Wednesday, January 25: Jeremiah 25- A few brief stops.

My wife and I have driven Blue Ridge Parkway through Shenandoah National Park and portions of the Pacific Coast Highway in CA. Spectacular, both are incredible drives, the kind where you stop multiple times and take in views and maybe snap some photos…

Today’s reading was like that for me. There were a number of places where I paused to ponder a thought, a statement, something. I hope you find this morning drive through chapter 25 enlivening…

Verse 3: For twenty-three years … the word of the LORD has come to me and I have spoken to you again and again, but you have not listened. Twenty-three years! I thought about all those years of hard service, unfruitful ministry (no one listened) and still Jeremiah was faithful to God never wavering from his calling… That thought was worth the stop!

Verse 7: "But you did not listen to me," declares the LORD, "and you have provoked me with what your hands have made, and you have brought harm to yourselves." God gave ample opportunity for people to turn or return to Him. They refused. As I stood here and gazed into the text, I thought, “At the end of the day, we are responsible for our lives and what we do or don’t do with them…” You have brought harm to yourselves, says the Lord.

Verse 9: my servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon…. My servant, Nebuchadnezzar? Certainly this pagan king did not believe in Yahweh. Then it hit me. Nebuchadnezzar was God’s servant because God was using him to be the instrument of God’s justice against Judah. I pondered the absolute sovereignty of the Lord who can use even pagan kings to do His bidding! Wow, we serve an amazing God!

Verse 12: But when the seventy years are fulfilled, I will punish the king of Babylon and his nation, the land of the Babylonians, for their guilt," declares the LORD, "and will make it desolate forever. God’s people get 70-years, Babylon desolate forever. It struck me this was the difference between discipline of His people and destruction of those who will not revere God as God. This opened many more vistas of contemplation. Too many to write here…

And so I spent a few minutes in many places. God speaking with and to me at each stop.

Lord, thank You for today’s journey. Varied and full. Lord, I never cease to wonder at Your greatness and Your variety. Each day with You is something new…a treasure, a delight and sometimes, often times, a correction.

Praise be to You, my Lord and my God! In Jesus’ name, I pray. Amen.