Jeremiah 16:1-7: a reflection

1Then the LORD’s word came to me, saying, 2“You shall not take a wife, neither shall you have sons or daughters, in this place.” 3For the LORD says concerning the sons and concerning the daughters who are born in this place, and concerning their mothers who bore them, and concerning their fathers who became their father in this land: 4“They will die grievous deaths. They will not be lamented, neither will they be buried. They will be as dung on the surface of the ground. They will be consumed by the sword and by famine. Their dead bodies will be food for the birds of the sky and for the animals of the earth.” 5For the LORD says, “Don’t enter into the house of mourning. Don’t go to lament. Don’t bemoan them, for I have taken away my peace from this people,” says the LORD, “even loving kindness and tender mercies. 6Both great and small will die in this land. They will not be buried. Men won’t lament for them, cut themselves, or make themselves bald for them. 7Men won’t break bread for them in mourning, to comfort them for the dead. Men won’t give them the cup of consolation to drink for their father or for their mother.

God gives Jeremiah a series of hard commands that set him apart from the ordinary comforts of life. He is not to marry, not to have children, not even to take part in the ordinary rituals of mourning and feasting, all as living signs of the judgment coming on his people, so severe that normal life and even normal grief would be swept away. Jeremiah's very life, its loneliness and self-denial, was to embody the message God had given him to speak.

Notice the costliness of Jeremiah's calling. To be God's prophet in that time meant not only speaking hard words, but living a hard, lonely life, forgoing the comforts and joys that others had, marriage, family, the ordinary fellowship of shared grief and gladness. His obedience cost him deeply, in the very shape of his daily life. God called him to a self-denial that most would find hard to bear, for the sake of the message he was to embody.

That reminds us that God's call sometimes involves costly, self-denying obedience. We may prefer to think that following God will cost us little, that we can obey him while keeping all our comforts; but sometimes his call, as it did for Jeremiah, requires real self-denial, the giving up of things we would rather keep, for the sake of his purpose. When God's call to you is costly, requiring you to forgo comforts or bear a hard, lonely path for his sake, do not turn from it as though obedience should always be easy. Jeremiah obeyed a costly call, and God was with him in it. Be willing to obey God even when the call is hard and self-denying, trusting that the God who calls you to costly obedience will sustain you in it.

Lord, you gave Jeremiah hard commands, forgoing marriage, children, and even the ordinary rituals of mourning, so that his very life would embody the message you gave him; his obedience cost him deeply. Remind me through him that your call sometimes involves costly, self-denying obedience. I may prefer to think that following you will cost me little, that I can obey you while keeping all my comforts; but sometimes your call, as it did for Jeremiah, requires real self-denial, the giving up of things I would rather keep, for the sake of your purpose. When your call to me is costly, requiring me to forgo comforts or bear a hard path for your sake, keep me from turning from it as though obedience should always be easy. Jeremiah obeyed a costly call, and you were with him in it. Help me be willing to obey you even when the call is hard and self-denying, trusting that you who call me to costly obedience will sustain me in it.