April 26, 2011
SO, WHAT'S THE PLAN?
Jeremiah 16
Kacie Turner
Central Truth
Never doubt that God has a very specific plan for your life.
Key Verse | Jeremiah 16:1–2
The word of the LORD also came to me saying, "You shall not take a wife for yourself nor have sons or daughters in this place." (Jeremiah 16:1-2)
Jeremiah 16
Famine, Sword, and Death
1 The word of the LORD came to me: 2 “You shall not take a wife, nor shall you have sons or daughters in this place. 3 For thus says the LORD concerning the sons and daughters who are born in this place, and concerning the mothers who bore them and the fathers who fathered them in this land: 4 They shall die of deadly diseases. They shall not be lamented, nor shall they be buried. They shall be as dung on the surface of the ground. They shall perish by the sword and by famine, and their dead bodies shall be food for the birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth.
5 For thus says the LORD: Do not enter the house of mourning, or go to lament or grieve for them, for I have taken away my peace from this people, my steadfast love and mercy, declares the LORD. 6 Both great and small shall die in this land. They shall not be buried, and no one shall lament for them or cut himself or make himself bald for them. 7 No one shall break bread for the mourner, to comfort him for the dead, nor shall anyone give him the cup of consolation to drink for his father or his mother. 8 You shall not go into the house of feasting to sit with them, to eat and drink. 9 For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will silence in this place, before your eyes and in your days, the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.
10 And when you tell this people all these words, and they say to you, ‘Why has the LORD pronounced all this great evil against us? What is our iniquity? What is the sin that we have committed against the LORD our God?’ 11 then you shall say to them: ‘Because your fathers have forsaken me, declares the LORD, and have gone after other gods and have served and worshiped them, and have forsaken me and have not kept my law, 12 and because you have done worse than your fathers, for behold, every one of you follows his stubborn, evil will, refusing to listen to me. 13 Therefore I will hurl you out of this land into a land that neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you shall serve other gods day and night, for I will show you no favor.’
The LORD Will Restore Israel
14 Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when it shall no longer be said, ‘As the LORD lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt,’ 15 but ‘As the LORD lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the north country and out of all the countries where he had driven them.’ For I will bring them back to their own land that I gave to their fathers.
16 Behold, I am sending for many fishers, declares the LORD, and they shall catch them. And afterward I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill, and out of the clefts of the rocks. 17 For my eyes are on all their ways. They are not hidden from me, nor is their iniquity concealed from my eyes. 18 But first I will doubly repay their iniquity and their sin, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations.”
19
O LORD, my strength and my stronghold,
my refuge in the day of trouble,
to you shall the nations come
from the ends of the earth and say:
“Our fathers have inherited nothing but lies,
worthless things in which there is no profit.
20
Can man make for himself gods?
Such are not gods!”
21 “Therefore, behold, I will make them know, this once I will make them know my power and my might, and they shall know that my name is the LORD.”
Dive Deeper | Jeremiah 16
Do you ever question if God has a plan for your life? And if He does, why do circumstances have to be so difficult? I know I have. There have been many times I have wished I could just fast forward through the pain and heartache of life and only hit "play" on the good days. And yet, I have to trust that God has a plan, even when things do not turn out like I think they should, and that His plan is bigger than I am.
I wonder if Jeremiah felt this way. In Jeremiah 16 God outlined specific instructions for Jeremiah that had major social consequences. He was to never marry or have children (verse 1-2); could not participate in the traditional mourning rituals (verse 5); and was not allowed to attend or take part in the joyful celebrations of the Israelites (verse 8). Talk about hardship!
Derek Kidner in The Message of Jeremiah says it well: "It is one thing to grow eloquent over a dire prospect for a wicked nation; quite another thing to taste the medicine itself. To ask this of Jeremiah, denying him the cherished gift of wife and children (an almost unthinkable vocation at the time), and then to isolate him from sharing the occasions of sorrow and joy around him (5, 8), was the measure of God's intense concern to get the message across."
In spite of Jeremiah's hardships, God had a plan. God used Jeremiah's example to represent His withdrawal from the people of Israel in a very real and tangible way. He demonstrated that not only is He a Holy God, but also one of deliverance and restoration (verses 14-15). He used Jeremiah to be an expression of Himself. Jeremiah's life may have looked different than he would have planned if given the chance, but God used Jeremiah's example for His glory and purposes. Just like He wants to do with us.
Discussion Questions
1. Do you believe that God has a plan for your life?
2. Has God ever asked you to do something that the world would scorn?
3. What hardships are you currently experiencing?
4. What does God have to say about your current circumstances?
WEEKLY FAMILY ACTIVITY
JEREMIAH 15-19 (APR 25-29)
Read Jeremiah 15:15-21.
How is Jeremiah feeling in verses 15-18? Who is he telling about how he feels? Who do you go to when you are struggling with fear, worry, or anger?
What is the Lord's response to Jeremiah in verses 19-21? Who is going to fight for Jeremiah and protect him? What does Jeremiah need to do (see verse 19)?
Verse 16 tells us that God's Word is good enough to eat! What do you think this means? What does food do for you? How is this similar to what God's Word does for us? When you are struggling, do you go to God's Word for comfort, peace, and joy?
Activity: Buy a cake mix and frosting (that you can write with) at the store. Bake the cake as a family. While the cake is baking and cooling, memorize Jeremiah 15:16. When the cake is cool, write "WORD" across the cake. As you eat it this week, be reminded that "eating" God's Word is great nourishment!