Sermon July 4, 1999 A Lasting Peace based on Jeremiah 28:5-9
Grace to you and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Theodore Roosevelt once said: "Americanism means the virtues of courage, honor, justice, truth, sincerity, and hardihood--the virtues that made America. The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living and the get-rich-quick theory of life."
As we think about this quote on our nation's birthday, we must wonder if "peace-at-any-price" will be lasting peace? Is it true peace? Our thoughts might turn to the conflict in Kosovo and wonder if peace will last there? What makes peace last is justice being accomplished.
What about our relationship to God? Are we at peace? Some would desire to proclaim peace with God without the required justice. Some, like the false prophet Hananiah, mentioned in our text, would claim peace was coming early and easily. This false prophet, Jeremiah had to refute. He had to let the people know that, what Hananiah was saying was wrong. God's peace comes after the violence and destruction of the Law. The healing of the Gospel comes to us after Christ suffered and died, bringing justice for our sins.
Last week we learned that Jeremiah was born in 640 BC. He was called as a prophet about 626 BC at the age of 14. We heard how he faced much persecution because of the message from God he had to deliver. Jeremiah found himself frequently tempted to give up his work for the Lord. Persecution tempted him to resign his call, but he did not. He kept on faithfully delivering the message God gave him to deliver.
Jeremiah faced challenges which many prophets faced. These challenges are 1) listeners who refuse to hear and 2) competing false prophets who preach a message not from God. These challenges remind each of us of our duties when listening to God's Word. First, we must open our hears to hear the Word of the Lord. In doing so, we humbly confess our sins and receive forgiveness. Second, we must avoid those who might lead us astray, that is false prophets. Last week our text had Jeremiah dealing with persecution from the people who refused to hear God's Word. This week, our text has Jeremiah dealing with a false prophet who is leading the people of Judah astray from God's Word.
It is helpful to understand the political situation in which the kingdom of Judah found itself. There were three superpowers at the time: Egypt, Assyria and Babylon. The Empire of Babylon grew in power and they defeated Assyria and Egypt. Among all this, the kingdom of Judah, the Southern Kingdom, was simply a pawn. Babylon would come after Judah and its capitol city of Jerusalem.
First they attacked in 605 BC. Jeremiah spoke the Word from God which said that Babylon would conquer Jerusalem and the people would be exiled for 70 years. He spoke of the Babylonians attacking and crushing the people of Judah for a long time. Others had said it would be over shortly. It was not, however. Babylon came back in 597, after the puppet king they put in place in Judah had rebelled. This time they took people and some precious articles from the Temple. The Babylonians installed another puppet king, Zedekiah. The people of Judah again expected peace and prosperity to return shortly.
God gave Jeremiah the opposite message to deliver, however. Despite what the false prophets had told them, the people would be punished longer for their sins of worshipping other gods. God told Jeremiah to deliver the message by acting it out. So, Jeremiah had to go around wearing a wooden yoke, used to team a pair of animals for pulling a load. This yoke was a message to the people that they must submit to Babylon.
Jeremiah also spoke a message warning against these false prophets. In Chapter 27, he said: (NKJ Jeremiah 27:16,21-22) "Also I spoke to the priests and to all this people, saying, "Thus says the LORD: 'Do not listen to the words of your prophets who prophesy to you, saying, "Behold, the vessels of the LORD's house will now shortly be brought back from Babylon"; for they prophesy a lie to you... -- "yes, thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, concerning the vessels that remain in the house of the LORD, and in the house of the king of Judah and of Jerusalem: 'They shall be carried to Babylon, and there they shall be until the day that I visit them,' says the LORD. 'Then I will bring them up and restore them to this place.' "
These false prophets continued to claim to speak from God. One of them, Hananiah, gave this message of peace: (NKJ Jeremiah 28:2-4) "Thus speaks the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, saying: 'I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. 'Within two full years I will bring back to this place all the vessels of the LORD's house, that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon took away from this place and carried to Babylon. 'And I will bring back to this place Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, with all the captives of Judah who went to Babylon,' says the LORD, 'for I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.' "
The message of false prophets is ordinarily peace. Jeremiah warned of this earlier in Chapter 6. (NKJ Jeremiah 6:13-14) "Because from the least of them even to the greatest of them, Everyone is given to covetousness; And from the prophet even to the priest, Everyone deals falsely. They have also healed the hurt of My people slightly, Saying, 'Peace, peace!' When there is no peace." The false prophets will proclaim peace when there is no peace because that is a message which will be believed by many. It is a favorable message. We would wish for the best. We would desire that the Lord would go easy on us. Peace is the message the people want to hear.
In fact, you could say our ears itch to hear the message of peace. Second Timothy mentions how the motivation to hear certain things can lead us to listen to false prophets. (NKJ 2 Timothy 4:3-4) "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables."
In our text, Jeremiah responds to this false prophecy from Hananiah. He says "Amen!" In other words, he would like it to be true. He would like the mistreatment of Judah to end soon. Yet, that is not what God is saying will happen. Jeremiah holds up the history of all the other prophets who did not predict a false, early peace. Then he speaks of the ultimate test for a prophecy: if the Lord fulfills the prophecy, then it is proved to be a true prophecy, otherwise, it is false.
Hananiah continues by taking off and breaking the yoke Jeremiah had been carrying around on his neck. Hanaiah was again saying that the people would be released from exile quickly. That was a message of premature peace. Jeremiah had to respond to this false prophet by coming back wearing a yoke of iron.
Jeremiah showed perseverance in proclaiming a message that was not popular. It was God's Word, and he was determined to speak it. God's Word is not popular when it is a word of law and punishment. The unpopular part is necessary. It must come first. Without the Law, the message of peace cannot come. Jesus too, brought a message which was unpopular. He shows Himself to be a prophet bringing a message that the world would reject, because it was not a message of peace. He says in NKJ John 7:7 "The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil."
Jeremiah was a prophet of doom, but that was necessary. God's message to unbelievers is not a message, at first, of peace. It is not a message of forgiveness and tranquility. Rather than throw that pearl of a message to swine, the Lord has a message of judgment and wrath. The unbeliever must first hear of the Law which shows him his sin. Through this, he then will see the need to be rescued from the terrible situation in which he finds himself. Then, the unbeliever is ready to hear of the gospel, the good news of how Christ has taken care of all his sins.
To listen to a prophet who gives a message of peace in the face of unrepented and unconfessed sins is to listen to a false prophet. Instead the Law must bring us to our knees so that we realize we are wholy dependent upon God to rescue us.
Jeremiah had to deal with the sins of a nation as a whole. On this Independence Day there is a temptation to try to look at our nation as a whole before God. We are different in the United States, however, from the Old Testament Judah. Certainly God did raise the Israelites up in the Old Testament to be His nation. That was a nation which was ideally ruled by God, though they often rebelled from their leader.
It cannot be denied that our nation has had a strong history of Christianity among its citizens. Our faith is reflected somewhat in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. It is important to see, however, that the United States is not the new nation of God. There is no longer a nation of God since Christ came. Instead, God deals with us as individual believers and as the assembly of all believers, the Holy Christian Church.
Don't misunderstand me as unpatriotic. I love our nation and many of the ideas our founding fathers held up. Yet, when it comes to Christianity, it primarily has a message for individuals, not for our nation. We are called as individuals to confess and repent of our sins. We are called as individuals to believe in Jesus and be saved. We are not saved because we are citizens of a particular nation. You can't count on your citizenship to redeem you.
The situation was different in Jeremiah's time. At that time God was responding to the sins of His nation which He raised up. God brought the descendants of Jacob out of slavery in Egypt and into the land He promised them. God was going to punish the nation for its sins by sending the Babylonians to destroy them and haul them off to exile. He would, in essence, undo everything He had done for His people since He brought them out of Egypt. He would send them away from the promised land and into a godless place. God used His nation as an example of how He treated the sins of His people. The sins must be punished.
This word of judgment of sins from God would not be His last word, however. Rather, God promised restoration and renewal. He would create a new covenant with the New Israel, the Holy Christian Chuch. The old covenants would be honored through Christ. Christ was the final word - a Gospel word, a word of forgiveness, restoration and renewal, a word of peace; lasting peace and true peace.
The only way to this true peace is God's way. That way is through the violence and destruction of the cross. There is no peace without the violence of the crucifixion. Through the cross we are freed from the slavery of our sins. This year's International Lutheran Women's Missionary League Convention is about to come to a close in Minneapolis. The theme is "Let Freedom Ring." We certainly celebrate this Independence Day the freedoms we have in our country, yet, for us who are Christians, the greatest freedom we have is the freedom from punishment for our sins. Since this is the greatest freedom, we want to let that freedom ring. We want to let others know of the great gift we have through Christ. We want to allow our Lord to continuously remind us of the freedom we have.
Jesus' words on this are recorded for us in John 8: (NKJ John 8:31-36) "If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered Him, 'We are Abraham's descendants, and have never been in bondage to anyone. How can you say, 'You will be made free'?' Jesus answered them, 'Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever. Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.'"
The false prophet Hanaiah proclaimed a quick peace that was not true. He told the people of Judah that they could have peace with God without the Law. Jeremiah shows us God's way instead, where the Law brings us to see our sins and the punishment we deserve because of them. Then we are ready to hear of a true and lasting peace. This peace comes through the cross and the one who sacrificed His life there for us, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.