"D-Day" (CaD Jer 39) – Wayfarer

And on the ninth day of the fourth month of Zedekiah’s eleventh year, the city wall was broken through.
Jeremiah 39:2 (NIV)

The term D-Day has become historically synonymous with the Allied Forces’ invasion of Normandy in World War II, but the term was actually a way of generically referring to an operation when the date of the operation was unknown, or secret. The term H-hour was also used to talk about the hour that certain things would take place. When briefing troops regarding their tactical orders they might explain where the unit will be and what they will be doing on D-day minus one (the day before the operation is launched). Likewise, when planning the invasion, it might be explained where the strategists expected a unit to be at “H-hour plus 12,” twelve-hours after the launch of the operation.

For thirty-eight chapters, the ancient prophet Jeremiah has been repeatedly and prophetically claiming that the Babylonian Empire under Nebuchadnezzar would destroy Jerusalem, and that the people of Jerusalem would die or be taken into exile. This anthology of Jeremiah’s messages represent four decades of his prophetic proclamations. When he began his prophetic ministry, the notion that Babylon would even be an Imperial power in the region would have been laughable. Jerry kept proclaiming it, which is why is does get fairly repetitive. But even this fact, the idea of proclaiming the same thing for an entire generation causes me to pause and think.

For forty-years Jerry repeatedly and consistently speaks of an event that no one wants to hear about, and doesn’t even sound plausible from a geopolitical perspective in the early years of his prophesying. How many times was Jeremiah mocked? How many times did people roll their eyes, pull their children aside and tell the kids not to pay any attention to Crazy Jerry and that yoke he carries around all day? How often did Kings, priests, and officials laugh at him, and derisively demand that he reveal D-Day, when this highly unlikely scenario would happen?

Today’s chapter is Jeremiah’s D-Day. It finally happens. In the quiet this morning I noticed a few things:

First, in Jeremiah’s very first message back in chapter one, God tells the prophet:

I am about to summon all the peoples of the northern kingdoms,” declares the Lord.

“Their kings will come and set up their thrones
    in the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem;

In today’s chapter, Jeremiah records:

Then all the officials of the king of Babylon came and took seats in the Middle Gate: Nergal-Sharezer of Samgar, Nebo-Sarsekim a chief officer, Nergal-Sharezer a high official and all the other officials of the king of Babylon.

Next, for the past few chapters, King Zedekiah has been having conversations with Jeremiah, asking the prophet what will happen to him. Keep in mind that Nebuchadnezzar put King Z on the throne and expected Z to be a faithful puppet, but Z betrayed Neb and made an alliance with Egypt (which motivated the Babylonian siege). I find it ironic, downright Shakespearean, that Z has watched all of Jerry’s prophecies come true, and he trusts the prophet enough to ask for advice. Jerry tells him that if he surrenders to Neb he will be okay, but Z doesn’t even have the faith to trust the prophet who has successfully predicted everything that is happening for the past forty years. Z makes a run for it, and ends up watching the Babylonians kill his entire family before they pluck his eyes out and drag him back to Babylon. What a tragic character.

I also found it interesting that the Babylonians, who were notorious for their cruelty, acted with surprising deference to Jeremiah. But, Daniel and his friends, along with the prophet Ezekiel, have already been in Babylon for ten years. Nebuchadnezzar made Daniel a top official in his administration, and Jeremiah had written to Daniel and the exiles back in chapter 29. Nebuchadnezzar was likely well aware of Jeremiah’s prophecies. Jeremiah is released from his house arrest in the courtyard of the King’s guard and escorted to his hometown where his family could care for him.

It would also appears that Jerry had enough clout to get the Babylonians to extend the same grace to Ebed-Melek, the African eunuch who risked his own life to rescue Jerry from the bottom of the cistern where his enemies had thrown him and left him to die.

I also found it fascinating that after rounding up all of the citizens they considered worthwhile to take back to Babylon, the invaders give the poorest people left in the area land and vineyards. I can only assume that this act of generosity was intended to ensure that those left owed some debt of gratitude to their Imperial overlords. It would also ensure that those left would be able to continue to eek out a life and also continue paying tribute of some kind back to Babylon.

In the quiet this morning, I think about the events prophetically described by both Jesus and the apostles regarding the end of the Great Story. My entire life I’ve read them, studied them, and heard countless people proclaim that our apocalyptic D-Day is imminent. I’ve thought long and hard about this along my life journey, and here’s where I land.

Do I think it will happen? Yes.

Do I know exactly how it will play out? No. I humbly acknowledge that the greatest religious scholars for hundreds of years predicted and prophesied a Messiah who looked nothing like Jesus. They got it wrong because they interpreted prophesy from a self-centric human lens. God makes it pretty clear that our ways are not His ways and the human condition doesn’t change on this terrestrial ball. I’m betting that there’s a lot that scholars today have wrong in their apocalyptic prognostications.

Do I think it will happen soon? [cue: a shrug] I have mentioned in these posts over the years that I have observed along my life journey that it is common for followers of Jesus in their later years to feel certain that the end is near. And, I think that it is psychologically easy to come to this conclusion when the world is changing more rapidly than any time in human history which means that their personal past is far removed from the current world in which they find themselves. Add to this the knowledge that the end of their earthly journey is certainly near, and I believe it’s very easy to project one’s personal reality onto the entire world.

Jeremiah reminds me to place my faith in God’s D-Day, however it may eventually play out, even if-and-when it seems improbable on any given day.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Controlling the Narrative (CaD Jer 36) – Wayfarer

It was the ninth month and the king was sitting in the winter apartment, with a fire burning in the firepot in front of him. Whenever Jehudi had read three or four columns of the scroll, the king cut them off with a scribe’s knife and threw them into the firepot, until the entire scroll was burned in the fire.
Jeremiah 36:22-23 (NIV)

It’s popular to think of the prophet’s words as primarily religious in nature, but in the time they were written they were acutely political. It’s easy to gloss over the mention of dates in these ancient texts, but they provide critical context that adds meaning.

Jeremiah’s dictation of his prophetic messages to the scribe, Baruch was done in the the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah. Scholars place that date as the first year of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign in Babylon. Neb’s defeat of the Egyptian army at Carcemish is one of the critical battles in human history. It shifted the balance of power in the region from Egypt to Babylon. The Babylonian’s subsequently demanded tribute from all of the city states in the region, including Jerusalem.

The historic record reveals that one city, the city of Ashkelon, refused the Babylonians demand. Ashkelon is not very far from Jerusalem. It was a Philistine city that played a part in the story of Samson hundreds of years earlier. The Babylonians attacked the city, completely destroyed it, and burned it to the ground as a mafia-like reminder to all the other city-states of what happens when you refuse to pay for “protection.”

Today’s chapter goes on to share that Baruch read Jeremiah’s words publicly in Solomon’s Temple in the ninth month of the fifth year of Jehoiakim when a time of fasting had been declared. Jeremiah couldn’t do it because he had been barred from the Temple. He was already a suppressed voice, unpopular with the current political and religious establishment. Fasting was not a regular part of the Hebrew’s ritual worship and was generally reserved for times of grief and spiritual need. This time of national fasting appears to coincide with Babylon’s destruction of Ashkelon. It is a time of fear and uncertainty as there’s a new Empire threatening their very existence.

Jeremiah’s words proclaim captivity, exile, destruction, and death at the hands of the Babylonians if the people don’t repent of their idolatry and give themselves wholeheartedly to God.

This is not the narrative King Jehoiakim wants proclaimed publicly. He wants his people to feel safe and secure under his administration. He needs prophets proclaiming Babylon’s downfall and Jerusalem’s survival. So, King J personally burns Jeremiah’s scroll (which would have been a very expensive and. time-consuming undertaking for Jeremiah) column by column and seeks to have both Jeremiah and his scribe arrested (read: silenced).

Sound familiar?

In my lifetime, I have never observed such a time as the one in which we are living, when political, media, educational and business institutions work hard to suppress and control anything contrary to the narrative they want publicly proclaimed. And, for the record, it happens on both sides of our divided political spectrum.

In the quiet this morning, I realize that I have the benefit of historical hindsight. Jeremiah was right. He was speaking the truth that the political and religious powers of his day didn’t want proclaimed. They considered Jerry’s religious editorials to be politically incorrect because they were critical of the current political and religious administrations. The leaders of the institutions didn’t want people stirred up against them. They wanted to control the narrative in order to control the people and maintain their political power.

Today, like everyone else, I wonder where things are headed in the months and years ahead. I’m no Jeremiah. Sorry.

I do, however, recognize patterns of human behavior throughout history. Whenever institutional leaders of any kind or political persuasion control what is said, suppress free speech, ignore factual evidence that contradicts their desired narrative, silences dissent, punishes or cancels dissenters, and refuses honest, open, and fair debate, it is not a good thing. It wasn’t a good thing in Jeremiah’s day, and it’s not a good thing today.

I don’t know what the future holds in the short run, but I know how the Great Story ends. I’m trusting the Story, and its Author. And, I’m committed to continue proclaiming it, as I have been called to do, all the days of this life journey.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Repenting My Repentance (CaD Jer 34) – Wayfarer

Recently you repented and did what is right in my sight: Each of you proclaimed freedom to your own people. You even made a covenant before me in the house that bears my Name. But now you have turned around and profaned my name; each of you has taken back the male and female slaves you had set free to go where they wished. You have forced them to become your slaves again.
Jeremiah 34:15-16 (NIV)

The Babylonian siege of Jerusalem is estimated to have taken 30 months. For two and a half years, the Babylonian army surrounded the walled city. No food or supplies could get into the city. This was a fairly common tactic used by armies throughout history. As starvation and fear slowly took over the population inside the city, cities would eventually surrender, or the besieging army would eventually breach the walls or the gate and storm the city, whose population was so weakened that they could not put up a vigorous defense.

It’s helpful to think about that context as I read these chapters of Jeremiah which were written during drawn out siege. Jeremiah was confined under house arrest inside King Zedekiah’s palace. He was privy, therefore, to what was happening on the political landscape and had access to the King when given a prophetic message from God.

The Babylonian siege was a consequence of King Z’s own betrayal. Jerusalem was under the thumb of the Babylonian empire, but he secretly made an alliance with Egypt to try and break the chains of their servitude.

Today’s chapter references some interesting events that took place during the drawn out siege. Having made an alliance with Egypt, Zedekiah sends a messenger to Egypt to request their aid in breaking the siege. The Egyptians respond by marching an army towards Jerusalem.

Meanwhile, inside Jerusalem the besieged residents of Jerusalem agree to free any Hebrew slaves inside the city. This sounds like a worthy and kind gesture given the grave circumstances, but it was likely motivated by a desire to appease God in the hope God would change His mind and deliver the city. It was also motivated by selfishness because a freed slave was responsible to find their own food, giving the former slaveowner more food to keep for themselves.

Eventually, word reaches the Babylonians that the Egyptian army is headed toward Jerusalem. The Babylonians withdraw from Jerusalem to meet the Egyptian threat.

Imagine the feelings of relief when those inside Jerusalem see the Babylonian army withdraw. So relieved, in fact, that the seemingly altruistic slave owners who had freed their slaves suddenly changed their minds and enslaved their servants once again. “Just kidding!”

Today’s chapter is God’s response to these events through the prophetic words of Jeremiah. In addressing the slave owners, there is a bit of word play in the original Hebrew that gets lost in translation. God says, “you repented” and freed your slaves (which was a good thing) but then you “turned around” and took them back. In Hebrew, the same word is used for “repent” and “turned around.” In other words, God is saying that the slaveowners repented from their repentance.

God goes on to sarcastically explain that because they did not proclaim freedom for their own people, God was going to proclaim freedom for the slaveowners – the freedom to die by sword or famine when the Babylonian army returns after taking care of the Egyptian threat. And, that is exactly what happened.

I have to confess that in the quiet this morning, I caught myself shaking my self-righteous, 21st century head at the slave owners and the residents of Jerusalem for their false kindness and self-centered motives. As I did so, I was reminded in my spirit that along this life journey I’ve also repented of my repentance a time or two. Indeed, I have. Guilty as charged.

I am no better than the falsely repentant slave owners. I am in total need of God’s mercy, fully dependent on God’s grace.

With that reminder, I humbly enter a new work week.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.