March 23, 2022 (Lent Week 3)

 

 

 

- Jeremiah 8:18-9:6

I drown in grief. I’m heartsick.

Oh listen! Please listen! It’s the cry of my dear people reverberating through the country.

Is God no longer in Zion? Has the King gone away?

Can you tell me why they flaunt their play-thing gods, their silly imported no-gods before me?

The crops are in, the summer is over, but for us nothing’s changed.

We’re still waiting to be rescued.

For my dear broken people, I’m heartbroken. I weep, seized by grief.

Are there no healing ointments in Gilead? Isn’t there a doctor in the house?

So why can’t something be done to heal and save my dear, dear people?

I wish my head were a well of water and my eyes fountains of tears so I could weep day and night for casualties among my dear, dear people.

At times I wish I had a wilderness hut, a backwoods cabin, where I could get away from my people and never see them again. They’re a faithless, feckless bunch. A congregation of degenerates.

“Their tongues shoot out lies like a bow shoots arrows – A mighty army of liars, the sworn enemies of truth. They advance from one evil to the next, ignorant of me.”
God’s Decree

“Be wary of even long-time neighbours. Don’t even trust your grandmother! Brother schemes against brother, like old cheating Jacob. Friend against friend spreads malicious gossip. Neighbours gyp neighbours, never telling the truth. They’ve trained their tongues to tell lies, and now they can’t tell the truth. They pile wrong upon wrong, stack lie upon lie, and refuse to know me.”
         God’s Decree

(Passage taken from the Message translation)

 

I remember at the beginning of the pandemic, when we thought this would be over much sooner, going through Lent via online services. Many of us remarked that that seemed to be the “Lentiest” lent we had ever experienced. We had something really tangible to wait for. And we hoped and expected it would come quickly. Looking back two years, our enthusiasm and anticipation is tinged with some sadness, it feels as though we haven’t moved very far since.

Verse 20 of this reading in Jeremiah says “The crops are in, the summer is over, but nothing’s changed. We’re still waiting to be rescued.” That verse really spoke to me in this passage. This lent, rather than feeling like the “Lentiest” lent, it feels as though we are just still waiting to be rescued. Nothing’s changed. And I think many of us are weary and worn in this waiting, I know that I certainly am.

Verse 2 says “At times I wish I had a wilderness hut, a backwoods cabin, where I could get away from my people and never see them again.” And I can’t deny that I sometimes agree with Jeremiah. On more than one occasion throughout this past several years, I have read some new headline about another variant, a social/racial injustice, or even a war waged on innocent people, and I have said to my sister only half joking, “I think we should pool our savings and go live on the beach somewhere, scooping ice cream. I’m tired of this.” And its tempting… especially in those moments when you receive yet another piece of deflating news and you have no real power to make a big difference.

Jeremiah is grieving deeply for his people in this passage. He is in the midst of a long period of waiting to be rescued and he is drowning in grief and heartsickness. And even though he wants to “get away… and never see them again” he still grieves for them. He is heartbroken and weary and he cries out to his God, weeping. The only thing left for him to do is to sit with his grief while he waits to be rescued.

I have felt myself pushing back against the waiting this Lent. I don’t want to wait anymore, I want answers, I want healing, I want to feel normal again. “Are there no healing ointments in Gilead?”
I am heartbroken for my sisters and brothers in Christ across the world who are being killed and I continue thinking, like Jeremiah, “why can’t something be done to heal and save my dear, dear people?”.

But like Jeremiah we also have to wait. We are fortunate enough to have each other, our church family, as support during this waiting. What I think this passage says to me is that it is okay to feel weary, to feel worn and heartbroken and even upset. It is okay to wonder why and want to hide away from it all. But like Jeremiah, we can’t forget to invite God into our waiting. Let him be a part of the process, and we may just be surprised how much work God can do in the waiting.

The healing balm in Gilead is coming. He is closer than we can even imagine and he is with us in our grief and in the waiting. 

 

- Sara Gateman