1/31/21 Jeremiah 1:4-10 “Who Are You!?”

29 Jan 1/31/21 Jeremiah 1:4-10 “Who Are You!?”

1/31/21      Jeremiah 1:4-10   “Who Are You!?”

I think one of the greatest gifts that God has given us is a brain.  I know that there are many people out there who may think that God might have passed me by with this one and that is ok.  I have done enough dumb things in my life to warrant this.  But also I know that I am not alone in doing dumb things.  I think everyone here today is guilty of this.  We all remember these things.  But we remember many other things also.  Sometimes I catch myself looking back on my life and remembering some of the opportunities that God has presented to me.  You all know these types of memories.  If I had played my cards right, I might have been the President of the United States.  Or I might have been a doctor or lawyer or even a TV star.  I am, of course, just being a little silly here.  But I do wonder sometimes where I would be if I had heeded one of the early callings that Jesus had for me.  Today, we are going to take a look at the early calling that God had for the prophet, Jeremiah.  I would like to see if we can see ourselves in this story and it shouldn’t matter if you are young or old.

Often times, especially when we are young but it happens later in life also, we really don’t know what we are capable of doing.  John Williams III views this like a coach looks at the water boy on the bench.  Most people and other players see him as just the water boy.  But the coach sees the potential of a future player.  For example, there was a doctor who was scorned and made fun of for a theory that he had.  He was the water boy among doctors.  He thought that the sanitary conditions during surgery should be improved by doctors washing their hands before surgery.  At this time many, many years ago there were so many people who never survived surgery or died shortly after due to infection.  This one brave doctor, who died before he saw these conditions improve, was laughed at, ridiculed and he died in a mental institution.  He was right but no one noticed until later.

This passage begins with the Lord saying to Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you.”  I would like to dwell on the repercussions of just this one statement for a moment.  We were created by God.  On the 6^th day of creation, God created us.  I think that every once in a while, we have to go back to our roots in Genesis and realize just what happened.  God created our world in 6 days.  He tells us this in Genesis so we should believe it.  The ancient word used in Genesis for day is one that means a 24-hour day.

We were not made by some magic gelatinous glob that evolved over billions and billions of years.  I think that one of the easiest ways for me to make this point is to tell a story I have told before about the super smart scientist who thought he was better than God.  He challenged God to a contest.  Whoever could make a human first would win.  God agreed to this and the scientist went to gather up some dirt.  God stopped him and said, “Get your own dirt!”

Science is no closer now than they were 50 years ago to finding out just where we originated.  As a matter of fact, they were far closer 200 years ago than today.  If you ask the top minds in the world today as to where did we come from, they cannot give you a reasonable answer.  But 200 years ago, they would have told us that we were made by God.  Somewhere along the line everything got distorted to the point where today we have many scientists who believe that they are smarter than God.  And I say to them, “Get your own dirt!”

There is no way that I can tell you what you have to believe.  But I will tell you that I know that we were made by God on the 6^th day of creation.  There are lots of books and movies out there that will support my knowledge.  I hope that you check some of them out if you are skeptical because I think that it is very important that we believe in the things that happened in Genesis because they are the basis of everything that follows.  Also, if you don’t believe these parts of Genesis, then what else don’t you believe?

So now that we all believe that God made us, it is not hard to believe that God knew us before we were born.  When God was making Adam and Eve on the 6^th day, you were also on his mind.  You were not only on His mind on the 6^th day, but also the 5^th, 4^th, 3^rd and so on.  You have always been on His mind (Sing ‘You are always on His mind). This may seem a little hard to understand, but you have always been on God’s mind and He made the world for you.  It is very hard for us to get our minds around this concept so that we can understand it.  But please remember, you don’t have to understand it, you only have to believe it.

In our reading, God not only tells Jeremiah that he knew him in the womb, but God also set Jeremiah apart and appointed him to be a prophet.  This almost sounds like a good argument for predestination but I won’t go there today.  I think that it is enough to say that God had his life planned out for him.

The same thing happens in today’s world.  We have our lives mapped out for us by God.  What I mean by this is that I think that God has a plan for each and every one of us.  Some of us are going to be farmers, some of us will haul gravel, some of us will be teachers or some of us will be pastors.  I think that God knows all the possibilities for our lives.  He knows the possibilities if we say yes and if we say no.  He has laid out certain plans for us, but it is up to us to get there.  The first step on this road is accepting Jesus Christ as your Savior.  All your success in your life with God hinges on this first step.  If you are not willing to take this first step, then you will be rejecting the wonderful plan that God has for your life.  I wish that I would have taken this first step when I was 10 or 20 instead of 40.  I spent my first 40 years wandering in the wilderness, lost.  That, my friends, was my decision and a very poor one.

I would also like to clarify something today.  You know that I will always tell you that if you want happiness and fulfillment, you need Jesus.  This does not mean that there will not be hard times ahead in your life.  This doesn’t mean that there will be no deaths, or loss of jobs, or times of sadness.  I don’t mean this at all because we will have these things.  This is part of our lives.  What I mean is that unless you have Jesus in your life you will have no chance for happiness and you will have nowhere to go when these bad things happen.  You will have no one to tell your inner most good things, bad things and secrets.  But with Jesus He will always be there to help you no matter what happens or when it happens.  This is what He does so remember to reach out to Him when you come upon hard times.

So, God has known you since the beginning of time.  How do you respond to this?  I think that it is interesting that the first thing that Jeremiah did was say that he didn’t know how to speak.  This is the same excuse that Moses used.  Not only that but he says that he is a mere child.  He is trying to say that he doesn’t want to do this.  Prophets weren’t always the most popular people back then.  I think that he might have been a little scared.  After all, he is talking to God and God knows all and is all powerful.

I think that one of the things that scare us most about God is what He wants us to do.  For the most part we live a pretty comfortable life.  We have food, shelter and some of the nice things.  In the back of our minds, we sometimes think that we might lose all of this if we follow God.  After all, we could end up being a missionary in a remote part of the world.  We could end up serving God in a ghetto in one of our cities.  Or we could even end up being a pastor.  These are all great places to end up.  What we sometimes fail to realize is that God needs Christian’s right where you are.  He needs someone to go into your community and spread His Word.  All of us are not cut out for the danger of missionary work.  But we do need to listen so that we can hear what He is telling us.

I think that listening to God is a real hard thing for many people to do.  You all know the first thing I will tell you.  You need to have a prayer life first.  Set aside time for prayer every day.  You always need to tell God what is on your mind or what you would like Him to do.  But you don’t want to stop there.  You need to try to shut down your mind and listen.  It is hard to do.  I always tried to help our confirmation class do this and I think that we are had some positive results.  But they told me that it is hard to listen.  It is hard to turn off our minds and listen.

But when you listen and follow God, great things will happen.  Look what Moses did.  He led a nation to freedom.  It wasn’t easy but it was what God wanted him to do.  Jeremiah had the job of telling Judah and Israel that they had to change their ways or they would cease to be a nation.  This was most certainly not an easy job and Jeremiah suffered many hardships.  Now look what you can do.  It is not that hard to go down the road and help a neighbor.  It is not that hard to teach in Sunday school.  It is not that hard to show someone that you believe in Jesus.  These are the types of things that most Christians are called to do.  So, don’t be afraid to listen and follow what Jesus is telling you.

Because when you start to follow Jesus, then Jesus will be there to help you all the way.  Look what He does for Jeremiah.  He assures him that He will be there and He will rescue him from his enemies.  Jeremiah knew that real prophets were not very well liked.  As a matter of fact, they were hated by the authorities and were sometimes put to death.  He had every reason not to want to do this.  He lacked the self-esteem to do the job.  But God reassures him that it will be ok.  He is filling him with God’s self-esteem.

Self-esteem is often measured by what others think of us.  Jeremiah knew that he would not be liked by his own people.  We have this same problem.  Unfortunately, for the most part, our self-esteem has nothing to do with God.  We just plain want to look good.  And we get really hurt when we are not the best or the fastest or the smartest or whatever it is that we think will draw other people’s attentions to us.  I look at some of the TV programs and I can only shake my head.  They are all about me.  How can I look good?  How can I be rich?  How can I be popular?

This is another area where we cannot afford to look at ourselves as the world does or we will never be satisfied.  According to our world, I can never have enough money.  I can never be popular enough.  I can never look good enough.  We will always end up disappointed if this is how we look at things.  We will always be thirsty if we drink of the water that does not satisfy.  We need God’s self-esteem.

Now even though Jeremiah is trying his best to get out of this situation, look what God does for him.  First God gives him verbal reassurance.  Then God reaches out his hand and touches the lips of Jeremiah and tells him that he has now put His words in the mouth of Jeremiah.  He tells him that He will be over nations to be built up and those destroyed.  One of the important parts of this passage is that God actually touched Jeremiah.  I would guess that this was the point of no return for Jeremiah.

Many of us have had these points in our lives.  I don’t know if I have ever been touched by God but I know that He has spoken to me.  I always feel invigorated and on fire when I am able hear what Jesus tells me.  But I want you to know that I have trouble being quiet and listening to the voice of God just like anyone else.  But keep trying because the feelings are great when He does talk to you.

Do things still hurt me?  Am I still bothered by the things of life that bother everyone else?  Of course, I still get hurt and I am bothered.  This is part of the broken human condition where we all live.  The difference is that I now have someplace to go when these things happen.  I can go to Jesus for help.  He has a plan for me and for you.  And He will help you and me get to the place where He wants us to be if we ask Him.

I guess that it all boils down to this.  Who are you?  Who are you?  God has known you forever.  God has a plan for you.  And God will help you to overcome yourself to achieve this plan.  So, who are you?  This reminds me of a story told by Rodney Buchanan about an American tourist who was in Paris when he saw a necklace that he liked in a trinket shop.  It didn’t cost much so he bought it.  When he got to New York, he was surprised at the high duty he had to pay when he went through customs.  So, when he got home, he decided to have the necklace appraised at a jewelry store and the owner offered him $25,000 right on the spot.  He turned him down and took it to an expert who gave him an astronomically high appraisal.  Then he asked the appraiser why this trinket was worth so much.  The appraiser gave him a magnifying glass and told him to look at the fine print.  He saw an inscription that read: “From Napoleon Bonaparte to Josephine.”  It was the name that made it so valuable.

Your owner has inscribed you.  God made you and your value is found in His inscription.  Let Him use you and you will find a great world that you never knew existed.  No one else but Jesus can live in your heart and no one else can do your job in this world.  Let us praise our Lord Jesus Christ for first loving us.  Let’s pray.