ARE YOU LISTENING?  

Jeremiah 4:1-4, 11-12, 22-28

           

[Since spoken communication differs from written, some of the grammar and syntax of this transcript may seem awkward in written form. To keep integrity with the spirit of the original delivery, the transcript stays close to the exact words spoken.]

Last week I asked the question in my sermon, a question from Peter Drucker, the writer of business books: What business are we in?  And I suggested that that's a really important question for us to ponder this year as we think about…"What's our purpose together as a community?"  And once we've figured out what our business is, we should then ask ourselves, "How's business?"  I offered a beginning thought to get that process started, in suggesting that that the business we're in has to have something to do with changing people's lives.  And that, unless this book and the message contained in it gain some traction in our lives, then what we're doing is just entertainment.  Somehow this, this book, needs to change us.  

Today I begin a sermon--a two-part, "mini-series" on Jeremiah.  And I want to ask us to kind of consider a variation on that Peter Drucker question.  To ask whether the business we're in, as a community of faith, is also about changing our common life.  Our life together as a people.  Our participation in the body politic.  Does this message have something to say about how we participate in the political realm of our people?  We're going to be getting into more detail with that question later on in the fall when we're going to have another two-part mini-series on the question of the relationship between faith and politics.  And you actually have a chance to weigh in on that question before I even speak a word from the pulpit.  A unique opportunity.  We're going to have a couple of sessions designed for people to discuss the relationship between faith and politics and that discussion will have a bearing on the sermons that I preach about that. 

But today, Jeremiah.  We're going to try and figure out how this obscure message from the Old Testament relates to our real life, together, here in America.  And the sermon today really is not just meant to help us learn about Jeremiah; really the whole message this morning is in the spirit of Jeremiah.  So if you disagree with it, take it up with Jeremiah.  See?  Isn't that skillful ducking of responsibility this morning? 

So, Jeremiah.  Let's learn something about who this guy was, and his message.  And we're going to do that by calling to mind a movie--maybe it's a movie that some of you saw.  It wasn't the greatest of movies--got mixed reviews.  But, in the spring, there was a movie called Next starring Nicholas Cage.  And the Nicholas Cage character had a gift.  His gift was an ability to know what was going to happen in the future.  He used it to make some money in Blackjack in Las Vegas, and that sort of thing.  But the plot of the movie involves how this character, an ordinary guy, with this gift, knew that something cataclysmic was going to be happening in the future.  And the plot turns around his involvement in preventing that cataclysmic event. 

I mention that movie not necessarily to recommend that you watch it, because again, I guess it's a pretty mediocre movie.  But it's a great plot as an entryway into understanding the situation, the existential situation of Jeremiah.  Because he was like that Nicholas Cage character in a lot of ways.  He was a person--you might say he was given a similar kind if gift.  He was called by God to be a prophet.  And as I mentioned in a previous sermon, that was not necessarily a great privilege.  It was something that Jeremiah protested.  Like the character in this movie, it was something that he had to do, reluctantly.  And a prophet--again as I mentioned in that earlier sermon--is not just somebody who can tell what's going to happen the future, because he's tuned into the God channel.  The task of a prophet is to speak the word of God, the davar elohim, to the people of God.  And that is a tough job.  It didn't make Jeremiah particularly popular, as we'll find out.  Because his job was to warn the people about a disaster that was about to happen.  And the thing that makes Jeremiah interesting, like the plot of that movie, is that the future is not a forgone conclusion.  It's not fixed.  The disaster that seemed to be looming on the horizon could be prevented.  It depends upon what we do today.  And the question of Jeremiah was, "Is anybody listening?  Is anybody paying attention?" 

So the text that we heard this morning from Jeremiah, that I read and Mary Alice read--Mary Alice read the part that was about how the future is not fixed.  If the nation repents, and conforms once again to the covenant--the promise the nation made with God when God brought them out of Egypt--then this disaster can be averted.  The second part of the reading, that I read, was a vision of Isaiah about that dire consequence that will happen if the people refuse to change.  And it's a chilling vision.  In fact it's a vision about the earth reverting to the kind of chaos that existed before creation.  That's how bad it's going to be if you don't pay attention, and listen to the word of God.  "For thus says the Lord--the whole Earth shall be in desolation, the heavens above shall grow black…."

Can you imagine knowing about 9-11 before it happened?  And being in a position to prevent it?  You see, if we just think about that we get a sense of what's at stake for Jeremiah, and just how desperate he is to make his people listen to the word that had been given to him.  Can you imagine no one believing you?  No one listening?  You see, what's going on for Jeremiah--he sees his fellow citizens, and the leadership of his country in particular, practicing a kind of national religion that was blinding them to the disaster that was about to happen.  And that resulted in a foreign policy that was disastrous for the country.  In the time that Jeremiah's speaking--the time that this text was written--Judah (that was how the land of Israel was called) was balanced on a knife-edge between two greater nations.  Between Egypt, which was sort of a waning power in the wake of the last big empire, the Assyrian empire; and the Babylonians, the empire that was growing, a juggernaut that was headed their way.  So Judah, this little country, is sandwiched between these two great powers, and they're trying to play them off upon each other. 

And Jeremiah's accused of being unpatriotic by saying, "There's no resisting the Babylonians."  In fact what Jeremiah's saying is, "Babylon.  This great, hot wind from the north, this great threat--Babylon is the servant of God, meant to chastise the nation and shock you into paying attention to the covenant, the promise, you made.  To pay attention to the values upon which this nation was founded.  Values of justice for the poor; values of fairness and morality." 

That's not what the false prophets were saying, though.  The sort of super patriots, the religious leaders in the temple, were saying to the people and the leadership, "This is God's country.  God would never let anything happen to this place, to Jerusalem.  This is God's house.  How would God ever let this place be destroyed?  And so don't worry, be happy.  God bless Israel."

I have to admit, when the seventh inning stretch happens…it used to be that you only heard Take Me Out to the Ballgame.  And now, inevitably--and don't get me wrong, I certainly count myself a patriot--but now we hear God Bless America, too.  And I have to say, there's a kind of ambivalence that wells up in my heart when I hear that being sung.  Because I think it can be construed as a very unhelpful message for America.  As if somehow God has a sort of favor for us that God doesn't have for other nations.  Like we're somehow special, and we can then do no wrong.  We are God's chosen people.  Instead of understanding that the blessing that comes from God emanates from our living out the values upon which the country was founded.  Values of justice and freedom and equality--and that is our blessing. 

You see, I think that's where Jeremiah would have come down.  His was the voice railing against all those patriots saying that God isn't going to let anything happen to this place.  So eat, drink, and be merry.  That national delusion led to an utterly foolish and naïve foreign policy, which brought the wrath of the Babylonians and ended up destroying the nation.  And if you don't believe me, read the book. 

The world of Jeremiah at that time…as I imagine it, I think it might have seemed rather like America before 9-11.  I think no one ever thought--I certainly never thought--that anything like 9-11 could happen in America.  Did you feel that way?  That's what happened in other places, where terrorism happens.  This could never happen here.  But it did.  The disastrous event that Jeremiah predicted, the invasion of the Babylonians, happened.  597 and 587 B.C.E. the Babylonians stormed Jerusalem.  Over a period of eleven years, and because of even more bungled and stupid foreign policy decisions, the Babylonians ended up sacking and utterly destroying Jerusalem and the temple.  And if we want to understand the Bible, we cannot understand it unless we understand this event:  the Babylonian captivity.  It lasted 59 years for the people of Israel.  Remember the words of the Psalm?  "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, and there we wept, when we remembered Zion."  The people who thought nothing like this could ever happen found themselves weeping, in Babylonia, for the old country. 

Jeremiah was right.  It did happen.  And no one listened.  Jeremiah believed that God used history to teach a lesson to Israel, but a lesson that ultimately was not about judgment, but about love.  That taught the nation about the nature of hope.  And that's what we'll talk about next week. 

But before I conclude, a postscript.  I said that this message needs to have something to do with how we live our lives today.  It needs to gain traction in our behavior as human beings, and as Americans.  And so as we try to get at that, here's a question.  Maybe it's a question from left field--but I think it really does relate to Jeremiah. 

Here it is….What if Al Gore is right? 

Now, whatever you think of Al Gore, I mean to lift him up as an example of how we might imagine Jeremiah might have felt in those times.  Because he's a guy, whether you believe in his message or not, who's trying to ask the question, "Are you listening?"  What if he's right?  Is it possible that this is a Jeremaic moment for the world, and the decisions that we make today have dire consequences for tomorrow? And so, what will we say to our children and grandchildren if the Earth reverts to chaos tomorrow because of the exhaust that is coming from our tailpipes today?  What will we tell our children and grandchildren if we rape the world in order to drain it of fossil fuel?  Will we be able to say we didn't know?  That our foreign policy, like that of Jeremiah's day, was based not on justice or human rights, or righteousness, but self interest:  the need of an oil-addicted empire to dominate others because we need their petroleum?  Will we say we listened to false prophets who claimed the data is inconclusive about the world warming?  Can we say we enjoyed cheap consumer goods and fed our families well, and had a good time, as polar bears became extinct, and as peasants in sub-Saharan Africa died a withering death in the heat?  Are we listening?  I think that's what Jeremiah would want to know today.  Is anyone paying attention?     

It ought to make us uncomfortable reading this book.  It ought to make us think about how we're living our lives today, because of what might happen tomorrow.  It ought to affect how we vote in the next election; our buying choices; our lifestyle choices; and how we are to live together if this planet is to survive. 

Are you listening?

Amen.

 

September 16 , 2007

Jeff Vamos

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