Jeremiah 20:7-9
Jeremiah was a bold prophet with a tough message. Assigned by God to deliver harsh messages of God’s impending judgment and wrath, there is no record that Jeremiah ever had a single convert in his entire ministry. It must have been difficult to continue preaching to a people who seemed deaf to your message and unresponsive to your invitations of repentance.
Pashur, the son of Immer the priest, was the chief governor over the temple in the days of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 20:1). He heard Jeremiah stand in the temple courtyard and deliver a message typical of Old Testament prophets, “Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will bring upon this city and upon all her towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have hardened their necks, that they might not hear my words” (Jeremiah 19:15). Upon hearing this harsh message of God’s impending judgment, Pashur smote Jeremiah and threw him in the stockade next to the temple.
At some point in his incarceration, Jeremiah began to feel a bit sorry for himself. He had had nothing but “derision daily, every one mocks me” (20:7). His feeling of loneliness and isolation was personified by the prison bars and the stocks. He then made a decision that he was done with ministry, “I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay” (Jeremiahs 20:9).
Jeremiah may have decided that he was done with ministry, but ministry was not done with him! When persecutions become frequent and heavy, and our spiritual arms droop, we often wish that we could be somewhere else. The cares of this life cause us to want to lay down our sword from time to time, but the sheer force of the gospel power, which is the power of God unto salvation, picks us up again.
When you have consumed God’s grace and favor, and the loveliness of Jesus becomes your daily meat and drink, you are completely incapable of turning around and heading in the opposite direction. There is nothing about the finished work of Christ that causes the believer to want to run out and sin; in fact, grace creates the opposite desire. You simply cannot help yourself from loving Him and ministering of His goodness and grace. It is a fire shut up in your bones!
When closing his first letter to the church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul commented on the first fruits of Achaia (meaning the first converts from Asia), that they had “addicted themselves to the ministry of the saints” (1 Corinthians 16:15). These saints had poured themselves in the service of ministry. They were not preaching and teaching the Word, but they were supporting those that did with both their efforts and their finances (Galatians 6:6). They had grown so accustomed to consuming the bread of heaven that comes from doing the right thing at the right time that they were considered addicted to such ministry. Oh that we would be as addicted to so great a cause as the presentation of the good news of Jesus Christ and the Father’s love.
Your Father is a fire, and that fire burns bright for you and in you. If it is shut up in your bones, let it out. It is a dark world without the light of the cross.
Jeremiah was a bold prophet with a tough message. Assigned by God to deliver harsh messages of God’s impending judgment and wrath, there is no record that Jeremiah ever had a single convert in his entire ministry. It must have been difficult to continue preaching to a people who seemed deaf to your message and unresponsive to your invitations of repentance.
Pashur, the son of Immer the priest, was the chief governor over the temple in the days of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 20:1). He heard Jeremiah stand in the temple courtyard and deliver a message typical of Old Testament prophets, “Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will bring upon this city and upon all her towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have hardened their necks, that they might not hear my words” (Jeremiah 19:15). Upon hearing this harsh message of God’s impending judgment, Pashur smote Jeremiah and threw him in the stockade next to the temple.
At some point in his incarceration, Jeremiah began to feel a bit sorry for himself. He had had nothing but “derision daily, every one mocks me” (20:7). His feeling of loneliness and isolation was personified by the prison bars and the stocks. He then made a decision that he was done with ministry, “I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay” (Jeremiahs 20:9).
Jeremiah may have decided that he was done with ministry, but ministry was not done with him! When persecutions become frequent and heavy, and our spiritual arms droop, we often wish that we could be somewhere else. The cares of this life cause us to want to lay down our sword from time to time, but the sheer force of the gospel power, which is the power of God unto salvation, picks us up again.
When you have consumed God’s grace and favor, and the loveliness of Jesus becomes your daily meat and drink, you are completely incapable of turning around and heading in the opposite direction. There is nothing about the finished work of Christ that causes the believer to want to run out and sin; in fact, grace creates the opposite desire. You simply cannot help yourself from loving Him and ministering of His goodness and grace. It is a fire shut up in your bones!
When closing his first letter to the church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul commented on the first fruits of Achaia (meaning the first converts from Asia), that they had “addicted themselves to the ministry of the saints” (1 Corinthians 16:15). These saints had poured themselves in the service of ministry. They were not preaching and teaching the Word, but they were supporting those that did with both their efforts and their finances (Galatians 6:6). They had grown so accustomed to consuming the bread of heaven that comes from doing the right thing at the right time that they were considered addicted to such ministry. Oh that we would be as addicted to so great a cause as the presentation of the good news of Jesus Christ and the Father’s love.
Your Father is a fire, and that fire burns bright for you and in you. If it is shut up in your bones, let it out. It is a dark world without the light of the cross.
