Scripture Daily

Context No. 1752 of 4322 · Jeremiah

Context · Reflection

Jeremiah 13:6-11: in context

6After many days, the LORD said to me, “Arise, go to the Euphrates, and take the belt from there, which I commanded you to hide there.” 7Then I went to the Euphrates, and dug, and took the belt from the place where I had hidden it; and behold, the belt was ruined. It was profitable for nothing. 8Then the LORD’s word came to me, saying, 9“The LORD says, ‘In this way I will ruin the pride of Judah, and the great pride of Jerusalem. 10This evil people, who refuse to hear my words, who walk in the stubbornness of their heart, and have gone after other gods to serve them and to worship them, will even be as this belt, which is profitable for nothing. 11For as the belt clings to the waist of a man, so I have caused the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah to cling to me,’ says the LORD; ‘that they may be to me for a people, for a name, for praise, and for glory; but they would not hear.’

God had told Jeremiah to bury a linen belt by the Euphrates; now, after many days, he sends him to dig it up, and the belt is ruined, good for nothing. God explains the sign: so I will ruin the pride of Judah and Jerusalem. For, he says, as a belt clings to the waist of a man, so I made the whole house of Israel and Judah cling to me, that they might be my people, for praise and glory; but they would not listen. Separated from him, they had become like the ruined belt, useless.

The image God gives is intimate and sad. A belt clings close to the body, wrapped snug about the waist; and that, God says, is how he made his people to cling to him, close, intimate, bound to him for their very purpose. He made them to be his own, near to him, that through their closeness they might be for him a people, a name, a praise, and a glory. This is what God desired: not distant subjects but a people clinging to him as a belt clings to the waist, close and belonging. But they would not; they pulled away, went after other gods, and in separating from God lost the very thing that gave them worth, becoming like the belt buried far from the body and left to rot, good for nothing. There is a truth here about our own purpose and where it is found. We are made to cling to God, close to him, and it is in that nearness that we find our purpose and worth; like the belt, we are made to be bound to him. And apart from him, separated by our own turning away, we lose that purpose, become truly useless, cut off from the One who gives us meaning. The ruined belt is a picture of a life separated from God: not necessarily dramatic in its ruin, but purposeless, no longer fulfilling what it was made for. The remedy is to cling, to draw close and stay close to the God we were made to be bound to, in whom alone we are what we were meant to be. God made us to cling to him; our worth and purpose are found in that nearness, and lost in the pulling away.

Am I clinging close to God, bound to him as a belt to the waist, finding my purpose and worth in that nearness, or have I pulled away, and become, like the ruined belt, purposeless and cut off from the One I was made to cling to, and will I draw close again to the God in whom alone I am what I was meant to be?

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