For I hear many whispering.
Terror is on every side!
“Denounce him! Let us denounce him!”
say all my close friends,
watching for my fall.
“Perhaps he will be deceived;
then we can overcome him
and take our revenge on him.”
11 But the LORD is with me as a dread warrior;
therefore my persecutors will stumble;
they will not overcome me.
Everyone has a limit. We can say we will be disciplined and never lose our temper but the old appetites will return. We get hungry, thirsty, tired, and scared. Jeremiah did as well. Here he faced the temptation to stop proclaiming the name of the Lord. He was in a pickle. If he spoke for the Lord, the people would beat him. If he did not speak for the Lord, he would be miserable. There seemed to be no way out until he realized that it is always best to call on the name of the Lord. In the end, he knew that God would protect him.
There was one other who faced the same dilemma. Should he go forward with the plan and face the wrath of man, or should he back out and be safe? If the latter, we would still be dead in our sin and Jesus Christ would cease to be God because he broke a promise. Both Jeremiah and Jesus got it right.
That means we have good examples for relying on God instead of staying safe. There is no punishment for calling on the name that is not overshadowed by the grace and mercy of Christ. We will get hungry, thirsty, tired and scared but now we know that in all things…
We are not alone.
Pastor Brad Boyer
Cape Community Church