God Promises
Deliverance
Advent 1 – December 1, 2019
“Promise of the Messiah”
“Life
is amazing. And then it’s awful. And then it’s amazing again. And in between
the amazing and the awful it’s ordinary and mundane and routine. Breathe in the
amazing, hold on through the awful, and relax and exhale during the ordinary.
That’s just living heartbreaking, soul-healing, amazing, awful, ordinary life.
And it’s breathtakingly beautiful” – L.R. Knost
· Not sure when I started following this author; often
see this quote along with a few others floating around the internet, posted by
my friends
· And to read it and some of her other works, you
wouldn’t necessarily guess what her life has held in the past several years
o Fighting a rare, incurable cancer they don’t quite
know how to treat
o Raising children, some with special needs
o In danger of losing health insurance because her
husband’s company is downsizing and he may get laid off
o One thing after another with no promise or guarantee
of a happy ending
In some ways, her story reminds me of what is
happening in the time of Jeremiah this morning
· Not exactly the same, of course
· This is a whole nation caught up in a situation that
has them at the brink of utter destruction
o Besieged for the past year by Babylonians who are
gaining in strength and might and power
o Houses are in rubble as the people have tried to
bolster their walls
o They themselves describe it as a “waste without human
beings or animals” – desolate, without inhabitants
· No sense of the amazing here. No sense of the ordinary
or the mundane or routine here either – pretty much just the awful; just the
trying to survive from one day to the next as supplies get thinner along with
the people, as the military threat grows
· And lucky Jeremiah – the weeping prophet – he gets to
be the one to carry the bad news to the people and the leaders that things are
only going to get worse – that ultimately they will be conquered and carried
off into exile in a foreign land (about 10 years from today’s reading in the
biblical timeline)
o It’s why he’s in prison – confined in the court of the
guard – the king didn’t take kindly to Jeremiah’s word from the Lord…
· It’s a time of chaos and hopelessness and despair with
no way out
We know what it is to feel besieged/trapped by bad
news or bad circumstances
· Moments or seasons when everything seems to be
spiraling downward, when it feels like everything is falling apart
· Divorce or death of a spouse; long-stretches of
unemployment with interview after interview with no job offers; substance
abuse; depression; caring for a loved one with dementia or Parkinson’s;
·
On a larger
scale, we look around the world and see places with the kind of devastation the
book of Jeremiah describes – places torn apart by long-raging wars, reduced to
rubble by hurricanes or flooding or wildfire
· All of these kinds of awful situations where we can
only hold on hoping to get through them…
But just as LR Knost says that life is amazing and
then it’s awful and then it’s amazing again … and then it’s breathtakingly
beautiful despite all of the challenges she faces, God speaks to and through
the prophet Jeremiah, giving a word of hope and a vision of the better future
to the people of Judah (still in the southern kingdom, the northern one was
destroyed 100+ years ago) – even in the middle of the awfulness they are
experiencing
· “The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah a second time…
Thus says the Lord who made the earth… ‘Call to me and I will answer you, and
will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known…’”
· Though the Chaldeans/Babylonians are coming in to take
over your city: “I am going to bring it recovery and healing; I will heal them
and reveal to them abundance of prosperity and security…
· “In this place of which you say, ‘It is a waste
without human beings or animals’…” in these towns and on these streets there
shall again be the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness – wedding parties
and joy and praise”
· Indeed, life will go so back to ordinary, mundane,
routine, that there will be time and energy and safety for the shepherds to
count each of their sheep as they take care of them
· “The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I
will fulfill the promise I made… I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up
for David, and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land…”
· Just as God has promised to the people over and over
and over again – God will continue to be their God and they shall be God’s
people
o God will allow them to go through the struggle, God
will allow them to be carried into exile, but God will never abandon them. God
will ultimately deliver them and lead them home.
God promises to deliver us too
· This is the promise we have spoken to us down through
the generations through Jeremiah too
· That though sometimes life is awful, God walks with us
through it and never leaves us alone
· Hope and longing and waiting of Advent points us
toward the One God promised who would bring justice and righteousness in the
land, the one who would bring peace and joy; healing and wholeness; redemption
and reconciliation
· God sends Jesus, the Promised One, who loved us so
much he became one of us, sharing our lives, knowing the amazing and the awful
and the ordinary, mundane, routine
o He carries our pain with us
o He promises to deliver us from whatever we are trapped
by
· So breathe in the amazing, exhale through the
ordinary, and hold on to Jesus during the awful. He will heal and restore you.
· Thanks be to God. Amen.
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