Now Shephatiah son of Mattan, Gedaliah son of Pashhur, Jucal son of Shelemiah, and Pashhur son of Malchiah heard the words that Jeremiah was saying to all the people, 2Thus says the Lord, Those who stay in this city shall die by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence; but those who go out to the Chaldeans shall live; they shall have their lives as a prize of war, and live. 3Thus says the Lord, This city shall surely be handed over to the army of the king of Babylon and be taken. 4Then the officials said to the king, ‘This man ought to be put to death, because he is discouraging the soldiers who are left in this city, and all the people, by speaking such words to them. For this man is not seeking the welfare of this people, but their harm.’
If you read the rest of the chapter you'll find that Jeremiah was quickly thrown into a well with nothing in it but mud and left to die. However the king has compassion for Jeremiah and pulls him out.
I'm not concentrating on how the story goes however. I'm thinking about what Jeremiah said. When thinking about it as history it's obvious that the reason was because the city was exeedingly wicked and the king did not listen to God. You'll see that if you read chapter 37 However if you look at it from the people's perspective at that time it's also easy to see why they would think that Jeremiah was crazy.
The question I have is could this be going on today? What I mean is, could a pastor or person preach about something unpopular or unacepted yet it is the truth about a subject? In my mind the answer is yes and I'm pretty sure it is in yours as well but I want to know what you guys think.
Questions or comments? I hope what I said wasn't confusing. =S
Today, we visited a pastor friend of ours whose wife had been battling cancer for several years and whose time was beginning to dwindle. I was somewhat reluctant to go; I'm not fond of "visiting," especially if they are people that I myself am not particularly close to. Strangely, however, this visit gave me a new perspective.
We drove up to their house when the old couple opened their door to greet us. Though weak, they seemed cheerful. My mom barely had time to sign their card. The wife seemed enthusiastic to have company; she set up chairs for us, cleaned up the house, and offered us drinks. For a little while, we talked with her husband, but she began to get restless and grabbed my hand to show me around. Surprised, I tried to be as polite and cheery as I could. She showed me a special room with a bed that she told me was the bed in which she "would die." I was a little disturbed by that, but politely I told her that it was a nice room. She agreed.
Then she took me outside to her most special place--her garden in which she grew various flowers and herbs. She plucked gardenias and jasmine leaves for me to smell, and told me how she loved to plant but had little strength to, now. We went around the garden about one and a half times, then we went back inside. Without asking first, she handed me a soda. Her husband joked that she was the type of person that was always doing something. He pointed to us a picture on the wall and made us guess how old she was in that picture. We all guessed somewhere between 20 and 30, when in fact, she was 46. We soon prayed for them and left.
Despite the fact that she was, literally dying, they both had an infectious look of joy on their faces. "We live by God's grace," the husband said.
I also developed a new perspective of older people. Often times we lose our respect for the elderly and picture them as simple, little old people slouching on their wheelchairs and staring helplessly at the wall. We never saw them when they were young, beautiful, energetic, adventurous, artistic, and just plain cool, if not during their time.
We are young people. We often feel like we're on top of the world. We're not. In fact, we haven't seen anything yet.
Life is fleeting. Make the most of it, and look up to those who have already seen it.
