useful and beautiful.

          Jugtown received its name, as you can guess, from jugs. The law-abiding folks in the clay hills around there, I’m sure, intended their jugs to store molasses, honey, cane syrup, or something similar. Of course, it was also used to hold liquefied corn (also known as white lightning or moonshine). But with the advent of mason jars, such use of the jugs ceased. But early on, some of the potters had new ideas. In 1917, two of the potters began selling their wares in a store and tea shop in New York City. They emphasized utilitarian pots, things that could be used such as pie plates, crocks, mugs, and bowls. They stamped their unique mark on the bottom of each vessel. Over time, they began to teach new potters the craft and as one generation passed, another took up the wheel. Today, if you go to the area around Jugtown, you’ll find dozens or potters selling their wares. These artists have brought new life into that worthless clay that sticks to your shoes and gums up a plow.

Finding a new purpose is sometimes helpful, and it could make a good moral of this story. But is it really what this passage is about? We need to remember that we’re not the potter, we’re the clay. Our purpose comes from the potter. And while, as this passage shows, the potter wields power over the clay, the clay might not always be suitable. If that’s the case, the potter starts over and creates something that works with the quality of the clay he has. In this passage we see God’s sovereign control, as a new type of pot is created. God’s in control, a fact we’re not always comfortable with.

        Jeremiah is called to the potter’s house where God uses a common image of the ancient world to make a profound message. God’s word comes to him as he watches the potter over and over start off one direction with clay, and it not working, so he reworks the clay into something more suitable. This sounds hopeful. God will continue to work with us until we become a vessel that serves some purpose. One preacher, writing about this text, said that it demonstrates a sovereign God, “not a God of absolute capricious control, but a gracious willingness to change his plan to benefit his flawed people. When God discovers this fatal flaw in his people, he does not simply destroy them; he offers to start over.” [2]

But there’s a tension in the text that comes in verses 7-11. To make this passage to be only hopeful, we must cut the passage short and stop at verse 6. But that’s not fair to the text. Yes, there is hope in this passage, but the hope is offered to a repentant people who heed the warning that comes at the end of the passage. If they don’t heed the warning, the hope evaporates.

       Jeremiah’s task is to preach impending judgment to God’s people. If they don’t shape up, if they don’t stop running around chasing foreign gods and idols, if they act like they’re in control and the God of the Universe is of no matter, they will be punished. Just as the potter can shape a vessel in a new way, they can be handled in a different manner. God can shape another nation to punish. There appears to still time, at this point, for the Hebrew people to change. Later prophecies of Jeremiah hold out no hope of repentance, but here, it’s not too late.[3] But time’s wasting. If they don’t hurry up and repent, it’ll be too late. And as we see in verse 12, the people don’t take Jeremiah’s words seriously. They follow their own plans and act in their own ways. God is not amused.

          The message of this passage is that God has the power to reshape us, but we must let God work with us. If we resist God’s shaping, we may not be completely crushed, but we won’t fulfill the potential for which we were designed. The intention of our passage isn’t to be fatalistic and say we have no control. Instead, it’s a warning that we’re to work with God and not against him.

We often look at Scripture through our individualistic lens, and there’s no doubt that God has control over us as individuals, but it’s important for us to understand that this passage isn’t about a person, but about a people. God’s people. Today, we could apply this passage to the church. Those of us in mainline denominations often feel the church is being pulling apart. But using this analogy, we can see that perhaps the church is just being reshaped. If that’s the case, we need to look beyond our own perceived needs within the church, and to look where God needs the church within the world. That’s the hard task the Session has before it. It’s not what we can do to please the most people, but what we should be doing to join in God’s work.

        When you leave this sanctuary today, ponder these questions: Where is God at work in the world? How can we participate? How can we be the clay that trusts the potter? Amen.

©2019

 

[1] Eugene H. Peterson, Run with the Horses: The Quest for Life at Its Best, (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 1983), 76-77.

[2] Stan Mast, Old Testament Lectionary for September 2, 2019: Jeremiah 18:1-11” published by the Center for Excellence in Preaching: https://cep.calvinseminary.edu/sermon-starters/proper-18c-2/?type=old_testament_lectionary

[3]  John Bright, The Anchor Bible: Jeremiah (New York: Doubleday, 1965), 124-125.

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
September 15, 2019
Jeremiah 2:1-13

 

We began our series on Prophesies and Pottery last week, when we saw how Jeremiah was formed by God to be his mouthpiece to Israel. Our image was that of a lump of clay, which has not yet been formed into the vessel. We’re all like that lump and when we allow God to mold us, we can become something beautiful. Throughout the Book of Jeremiah are images of pottery and clay. Some are being formed. Others have already been formed and fired and are now broken and no longer useful. Today’s image is like that, of a broken cistern. There is not much use in a vessel which no longer holds water, just as the cracked pot in our display is useless. Today’s message can be summarized: “Don’t be a crackpot.”

       Last week we learned of Jeremiah’s call by God as a prophet to pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.”[1] As I stated then, Jeremiah was one of the longest serving prophets in Israel’s history, with a career spanning roughly forty years. In chapter two, we see that the prophet gets down to business, as he calls on God’s people to change their ways before it is too late.

This chapter takes the form of a legal indictment, a common genre in the ancient world. There are surviving examples in which a ruler or a king wrote an indictment against a ruler of a vassal state who is not fulfilling the desires of the controlling state. Think about the king of Judah, as a vassal state of Assyria, receiving a letter from the king of Assyria. The letter would contain an indictment. It could be used to nip in the bud any thoughts of revolution, as the superior king reminds his inferior king the benefits of their relationship while also threating punishment if things don’t change.[2] A more recent example might have been a letter sent from the Soviet premier to Hungary in 1956 or Czechoslovakia in 1968, right before troops rolled in. The leaders of Hong Kong have probably also received such a letter. It’s also like a letter of a jilted spouse or lover. God sends this letter to his people through Jeremiah. It’s a warning and a reminder of who’s in charge.

This passage contains some of the earliest words of Jeremiah,[3] perhaps being spoken even before the religious reforms of King Josiah, long before Babylon comes onto the international scene. Last week, I spoke about how Jeremiah was called to be a prophet at an optimistic time in the history of Judah. The armies of Assyria had destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel and for a century had controlled Judah as a vassal state. But Assyria’s power was waning. Without them on the international stage, there was hope of a better future for the Hebrew people. But it didn’t happen. Josiah was killed, his reforms were short-lived, and the people continued to chase after the gods of their neighbors. Jeremiah’s voice brings God’s indictment against the Hebrew people, especially the leaders (both religious and secular) for allowing and encouraging such idolatry. As you can imagine, when things are looking up, people don’t want to hear such rants as came from Jeremiah. But he was called to be faithful, not to scratch their itchy ears. Read Jeremiah 2:1-13

 

        In the spring of 2018, my sister, my father, and I took a trip to the Dry Tortugas. I’m sure many of you read the article I had about the trip in The Skinnie.[4] A popular misconception is that Key West is the last of the keys. It’s not. Sixty-eight  miles west of Key West are the Dry Tortugas, a collection of small coral keys that rise just above sea level. The island was discovered by the Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon, who named it “las Tortugas” or “the turtles.” Without any fresh water to drink, cartographers added the word “dry” as a warning to sailors. Even without water, the islands were strategically important for our country, especially in the days of sailing ships.  The keys provided a harbor for ships during storms and they provided an outpost to intercept any attempts of an invasion of our Gulf Coast. The islands protected the harbors of New Orleans, Mobile and Pensacola. In the early 19^th Century, after the War of 1812, when our nation began to seriously deal with national defense, Fort Jefferson, a huge brick fortress, was built on the largest key. Fort Jefferson may be the largest brick structure in the Western Hemisphere.

      If you’re going to have a fort with a substantial garrison on an island without fresh water, you must find a way to overcome that limitation. The engineers who designed Fort Jefferson came up with a unique way to address the lack of water. They built a series of cisterns under the walls of the fort and designed a system to funnel rainwater into the cisterns where they provided water for later use. The fort could hold nearly two million gallons of water. It was thought there would be enough water and provisions within the walls for the fort to survive a yearlong siege.

       But the plans of men and women often fail. This massive fort, built with millions of bricks and packed dirt, was so heavy that of the 136 cisterns, all but three cracked and allowed saltwater to infiltrate. They became useless.

Through Jeremiah, God says that the Hebrew people are like cracked cisterns. The Hebrew people knew that God was talking about, for they lived in a semi-arid land that only received water part of the year. Farmers would dig out cisterns in the rock, but since the rock was limestone, which is porous, they’d have to seal the rock with a plaster-like substance. But the earth moves and at times such cisterns would crack and began to leak and when the farmer needed water, none would be available.[5]

       The cracked cistern image shows Israel’s condition after chasing after non-existent gods. As humans, we all need water. An image of God’s providence found throughout Scripture is that of living water nourishing us.[6] God expects us to draw from such living water, but when we turn our backs on God, or try to create our own source of water (be it security or prosperity) while ignoring God, we risk dying of thirst. That huge, powerful fort that couldn’t provide its own drinking water is a good example. It takes more than human strength and might to provide for our needs. It’s also dangerous for us to seek security in anything outside of God, for no other gods (that’s gods with a small g), or human systems of power, will last forever. Sooner or later, we will fail. Only God is eternal. Do we stick with God or with the plans of men and women?

But the people of Israel didn’t want to hear this. Jeremiah the bullfrog, croaking in the corner of society, was a nuisance they tried to ignore. And soon, it would be too late. Jeremiah’s call needs to be heard throughout all ages: “trust in the Lord, not in anything else.” It’s as true today as it was 2500 years ago.

As you know, the Session of your church have been studying the challenges facing us. As a congregation, we are aging. We are struggling to find ways to reach new groups of people, and to invite them to be a part of our fellowship and help us continue to reflect Jesus face to our community and to the world. The Session has spent considerable time and energy examining the congregation and the community. We have looked at our worship services, the message and the music, along with the needs and wants of members and non-members. But about half-way along this road, it finally dawned on some of us that what’s important isn’t what we want, but what God wants. So, we added a prayer component to our attempts to strategically plan. We know that without God, we are useless. We are like cracked pots in which the water runs into the ground. The problem with cracked pots or cisterns is that sooner or later, when drought comes, we’re left dry. So, I encourage you to join with the Session in praying daily for our congregation. Each week, you’ll receive a new prayer. It’s on your flyleaf of the bulletin and you’ll also receive it as an email reminder during the middle of the week. Take this prayer and pray it daily. Whatever we end up doing, we need to be seeking God’s direction.

      Friends, we don’t want to be cracked pots. We want to be vessels holding abundant living water that will quench our thirst, and can be shared to others, to quench theirs. Amen.

 

©2019

[1] Jeremiah 1:10.

[2] J. A. Thompson, The Book of Jeremiah: TNICOT (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1980), 159-160.

[3] John Bright, Jeremiah: The Anchor Bible (New York: Doubleday, 1965), 16.

[4] Jeff Garrison, “A Visit to the Dry Tortugas,” The Skinnie, Vol. 16 #15 (July 20, 2018).

[5] Thompson, 170-171.

[6] Jesus spoke of this as recorded in John’s gospel (see John 4:10-14, 7:37-38). It appears several places in Revelation (see Revelation 7:17; 21:6; 22:1, 27), Even more common is the stream that God provides which brings life, which is found at Creation in Genesis (Genesis 2:6) and throughout the Psalms (see Psalms 1:3, 46:4 as examples). Jeremiah will later use the image of the stream bring life in 31:12.

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
September 8, 2019
Jeremiah 1:4-10

 

 

 

        The prophet Jeremiah lived in interesting times. He was one of the longest serving prophets in Israel’s history, his calling coming as the Assyrians were losing power.  It was a time of optimism in Jerusalem because they had existed as a vassal state under Assyria for over a century. It appeared they might be free once again, as in the years of Kings David and Solomon. Furthermore, Josiah, one of Judah’s few good kings, was implementing religious reforms. But then Josiah is killed in battle against Egypt.[1] Instead of peace and prosperity, the years following Jeremiah’s call are troubling. Babylon rises in power and the nation’s existence is again threatened.[2] Jeremiah, as a prophet, must go against the grain as he brings God’s message to the Hebrew people.

          We, too, are living in interesting times. Things are scary in our world: rogue nations having the bomb, individuals going berserk and killing people, terrorists creating political instability, and huge storms leaving behind chaos and destruction. The news often leaves us fearful and angry. And since we often don’t have answers for the problems we face, we blame others. Ben Sasse, a Senator from Nebraska, suggests one of the few things uniting us is our contempt for those of whom we assign blame. “At least,” we say, “we’re not like them.”[3] By the way, in his book Them, Sasse suggests this is not the way to live!

As in the days of Jeremiah, we need to hear a rational voice reminding us to trust in a God who has the power to reshape and remake us, as a potter crafts clay, in a way that the future will be bright and wonderful. Maybe we—look around, you and I—need to be that rational voice. This is God’s call to the church of today. We must step up to the plate and offer an optimistic challenge to the world today. This morning we’re going to look at the call of Jeremiah. As I read this passage, consider how God might be calling you… Read Jeremiah 1:4-10.

 

Jeremiah was a bullfrog,
was a good friend of mine.
I never understood a single word he said
but I helped him drink his wine.[4]

 

Did Hoyt Axton, who wrote this song that became a major hit for Three Dog Night, have the prophet Jeremiah in mind? There’s some debate about it. His lifestyle didn’t exactly display Sunday School values, but the words “Joy to the World” certainly draws upon the Christian imagination.[5] We don’t know his intentions, but Jeremiah was a bullfrog. Let me explain.

        Back in early May, Gary Witbeck and I took a trip into the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. On our second night, we were camping on a platform at a place called “Big Water.” It’s the headwaters for the Suwanee River. As the sun set and evening descended, we watched alligators battle over territory (or maybe they were fighting over mates, or were flirting, we couldn’t tell the difference). While the gators fought, in the background a chorus of frogs sang. Their song would come in waves, starting up the river and working its way down and then back up. The frogs were in perfect harmony. You couldn’t tell one frog’s croak from another. It was quite beautiful.

But occasionally during that evening, we’d hear the loud croaking of a bullfrog. They were distinct. They were loners. You could pick out each individual one and the direction toward where the frog was located. Jeremiah was like that, like a bullfrog. He provided a distinct message to the people of Israel. He was heard off to the side. There were others in those days, a chorus of prophets, who spouted off the message the people and the king wanted to hear. Their sounds all blended together. But Jeremiah was alone, going against the popular chorus. He was God’s messenger.

        But this is where the song gets it wrong. The one singing, claims to be a friend of Jeremiah, enjoying drinking his wine. But the Jeremiah of the Old Testament, was often lonely. He didn’t have many friends bellying up to him at the bar. Like a bullfrog, he cried out the message from God that he’s been given, and message that no one wanted to hear, so he was often alone and vulnerable. But he was faithful, and when we consider eternity, that makes all the difference in the world.

Today, the church appears more and more marginalized in society. After decades of arguing over things around the periphery (issues of sex and of women leadership and homosexual rights and such), and having been so caught up in political debates, those outside the church identify us more by what we’re against than the person we are to be following. For Jeremiah, doing God’s work was a challenge. For us, following Christ can be just as challenging.[6] We need to offer hope to the world that can only be found in Christ Jesus. But it’s easy to succumb to the chatter around us, to become a frog in the chorus and not the distinctive sound of the bullfrog.

        You’ll notice in the text that Jeremiah didn’t have a choice in all this. He was chosen by God before the foundation of the earth. Yesterday morning, in the Men’s Bible Study, we were reading Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, where are reminded that God calls us through Jesus Christ to do the work which has been prepared for us.[7] Our call, like Jeremiah’s and the Ephesians’, isn’t something that we initiate. It comes from God.

Eugene Peterson notes how we often get things wrong. We see ourselves coming to church to learn about God or to check in on what’s God up to. But that’s backwards. It’s not our initiative. God has known us all along and is calling and leading us through the Spirit. God’s doing this long before we even accept his existence.[8] Regardless of who we are, God loves us and sees us as important and can use us to help make this world a better place.

        Of course, like Jeremiah, we can beg off. Jeremiah said, “I’m just a boy.” Looking around, we might say, “we’re too old.” But God has heard that one, too.  Remember Abraham and Sara? How old were they?[9] Have you ever wondered if maybe the reason God used all these old folks in the Old Testament was to take away our excuses? We’re all young. None of us have an excuse. God promised Jeremiah that he’s going to be with him and that he would be given the words to say to the corrupt generation into which he’d been born. Likewise, Jesus promises his followers (that be “us”) that we’ll be given the words to say.[10] Do we trust God enough to live differently, to sing a different song, to stand out against the crowd and to live, not for ourselves, but for our Lord Jesus Christ?

          Jeremiah has been appointed for a mission. Likewise, the church has been appointed for a mission. We’re all called by God to follow Jesus and to point to him as our hope in a world that often seems hopeless.

 

         Over the next six weeks, as we work through this series, we’ll be using images of potters. Our image today is a clump of clay, being kneaded like bread dough. The technical term for doing this to clay is “wedged.” The potter takes the clay and stretches and pushes it like a baker works dough. In doing this, all the air pockets are worked out so that the clay is easier to shape on the wheel and afterwards, when firing, the pot won’t have air pockets that’ll explode and destroy the vessel.[11] As followers of Jesus, we have to be open for God working with us, just as a potter works with clay, in order that we might be reshaped. God will work out the old and create in us something new. Are we open to such shaping? Are we willing to be a bullfrog for God and to call people to be attentive to Jesus’ way of living?

         Paul, writing to the Ephesians, encouraged them to put away all bitterness, wrath, anger, wrangling, slander and malice. Such behavior is to be wedged out of us, like air is wedged out of the clay, so that we might be kind to one another, tenderhearted, and forgiving.[12] The world may see such traits as signs of weakness. They even got Jesus killed. But that was then. We need to remember that the world, as it is, won’t last. We’re not looking for the world’s approval. We’re striving to be faithful to that which is eternal, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

 

©2019

[1] 2 Kings 23:28ff.

[2] For a background on the world in Jeremiah’s day, see John Bright, “The Life and Message of Jeremiah,” in Jeremiah (New York: Doubleday, 1965), LXXXVI-CXXIV.

[3] Ben Sasse, Them: Why We Hate Each Other-and How to Heal (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2018), 9.

[4] Hoyt Axton, “Joy to the World.” Recorded by Three Dog Night on Naturally, 1970.

[5] https://www.songfacts.com/facts/three-dog-night/joy-to-the-world

[6] See Stan Mast, Notes on Jeremiah 1:4-10 published on the “Center for Excellence in Preaching website: https://cep.calvinseminary.edu/sermon-starters/proper-16c-2/?type=old_testament_lectionary

[7] See Ephesians 2, especially Ephesians 2:10.

[8] Eugene H. Peterson, Run with the Horses: The Quest for Life at Its Best (Downers’ Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 1983), 37-38.

[9] Abraham was 75 when he was called (Genesis 12:4). He was 100 and Sara 90 when Isaac was born (Genesis 17:17).

[10] Matthew 10:19.

[11] For a discussion of this process, see Marjory Zoet Bankson, The Soulwork of Clay: A Hands-On Approach to Spirituality (Woodstock, VT: Skylight Paths, 2008), Chapter 1: Grounding.

[12] Ephesians 4:31-32.  Likewise, Jeremiah is called to both “pluck up, tear down, destroy and overthrow” while also building up and planting  (which we can assume to mean removing that which is not pleasing to God, and planting/building up that which is pleasing).