No "Off" Days in the Battle

A few years ago, I woke up one morning to a major storm...a storm in my soul. I was threatened with anger, bitterness, rejection, disappointment, unmet expectations, and the desire for revenge and to strike back. After indulging in a bit of heart rebellion, I finally turned to my Lord in Luke, Psalms, Proverbs, and Jeremiah for healing.

The gentle reminder from our Lord that often the enemy attacks when we are most tired is certainly true in my case...we just came back from a major ministry trip where the days were packed with meetings and almost no time to rest, compounded with jet lag both directions.

Jeremiah...I think if he was on earth today I'd want him to be my best friend. Few others would be able to understand. Who else suffered such complete and utter rejection by his friends, family, and leaders of his day?

I imagine him wondering how to keep serving the Lord, keep a steady course, when criticisms mount up, when one after another people slander and judge, political leaders rejected him, those in religious leadership..."the church" in his day laughed at him, when even father and brother not only renounce him, but plot to kill him?

What a constant torment this must have been for Jeremiah! The easiest response was to become depressed to the point of suicide. The constant slander could have led to incessant questioning and second guessing his own manner of speaking, the content of his speech, his non-verbals, and his very identity as a person. The attacks and rejection did lead him to major questioning of God...his goodness and His overall plan.

The extreme distress he was experiencing led him to lose eternal perspective on what he was going through, who he truly was, and the reality of God's goodness and sovereignty.


As much as Jeremiah may have wanted to be with his family, because he experienced the loneliness of being a single in ministry, he would have preferred quiet.

Proverbs 17:1 "Better is a dry morsel with quiet tan a house full of feasting with strife." 

For Jeremiah, he was almost friendless. Even his closest, trusted friends betrayed him and acted unloyally.

Jeremiah 9:4-5  "Beware of your friends; do not trust your brothers. For every brother is a deceiver, and every friend a slanderer. Friend deceives friend, and no one speaks the truth."  Why did Jeremiah have to go through this?

He tried to trust them again, and again and again he was hurt.  He was, like Spurgeon describes, "being almost carried away by those hurricanes of infidelity which come from the wilderness, and like whirlwinds, smite the four corners of the house and threaten to overthrow it."  Whirlwinds of anger, depression, hopelessness.

God gave Jeremiah specific words to hold on to:

Jeremiah 12:6 "For even your brothers and the house of your father, even they have dealt treacherously with you; they are in full cry after you; do not believe them, though they speak friendly words to you."

The issues with Jeremiah's family is the last issue mentioned of the numerous conflicts Jeremiah faced. Our enemy will not hesitate to use those closest to us to hurt us, distract us, often because only those we love dearest can cause us the deepest pain. 

Jeremiah needed to focus on the words of his contemporary:

Is. 49:15-16a "Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands;"

Jeremiah's path of suffering was marked out, and his was no different, and not even as great as our incarnate Lord's...the life of faithful discipleship is the way of the cross.

Radical self-denial means not only that we are willing to face death, even death on a cross, but willing to tread the path of the cross, which in the end is ever so much more difficult. This path includes being attacked, verbally and emotionally abused, denied by close friends and possibly even family.


As for me, I cling to the promise in Is 40:11, "He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young."  I take firm hold of my soul and remind myself what God says:

Malachi 4:6:  "And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.” 

and

Luke 1:17   "And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous--to make ready a people prepared for the Lord."

Jeremiah found his "family" not in his blood family, but in those who walked the same path as he:

Ps 27:10 "For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in."
Ps 45:10 "Hear, O daughter, and consider, and incline your year: forget your people and your father's house and the king will desire your beauty."
Matt 23:9 "And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven."

While the Lord does take us in, he also asks us to put him first, no matter what. Jesus says in Matthew, "If you want to be my disciple, you must hate everyone else by comparison--your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters--yes, even your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be my disciple."

Okay, Lord. I get it. No matter how people treat me, I'll follow You. The storm stilled to peaceful waters.