Good morning, friends. If you are surprised to find me standing here this morning, I must confess that I am still a bit surprised myself. It was only a few short days ago that I received the call to be here and share God’s word with you. My friend Kimberlee was prepared to preach this morning before falling ill earlier in the week. She reminded me on the phone, however, that she had warned me two weeks ago when she suggested that I write a backup sermon to tuck away in my back pocket, just in case she went into early labor. Good advice. Unfortunately, not followed. She asked me to let you know that the baby has not arrived yet, and that she is doing fine.

So, here I am. Ready or not.

But you know what, God is good. And there is a word on my heart that I am excited to share with you. It may not be polished, and it may not be pretty, but I’m reminded that Peter didn’t get any prep time before giving his Pentecost sermon. Stephen didn’t have any time to write out his speech to the Jewish council…
though they did end up stoning him, so perhaps that’s not the best illustration for me to use here. Nevertheless, I trust that the Lord will be very present and very active this morning as we continue our sermon series on Jeremiah.

Last week Dan shared with us some of the background to Jeremiah and the period during which he served as a prophet. The crucial event took place in 587 B.C., as Babylon swept down from the North and overtook the city of Jerusalem. The temple was destroyed and many of its leaders were carried off into exile. Jeremiah received his call just prior to this, and was sent to the people of Israel with the message that God was going to “pluck up and pull down, destroy and overthrow, build and plant.” Israel had broken the covenant relationship with Yahweh. Jeremiah sounded the warning. Israel was about to be shaken up.

If you were in Seattle on February 28, 2001, you will no doubt remember the earthquake that shook the city. It was a 6.8 in magnitude, which, for those of you who were not here to experience it, means that it was a big one. It was felt as far away as Salt Lake City in fact. Those of you who were here probably remember where you were when things started to shake.

I was in a parking lot in Shoreline, surrounded by tall trees and power lines. All of a sudden I felt a little wobbly. At first I thought it was me. Then I noticed the asphalt beginning to rise and fall like ocean waves. Trees began to sway. Buildings began to lean this way and that. Cracking and moaning came from every direction. There was nothing I could do. Except pray. What once felt stable, instantly felt tenuous. It got our attention. It changed the way many of us thought about our relative “safety and stability” here in the Pacific Northwest.

Sometimes it takes us being a little shaken up to have our view of things shifted. I believe this is something like what we find in Jeremiah. Something has gone wrong in the Nation of Israel. The relationship that God once shared with His chosen, holy, separate, people has become distorted. In fact, it has become so distorted that the people themselves seem at times to be completely oblivious to what’s going on.

And so, Jeremiah is sent, wielding a prophetic pen loaded with sharp and vibrant images and metaphors: marriage, fruit, fountains of living water, cracked cisterns. His goal: to convert the imaginations of the people back to God, by revealing to them the truth of their unfaithful and idolatrous condition.

For clarification, let me make one point here. When I use the term imagination, I am not talking about fairy tales and make believe. I am speaking in the prophetic sense of truthful re-visioning. Or, simply put, “truth-telling.” And this, it seems, is what Israel was struggling with: seeing the truth of its broken relationship with God.

This morning, we will read from Jeremiah 2:1-13.

Does your family have a designated “historian?” You know, someone whose unspoken job, or special gift you might say is to be the keeper of family memories, the teller of family tales. In my family, that would be my younger brother. He’s the “Hey, remember when” guy. He’s the guy that tells the stories during our Christmas dinner, and gets milk to shoot out of people’s noses. He’s pretty funny.

“Hey, John, remember when mom took that corner and the car door flew open and you rolled out into the bark dust?” (Those were the days before seatbelts were required).

“Hey John, remember when we visited Uncle Jim and Aunt Lucile in North Dakota and we all got chicken pox? Wasn’t that so much fun?”

“Remember how our family went to that all you can eat buffet twice, and I got sick and threw up on you both times?”

“Remember when I got that Hot Wheels car stuck in my nose and we had to go to the doctor?” (And just in case you are wondering, the answer is no. I did not put it there).

It’s good to hear those stories, some of them get told over and over again. I never get tired of them. Some have observed that when my brother and I are together, all it takes is a glance across the table to get us going. All it takes is one of those looks, eyes meet, and you can almost see the shared memories darting back and forth through the air. There is history between us. There is a common story. We know one another. There is familiarity. There is a relationship. We remember.

I think this is a remarkable beginning to Jeremiah’s ministry. One might expect him at the outset to launch into a “Thus says the Lord,” followed by something like “You wicked, evil, people!” But that’s not what we find. Instead we find this: “Thus says the Lord: I remember.”

I remember.

This week I’ve become fascinated by this. God remembers. I know it’s so simple, but it’s jumped off the page and grabbed me. And here it is, the thing that is so important that it must be remembered before all else can be spoken: I remember the devotion of your youth, your love as a bride, how you followed me in the wilderness.

When I read this I get the sense that God is reminiscing. What is often the first thing that newlyweds are asked? “How was the honeymoon?” Here’s God, remembering the honeymoon with great fondness, remembering the youthful love of his people, their covenant faithfulness, and their willingness to follow after him even in the most barren places. It was in the wilderness that the covenant was forged between them. “I will be your God, and you will be my people!”

Here using the metaphor of marriage, we find that the relationship is to be one of fidelity, loyalty and dependence. There is a bonding and an exclusivity to it. In the wilderness, if you recall, Israel was completely dependent on God. There was manna from heaven, quail that miraculously appeared, and water that sprung up from rocks. God was the source of life for Israel. But the honeymoon was now over.

Something had gone terribly wrong. Israel had strayed from their covenant relationship. They had ceased telling the story of Yahweh’s history with them—the story that reminded them of who they were. In fact, it appeared as if they had lost their spiritual memory entirely. They had rejected God, exchanging their glory, to turn to other worthless gods. And they had chosen useless alternatives for their source of life. They were living as though they could live separate from God.

And then comes the “Therefore” in the text. This is a courtroom scene unfolding. It is a divorce hearing. God is the plaintive and judge. The heavens stand as jury, and Israel is being tried for unfaithfulness. Therefore, once more I accuse you. Here’s the charge: My people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and dug cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns that can hold no water.

Why? That’s the question I wonder about.

• Why did they reject God?
• Was he too difficult to follow?
• Were there too many rules and regulations?
• Was he too demanding? Too absent?
• Why did they stop telling the story of how God freed them from slavery in Egypt, and cared for them in the desert?
• And how was it that they were unable to recognize the fallen state of the relationship?

And what about us? Where do we stand in this text? I think it’s true that our lives are shaped by many different things. I think it’s true that we turn to other gods. I think it’s true that we carve out cisterns for ourselves, and even though they are cracked and require much work to fill, we hold on to them tightly. In the church we have a name for it. It’s called sin, and we all suffer from it. It’s what happens when somehow we begin to live our lives as if we didn’t need God.

When I was twenty-two years old, I took a trip with a couple of friends to Morocco, in Northern Africa. We had one primary goal in Morocco: to ride camels in the Sahara Desert for three glorious days and nights, and live to tell the tale.

We had already been on the road for some time. We were confident. Independent. Our lives were in our own hands. After a nauseating ride through the Atlas mountains, we reached the desert, secured a guide, and off we went.

Picture it: sitting on top of a camel, pointed out into the direction of rocks, sand, and simple barrenness. It was at least a hundred degrees out. Our guide had loaded up all the supplies we would need, including a three-day supply of water. Our confidence was still high.

First day: sand storm in the morning, lightning storm in the afternoon. No problem.

Second day: scorpions in camp. No problem.

Third day: We stopped for a rest and discovered that the remainder of our water bottles had all cracked against the side of the camel. No water in the middle of nowhere in the Sahara Desert: big problem.

We were a full day’s ride from any water that would not make us violently ill. The sun pounded down on us. No saliva. Dry throats. It was the first time in my life that I wondered what it would be like to die of dehydration. It was the first time on the trip that I was not confident that my life was in my own hands. I remember laying on the cool desert sand that night, looking up at the stars, praying this simple prayer, “God, I’m thirsty.”

We made it back to town, absolutely parched. We were offered many things to drink: different kinds of pop and juice. But there was only one thing we wanted: water. And when we had it, it was life to us.

I think about that story, and about the one we are looking at this morning. My imagination was shaken and converted there in the desert. It was a literal thirst that caused me to cry out to God and acknowledge, to remember, my total dependence on God for survival.

Friends, let me offer a suggestion. I wonder if part of the problem is that we are bored. We sit down to read Scripture and we’re bored. When was the last time you opened your Bible and just stared at the page? What about prayer? When was the last time you sat down to pray and nothing happened? Only silence. We become bored with a God that at times comes across as being rather disinterested. And so, we’re easily distracted by everything else that the world throws at us. We begin to live as if we don’t need God. How easy and tempting it is to settle for believing that this is all there is. That this is normal. What happens when our hearts have grown dull and weary and we’re left standing there crying out, “There must be more than this!”

I recently heard a story about Mother Theresa who, as you know, worked in Calcutta with the poorest of the poor, the sickest of the sick. Daily, she held the hand of the weak, the broken, and the dying. As the story is told, a group of reporters had gathered to watch as she slowly circled a statue of Jesus. At each pass, she would look up into the eyes of Jesus, tears in her eyes. And as she walked, she very softly prayed two words, barely audible.

One reporter dared to venture a little closer to hear what she was saying. “I thirst” (whispered). Then closer. “I thirst…I thirst…I thirst.” You see, I believe that Mother Theresa never lost touch with her need of God, with her absolute and utter dependence on this loving God as her source of life.

I see here in Jeremiah a God who is a wounded lover. What wrong did your ancestors find in me that they went far from me, and went after worthless things? This is a God who longs for his people. A God who will do whatever it takes to restore this broken relationship. When our lives are shaken, when we wander through the wilderness, alone and thirsty, we long to have our imaginations converted so that we might turn and see rightly. And in this we are invited to remember.

Remember that you were slaves in Egypt.

Remember that I led you out of your captivity.

Remember that I sustained you in barren lands.

One of the great things about God’s story, which is also our story, is that we know how it ends. I can’t say that I know exactly what it will look like. But I know that there is a day coming when Christ will return.

And it is my hope and prayer for each of you, that on that day you will have an opportunity to stand face to face with this man, Christ Jesus. That it would be your first meeting and your ten thousandth meeting. That there would be familiarity in those eyes. That there would be a history there. A common story. That there would be shared memories. Will you see love in his eyes? Will you hear him say, “I remember you. I know you.”

My hope, Friends, is that we will all gaze into his eyes and hear him speak to us.

Do you remember the joyful times?

Yes. I was with you.

Do you remember those dry seasons?

Yes, I remember. “You were thirsty and you came to me for drink. Even in the most barren seasons, you came to me. Even in seasons of sorrow and struggle. You showed up.

And yes, I was with you.

And in the end, will he stretch out his hands to embrace us? The same hands that were nailed down to a rough plank of wood? And will he say to us,

Remember that I love you this much. Do you remember?

Yes, I remember. I remember. I remember.

Amen.