I have been reading the book of Jeremiah. For 40 years he was a very unwanted prophet in the land of Judea. His contemporaries were prophets who said what the people wanted to hear. The people loved them. Then came Jeremiah. He said what the Lord told him to say. The people hated him. They hated him for 40 years. F O R T Y Y E A R S!
It got so bad that when people saw him they would say, "Jeremiah, what has the Lord burdened you with today?" Still he plugged along, saying not what was popular but what was right. Not what people wanted to hear but what God told him to say.
He never married.
He never had children.
People threatened to kill him.
He spent time deep in a cistern before being rescued out of the mud and gunk.
His sorrow for his fallen country was so great, he visibly wept.
And he continued speaking the truth, the word of the Lord God of Heaven's Armies.
Forty years
At the end of his life, he could have gone to Babylon and lived out his remaining days in comfort. Instead he chose to to stay with the remnant left in Judah. Still poor and unwanted, he returned to his beloved people. Jeremiah kept speaking. Some of his prophesies unfolded before the people just as he predicted. Yet, still rejecting Jeremiah's advice and disobeying God, a group decided to head to Egypt forcing him to go with them.
F o r t y Y e a r s
He kept on keeping on.
F O R T Y Y E A R S
He faithfully served.
F O R T Y Y E A R S
For forty years it seemed that Jeremiah didn't matter. No one listened, no one cared.
Yet, when he was really down, the Lord told him, "I will take care of you."
Later Jeremiah said, "Lord, you are my strength and fortress, my refuge in the day of trouble."
Forty years
Forty years
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