Sunday, November 8, 2009

Jeremiah 35-37

God sends Jeremiah on another errand. He is to go to house of the Rechabites and bring them to church and have them drink wine. These are STRICT no wine drinkers, by the way. They tell him that they are strict no wine drinkers, as a matter of fact they don't have a vineyard or even a house. They are tent livers and no wine drinkers from WAYYYY back. (are these peeps some type of nazarites?)
Then the story goes in a completely different direction than I though. God goes on and on about how this family have obeyed the commands of their fathers but not the commands of God. So I thought He was gonna let then have it, but he doesn't. He says that because they have listened to their forefathers then they shall never fail to have a descendant stand before Him.
Obey your parents, children.
Next on Jeremiah's mother of all honey-do lists is to write a book. I think God thinks that maybe if its actually written down, these people will listen. A last ditch effort?
Well it didn't work quite as planned. The king burned the scrolls, and Jer rewrote them and the king burned them.....
Then it's back to prison for our friend. And yet the king keeps asking him for advice. I'm not sure if the king thought that the tales would change or what? Why does he KEEP asking and then not following?

1 comment:

Jamie said...

God wasn't saying they (the Rech's) don't obey Him. He was saying that here you have some folks who are super obedient to an ancestor of theirs (who is just a man), yet the Israelites won't obey God (and He created everything).

Let's remember how incredibly difficult and expensive writing things down back then was. It was VERY, VERY difficult and expensive.

I think he gets bumped up from maximum security to minimum security (aka "the countryclub" by politicians, mobsters, etc.) Anywho, I think the king keep asking because, like us, he hopes that sooner or later he'll hear what he wants. We don't always realise we're doing that and how silly it is, until we see or read about someone else doing it.

And Baker's street. Did anyone else beside me get a whiff of fresh baked bread and envision themselves walking through narrow streets in old town, Israel, when they read that?