God knows he is struggling, yet the struggle does not nullify God’s gracious love for him.
Our text for today deals with a serious complaint (20:7-10) about being mistreated on account of God’s Word. What a bleak text this would be if that is all we had. However, the whole text is not centered on suffering alone, but, instead, we are taken to a place where praise for the God who deliverers is our hope (20:11-13).
In the verses immediately following our reading, Jeremiah returns again to bitter complaint, even cursing the day he was born. You might be tempted to see this return to complaint as a loss of his faith in God. However, verse 13 demonstrates that he is simply reflecting the relatable struggle of the normal Christian life. Our faith in God wrestles between being weak and strong. It is in the forge of the struggle that our faith in God’s grace becomes even stronger. Our faith grows stronger in the struggle because it pushes us to Christ.
Is this not what Jesus was talking about in our appointed Gospel lesson for today from Matthew 10:5a, 21-33? In life everything and everyone may eventually turn on us. What is it Jesus said? “We will be hated by all” (10:21-22). Can you hear Jeremiah in the back give a big AMEN to that? But we should not have expected any different. If they did this to Jeremiah and all the prophets, if they did this to Jesus the prophet greater than any prophet, than why should we expect it to be any other way (10:25). Jeremiah agrees with Jesus in that his fear is not in men but in God. This God whom we fear, love, and trust above all things is the one who drives away all fear with His perfect love shown on the cross and in the empty tomb.
As a preacher, I would work hard to relate my hearer’s experiences of life to Jeremiah in that the Christian walk is rarely smooth, unbroken, and filled with uninterrupted rainbows and sunshine. The verses before the text show that the complaint of Jeremiah is certainly warranted. The supposed “friends” of Pashur and Jeremiah had beaten and jailed the prophet for preaching the law and judgment of God. Ironic name calling was what happened to Jeremiah saying his nickname is “terror on every side” in verse 10. But Jeremiah had just prophesied this same nickname over Pashur in verse 3.
So, how do you make a gospel turn in a sermon like this one? By drawing your focus on Jeremiah’s suffering so it can build you the bridge to Jesus as He suffered for us. Jesus is the prophet greater than Jeremiah who suffered similarly but ultimately for us. This is the good news Jeremiah hopes for, deliverance comes in a very tangible way in his life but, ultimately, it is something that can only come through the resurrection promise found in Christ alone. That is our deliverance from suffering and death. The hope of Christ is for Jeremiah and for us all.
The real trouble comes in the waiting. Another wonderful Gospel promise from this text is how God does not give up on Jeremiah or His people. He relentlessly pursues them to save them. God will not let us go even when we try to escape His grip on us. He will let nothing separate us from His love. Look at how Jeremiah attempts to walk away from God in verse 9: “Then I said, I will not make mention of Him, nor speak any more in His name.” But then see at what follows: “There is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with holding it in and I cannot.” God never gives up and holds on to Jeremiah. He will hunt him down to give him the good news that He will deliver him. God knows he is struggling, yet the struggle does not nullify God’s gracious love for him.
God never gives up and holds on to Jeremiah. He will hunt him down to give him the good news that He will deliver him.
Whenever I think of the relentless love of God, I remember the poem by Francis Thompson, called “The Hound of Heaven.” This is only a selection that I am giving, and, for the sake of the sermon, it will be an excellent illustration. Please do look at the whole poem. However, because of its length you may want to only take selections from the poem to illustrate the tension between the Christian life and the relentless love of God which never leaves us or forsakes us:
I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears
I hid from Him, and under running laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped;
And shot, precipitated,
Adown Titanic glooms of chasmèd fears,
From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.
But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbèd pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat—and a Voice beat
More instant than the Feet—
‘All things betray thee, who betrayest Me.’[1]
God pursues us with His grace relentlessly, and His goodness and mercy captures us every day of our lives. “You are stronger than I, and you have prevailed” (20:7) says the prophet. Our gracious capture is iterated in verse 13: “Sing to the Lord; praise the Lord! For He has delivered the life of the needy from the hand of evildoers.”
All throughout the Bible we have example after example of God’s relentless pursuit of us with His mercy. Even Paul points out that God comes to us persistently and even relentlessly in Romans 10:6-8:
“Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into Heaven?’ (that is, to bring Christ down) or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? ‘The Word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’ (that is, the Word of faith that we proclaim).”
There is no place God would not go to save you. He sent His only begotten Son to suffer our death and damnation on the cross to make us His sons and daughters forever. In fact, Jesus even rose again to prove it! In the season of Pentecost, we take stock of the struggles of living the Christian life. It is such good news to know that God never leaves us or forsakes us and is with us by the power of the Holy Spirit to give us Jesus. Listen again to what Paul says in Romans 8:38-39:
“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
The sermon structure that may fit best for this sermon will be the Frame and Refrain Structure.
“This sermon structure uses a single image (struggling with suffering in this world) in the opening and the closing of the sermon for the hearers. In the opening use of the image, the preacher describes the image and then offers a thematic statement that he associates with the image (nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus). The central body of the sermon then becomes a preaching of that thematic statement (through Jeremiah, Paul, and then us). The thematic statement becomes a refrain that holds the sermon together. The preacher uses that thematic statement to interpret the text and to apply that text to the lives of the hearers. It often helps if the refrain is gospel-centered (death and resurrection of Jesus for us) so it enables the preacher to proclaim the Gospel as it is heard in the text, the theological teaching, and the lives of the hearers today. The sermon concludes by returning to the image (creating a frame around the body of the sermon) and offering the hearers a final climactic statement of the refrain (speaking Romans 8:38-39 fully).”[2]
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Craft of Preaching-Check out 1517’s resources on Jeremiah 20:7-13.
Concordia Theology-Various helps from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, MO to assist you in preaching Jeremiah 20:7-13.
Lectionary Kick-Start-Check out this fantastic podcast from Craft of Preaching authors Peter Nafzger and David Schmitt as they dig into the texts for this Sunday!
The Pastor’s Workshop-Check out all the great preaching resources from our friends at the Pastor’s Workshop!
[1] http://www.houndofheaven.com/poem
[2] https://concordiatheology.org/sermon-structs/dynamic/imagistic-structures/frame-refrain/
