The Bible Breakdown

Jeremiah 08: The Lord Hurts With Us

• Brandon Cannon • Episode 659

Share episode
Speaker 1:

Well, everybody, welcome back to the Bible Breakdown podcast with your host, Pastor Brandon. Today, Jeremiah, chapter 8, and today's title is the Lord Hurts With Us. The Lord Hurts With Us and it's just a powerful thought that I don't know about you, but I don't think about nearly enough. But it's going to be awesome and we're going to get into all in just a second. But if you're new here and you like what we're doing, make sure you like, share and subscribe to the YouTube channel and the podcast. Make sure you leave us a five-star review on the podcast. We are on the road to 100 five-star reviews on the podcast. We'd love for you to help us make that happen and make sure that everyone is going to the Bible Breakdown Discussion on Facebook. They're doing an amazing job there. I look forward to seeing those posts every single day and we would love for you to comment on those. The goal of doing the Bible Breakdown Facebook discussion was to create community so we can talk back and forth about God's word, Because there are some books of the Bible. That is your jam. You love it, it's your favorite, it's great. Other people it's just a struggle, and some of you told me that that was your exact experience with the book of Isaiah. Some of you loved it. You couldn't wait for the next chapter and others couldn't wait to get out of it. But that's what the goal of the Facebook discussion group is all about is to create community for you to share with us what you're learning, where you're winning and also where you're losing, like where you need help. So make sure you're going there, because the more we dig, the more we find. Well, if you have your Bible, I want to open up with me to Jeremiah, chapter eight. Remember, the overall theme of the book of Jeremiah is God's light in darkness. God's light in darkness, and that it gives us a hope and a future. And, speaking of that, while you are getting that ready, I have another resource for you and it is by Dr Peter Gentry, and the book is entitled how to Read and Understand the Biblical Prophets.

Speaker 1:

One of the things about the biblical prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, all of these guys if you don't understand the context and the background, they can be hard to get through. It would be just like if we were to read a local newspaper from somewhere in China or somewhere in New Zealand. It would be hard to get through because we don't know anything about the context, we don't know who they're talking about. It would be terrible. But from someone who's from that community, they look forward to it every day because they know exactly what's going on. Well, the Old Testament prophets are a lot like that. They're talking about very specific things that are going on in the nations around them, and so this book, what it will do, is it will help understand why they are talking to the different nations and not just their own, who the prophets were and what it is that maybe we're missing, that help us to appreciate them more. So, once again, it's called how to Read and Understand the Biblical Prophets, and it is by Dr Peter J Gentry and I think you'll really love it.

Speaker 1:

Well, Jeremiah chapter 8 is one of those chapters that it kind of blows my mind because God is grieving over Judah's stubbornness. He's grieving over them, and it blows my mind because he doesn't have to right, Like it reminds me of when my daughters were younger and we would set in place some rules, parameters, boundaries, because they needed to learn how to take care of themselves and how to operate within rules, boundaries and different things, and so we would say things like if you do your chores, then we will go to the movies. I don't know making it up right, but if you'll do your chores and let's say one of their chores was to take out the trash If you take out the trash every day for a week, then on Friday we're going to go to the movies. Well, I would watch my daughters. And once again, that one's not necessarily right. There was all these ones and they had one job. This one job take out the trash every afternoon. And if it doesn't need it, great. But if it does, take out the trash, go to the movies.

Speaker 1:

And I would watch, as my daughters would think it was stupid, think it was unnecessary, I shouldn't have to do this. And so they just wouldn't do it. And I said, baby, why are you doing this? You're not going to be able to go to the movies if you don't do this. Well, I just okay. Well, if you just don't want to, then you're just not going to get to go to the movies. Well, that's unfair. No, baby, it's not unfair, you know, and there was a part of me, a cold-hearted part of me, that wanted to just say, well, tough, tough. That's just the way it is. You'll figure it out. But there part of me that just hurt for my daughter because I was trying to teach her a value in life and it just because I love her. I care about the fact that she wasn't learning this value. And it wasn't about the trash. I can take out the trash, you know, I could probably do it better than she can. I've been doing it a while. It was about the value and my heart would hurt for her because she didn't understand what I was trying to do.

Speaker 1:

Well, it's the same thing with God. When God sees us going in the wrong direction, he's still God, whether or not we go in the right direction. But he loves us so much that his heart grieves. When we go the wrong direction and if you think about it, that's awesome God doesn't have to do that. He's God all by himself, but he loves us so much that he grieves for us. Let's read this and see how God's word shows us this and what it says to us. You ready?

Speaker 1:

Jeremiah, chapter 8, verse 1, says this and that day, says the Lord, the enemy will break open the graves of kings and officials of Judah, the graves of the priests, prophets and the common people of Jerusalem. They will spread out their bones on the ground before the sun, moon and stars. The gods of my people have loved, served and worshiped. Their bones will not be gathered up again or buried, but scattered on the ground like manure. The people of this evil nation who survive will wish to die rather than live where I will send them. I, the Lord of heaven's armies, have spoken. That's devastating. In other words, what God is telling them is total, complete humiliation, ruin and nothing to be done about it.

Speaker 1:

Verse 4, Jeremiah. Say to the people this is what the Lord says when people fall down, they don't get up again. When they discover they're on the wrong road, they don't turn back. Then why did these people stay on their self-destructive path? Why do people of Jerusalem refuse to turn back? They cling tightly to their lies and they will not turn around.

Speaker 1:

Listen to their conversations, I listen to their conversations and don't hear a word of truth. Is anyone sorry for doing wrong? Does anyone say what a terrible thing I have done? No, All are running down the path of sin as swiftly as a horse galloping into battle. Even the stork that flies across the sky knows the time of her migration, as do the turtle, dove, the swallow and the crane. They all return at the proper time each year, but not my people. They do not know the Lord's laws.

Speaker 1:

How can you say we are wise because we have the word of the Lord when your teachers have twisted it by writing lies? These wise teachers will fall into the trap of their own foolishness, for they have rejected the word of the Lord. Are they so wise? After all, I will give their wives to others and their farms to strangers, From the least to the greatest. Their lives are ruled by greed. Yes, even my prophets and priests are like that. They are all frauds. They offer superficial treatments for my people's mortal wound. They give assurance of peace when there is no peace. Are they ashamed of these disgusting actions? Not at all. They don't even know how to blush.

Speaker 1:

Therefore, they will lie among the slaughtered. They will be brought down. When I punish them, says the Lord, and I will surely consume them. There will be no more harvest of figs and grapes. Their fruit trees will all die. Whatever I gave them will soon be gone. I, the Lord, have spoken.

Speaker 1:

Then the people will say why should we wait here to die? Come, let us go to the fortified towns and die there For the Lord, our God, has decreed our destruction and he has given us a cup of poison to drink because we sinned against the Lord. We hoped for peace, but none came. We hoped for a time of healing, but found only terror. The snorting of the enemy's war horses can be heard all the way from the land of Dan in the north. The neighing of their stallions makes the whole land tremble. They are coming to devour the land and everything in it, cities and people alike. I will send these enemy troops.

Speaker 1:

My grief is beyond healing. My heart is broken. Listen to the weeping of my people. It can be heard all across the land. Has the Lord abandoned Jerusalem? The people ask. Is her king no longer there? Oh, why have they provoked my anger with their carved idols and their worthless foreign gods, says the Lord. The harvest is finished, the summer is gone, the people cry, Yet we are not saved. I hurt with the hurt of my people. I mourn and am overcome with grief. Is there no medicine in Gilead? Are there no physicians there? Why is there no healing for the wounds of my people?

Speaker 1:

Wow, what an interesting chapter, because Jeremiah, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, is speaking for God and he's saying you're doing all of these sinful things and you're not even feeling bad about it. All these terrible things are happening and you know they're wrong, but you're celebrating them. And so guess what's coming. It's almost like if you go rob a bank, you shouldn't be shocked if you go to jail over that right. If you crash into a car, you shouldn't be shocked if your insurance has to pay for it. Like this is what happens. One plus one is always two, and so what God is saying is you have continued to sin, You've continued to turn your back on me. I keep telling you if you turn your back on me, I'm going to lift my hand of blessing, and what comes comes. And now the train is coming and you are shocked, God, why aren't you saving us? And he's saying um, how long have we been doing this? You know what I mean.

Speaker 1:

Once again, it's like my daughter, you know. I tell her you know, if you would take out the trash once a day, then on Friday we'll go to the movies. Well then, when Friday comes, dad, why aren't we going to the movies? Baby girl, for a week straight, I've been telling you and you didn't do it. Well, that's not fair, is it? Is it? And I am sometimes just that sarcastic enough to say you're right. It is not fair that you would not do what I ask you to do and yet still expect a blessing.

Speaker 1:

And you know, here's the thing about God is that God has every right to say to that, say that to us he has every right to say you're right. It is unfair that you don't listen to me, you don't do what I tell you to do, you don't avoid these sins, you don't do anything I tell you, and then you get mad at me when you're not blessed. You're right. That's very unfair. Here's the great thing about God is, when we have to sit in that difficulty, he comes and sits beside us. The Bible says though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will not fear evil. Why? Because you, God, are close beside me. What I love about God so much is that even when his justice requires that we have to pay the price for our sin, he comes and sits with us. It would be like the analogy I used a second ago.

Speaker 1:

Let's say, someone goes and they rob a bank and they get caught and they go before the judge and the judge says I'm sorry to do this. But you got to go to jail. You robbed that bank. Well, that's unfair. No, no, it's really not. It, it, this is the just reward for you robbing that bank. And so he goes to jail, and on the first day that that guy is now in jail, the judge comes in and sits down beside him. Judge, what are you doing here? I'm here because you're here. Well, judge, you didn't do anything wrong. You were just upholding the law, You're right. Well, judge, you're free to go anytime you want to. You're right. What are you going to do? I'm going to stay here with you. Why? Because you're here and I love you. That's God.

Speaker 1:

That's what God does is, when we're sitting in the middle of a disaster that we may have made, he comes and sits down beside us and he says let's start the healing process. And so here's my question for you have you invited God into everything in your life? If you're hurting, you know what God's word says, verse 21?. I hurt with the hurt of my people, I mourn and I am overcome with grief. It doesn't matter if it is a prison of your own making or if it is a prison of someone else's making. It may not be your fault, but it is your responsibility to turn it all over to the Lord. Is there an area of your life that you are walking and hurting alone? Because God doesn't want that, All you have to do is to invite him into your pain. But I got to warn you he will try to. No, he will try. He will do everything that you will let him do to heal you of that pain, and that may mean surgery. He may go in and deal with the root cause of that pain, but his goal for you is wholeness. And so wherever you are today, God wants to be with you. He wants to sit with you in that pain.

Speaker 1:

The Bible says in Hebrews that Jesus was tested at all points, like us, yet without sin. And so when we sin, he gets it. He gets what that temptation is like. He gets what that pull on us is like is like. He gets what that pull on us is like. It's just he didn't fall victim to that sin, but yet he walked in that shame of knowing what that hard season feels like. And so when we sin, he doesn't sit there and say well, why did you do that? Instead, he goes, I get it, I get how hard that is, and he comes into everything that we walk through. Let's pray together right now and invite him into our situation.

Speaker 1:

God, thank you so much that Lord. You are just and you are good, but you are also merciful and kind. And sometimes, Lord, in your justice, you decree that we go through difficult seasons. But the great thing is is then, once you have hit the gavel, you take off the robe and you walk with us. Lord, we invite you right now into every difficult place in our life. We invite you into our pain, into our broken relationships, into our physical issues, God, in our uncertainty, our worries, our fears, everything in between. We invite you into it all and we say, Lord, have your way in our lives. We celebrate you In Jesus' name. We pray Amen, Amen, Amen. What God's word says in Jeremiah 29, verse 13,. He says If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me. I pray that you find God today in all that you do, and I will see you tomorrow for Jeremiah, chapter 9.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Brandon Cannon

Host