“WAYS AND ….DOINGS”

A sermon based upon Jeremiah 4: 11-28

By Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin

Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership

11th Sunday in Ordinary Time,  June 17th, 2018 

(3-12) Sermon Series: Jeremiah: Prophet to the Nations

How many of you remember the movie Duck and Cover? It really wasn't a movie but more of a "short" advertisement — just over nine minutes in length. But don't sell it short — it featured a great leading role, Bert the Turtle, and a very catchy theme song:

There was a turtle by the name of Bert and Bert the turtle was very alert;

when danger threatened him he never got hurt he knew just what to do ...

He ducked! And covered! Ducked! And covered!

He did what we all must learn to do.  You and you and you and you! Duck, and cover!

(Archer Productions, Inc., Duck and Cover (Distributed by the United States Federal Civil Defense Administration, 1951).

After what looks like a dramatized cartoon, Bert the Turtle follows the "duck and cover" rule when a monkey dangles a fire­cracker over his head and survives the blast.  But then the movie takes a more serious tone as live footage of a nuclear blast is run, and viewers are assured that the way to survive such a blast is to "duck and cover."  ‘Duck and Cover' was produced by the United States Civil Defense Administration in 1951, about two years after Russia detonated its first nuclear device.  As the Cold War between the United States and Russia grew, Civil Defense began designating fallout shelters and devising other means for protection from nuclear attack (From Sermons on the First Readings, by Chrysanne Timm, CSS Publishing Company, Inc). 

Other films addressed the threat of nuclear attack. ‘On the Beach' in 1959 and ‘The Day After' in 1984 imprinted terrifying images of the complete destruction and desolation that would occur after a nuclear holocaust.  Some of us who came of age in the 1970s and 1980s seriously questioned whether we would live to see forty years of age.  Many feared the total annihilation of the whole world, the undoing of God's good creation.  It wasn't until later in the 1980s that concentrated efforts toward peace between the United States and Russia eased the fears of nuclear destruction of our nations, and ultimately our planet.  But with the threat of Nuclear war with North Korea now on everyone’s radar today, fear of nuclear holocaust is on the rise again, but who realizes the threat, and who understands the warning? 

WOE TO US, FOR WE ARE RUINED! (13)

When we read this passage in Jeremiah, we cannot but help remember the terrifying images of films we’ve seen about Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  Japan is the only nation to have been attacked with nuclear bombs. As a result of that bombing, burning hot winds ignited fire upon anything that remained standing after the massive blast. Entire neighborhoods were laid waste, all structures destroyed. The cities lay in ruins and the fruitful foothills looked like a desert. 

Although Nuclear bombs were not dropped on Nazi Germany, fire bombs were.  In both Hamburg (1943), and Dresden (1945) fire bombings were carried out by both the Americans and the British Air forces.  The results were horrendous.  I’ve known people who experienced one of those bombings they spoke of fires being so hot, that even people underneath the ground were burned or suffocated in the bombing raids.  The question was ‘Why is this happening to us?’   The same kind of question was being asked after Americans watched the destruction in New York and the falling of the Twin Towers.  “What do those people have against us?”   Who will forget the horror of those who were trapped in those buildings, or those who rushed in to save them when the towers collapsed?   Still today, illnesses and sickness remain, as a result, of the dust of devastation and destruction.  

When you speak all the destructive forces in this world, some of which we’ve lived through, you can’t help but be moved by these images from Jeremiah 4.  They are some of the bleakest images in the Old Testament. This is certainly not the kind of text pastors want to preach. The nation of Israel had been duly warned that continual sin against God would bring judgment upon them. God pleaded with them to repent and return to him, but it was to no avail. 

Had I not watched the Twin Towers fall on live TV, I am not sure that I would reflect upon this text in the same way.  Most of us have never had great fears regarding safety and security for our households or our community.   Only recently, due to the rise of Terror and random copy-cat violence, are churches beginning to face and come to understand the threats to our world.   A local pastor said in a Security meeting I attended recently, that twenty years ago selling the need for having a security plan at church would have been next to impossible, but not today.   Today most everyone is waking up to the threats.   We are beginning to grasp the gravity of destruction and desolation that can happen in our own time and place.

FOR MY PEOPLE ARE FOOLISH…STUPID (22)

Jeremiah may have believed that even though Israel did not ‘get it’ and change her ways, that the southern kingdom where he lived in Judah, where Jerusalem was, and where all the smart people were supposed to be, would now understand the gravity of their situation and repent.  Surely after watching the ‘towers’ fall in the north, Judah’s choice would be clear and Judah would ‘get the message’ to choose God and choose life.  But Judah and Jerusalem did not choose God or the good, and in this text Jeremiah laments their ignorance: "For my people are foolish, they do not know me; they are stupid children, they have no understanding. They are skilled in doing evil, but do not know how to do good" (Jer. 4:22 NRS).

"Stupid is as stupid does." So says the famous quote from the movie, Forrest Gump.   When we think of the stupidity of people in Jeremiah’s day, it can remind how nowadays, even in a time of high tech, people can be as ‘stupid’ as ever.  Just type the words "stupid people dot com" into your internet search engine and you find loads of websites where people share their tales of stupidity. One man wrote: "My ex-wife once called me at a bar and asked, 'Where are you?' Another story is told about a high school teacher who assigned her class a paper on World War Two. On the date it was due, one boy came in empty handed. "I went to every library I could find, but I found NOTHING on World War Two. I found a lot of books on World War 11, though."

The most laughable, and often the most tragic stories too, are about the criminally dumb. Nearly any law officer could write a book on these. The following one came through the grapevine from a patrolman in Ohio in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.  He was assigned to security detail at a New Orleans Wal-Mart that had been looted.  Several days after the flooding ceased, a man brought a plasma television back to the store's customer service department. He'd "picked it up a few days earlier" (those were his words). But when he took it home and plugged it in the television didn't work, so he was bringing it back for replacement. It was obvious to all that the television had been stolen. The officer had a tough time keeping a straight face as the store rep explained that this problem was to be expected since that part of the city still had no electricity.  Wonder how much time that man did for a TV he stole but couldn’t get to work because there was no power?

An Ann Arbor newspaper crime column reported that a man walked into a Burger King in Ypsilanti, Michigan, at 5 a.m., flashed a gun, and demanded cash. The clerk turned him down because he said he couldn't open the cash register without a food order. When the man ordered onion rings, the clerk said they weren't available for breakfast. The man became so frustrated he walked away.  Dumber still is the guy who walked into a Louisiana Circle-K, put a $20 bill on the counter, and asked for change. When the clerk opened the cash drawer, the man pulled a gun and asked for all the cash in the register, which the clerk promptly provided. The man took the cash from the clerk and fled, leaving the $20 bill on the counter. The total amount he got from the drawer? — $15.

Stupid behavior has its own competition these days. In recent years, the Annual Darwin Awards have honored "the least evolved among us." Sometimes the competition is deadly — as in the 2005 winner. "When his 38-caliber revolver failed to fire at his intended victim during a hold-up in Long Beach, California, a would-be robber did something that can only inspire wonder. He peered down the barrel and tried the trigger again. This time it worked."
(These stories from:  CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Sermons for Sundays after Pentecost (Middle Third): The Hard Task of Truth-telling, by Lee Ann Dunlap).

You might laugh, but it also makes you want to cry.   Stupidity can hit close to home too.   While criminally stupid is one thing, the spiritually foolish can have equally devastating consequences.  Year after year, Jeremiah had watched and warned his nation about the consequences of their spiritual ignorance, but his pleas fell on deaf ears.  Jeremiah laments: "….They have no understanding. They are skilled in doing evil,…and do not know how to do good" (Jeremiah 4:22).  Spiritual foolishness leads to moral stupidity which brings social tragedy, with both personal and national suffering. As Jeremiah looked toward his nation's future, he saw only death and destruction: the earth "waste and void," the heavens "had no light," the foundations of the earth shaken to the core.  The fruitful land lay deserted and the cities were in ruin. From the depths of his soul, Jeremiah knew these desolations were the fate of the spiritually stupid.  So Jeremiah wept, even as God wept.  This is why he is called the ‘weeping prophet’. Why was Jeremiah weeping?  His people were acting like “stupid children," but still they belonged to God.

Sadly enough, foolishness and stupidity are with us yet.  Not long after Hiroshima and Nagasaki became "cities laid in ruins” of the our planet being plunged into darkness with no light from the heavens has shifted from poetic language to an all-too-real possibility.   In the days since then, humans have not only split the atom and drop the bomb, but we have spliced the genetic code and trod on other divine mysteries, as well. Designer babies may soon be an option for those who can pay. Gene-specific germ warfare (killer viruses which can target a specific ethnic or racial group) may well be added to future war arsenals. Jet travel in the modern age means a deadly virus can be passed around the globe in a matter of hour.

As Lee Dunlap has said, “ Miracles" have become the norm of human science, while God is increasingly pushed from the public arena.  Even though much good has been accomplished by the human pursuit of knowledge and control, we have, by our own stupidity, placed our own survival in jeopardy. Global warming, ozone depletion, worldwide pandemics, even the rise of terror, are very real consequences of spiritual foolishness. We have usurped God's authority while failing to attain God's wisdom and in so doing invited judgment upon ourselves.

Yet spiritual foolishness need not be on such a world-wide scale. Examples are evident even in churchyard.  Spiritual stupidity, like any other, happens when we don't stop to think about the long-term consequences of our actions, or when we refuse to listen to the warnings of others when the truth is right in front us.  We live in a time, as the Washington Post says, when the “truth has a difficult time” getting through.  And believe this: We religious or spiritual types can be as obstinate and dense as anyone.

Pause for a moment to consider what we might call "stupid church behaviors" and most of us could fill a page or even two. To give a few examples: How about Baptists using to fight religious battles with each other rather than finding it a resource to read and learn how to love, or what about so called Christians having "hissy-fits” in the pew over the color of the  carpet or the problem with the youth people then come and ask the pastor why the church has so few children. Duh!   Or what about those who oppose making the building more accessible to handicapped persons or more appropriate for strangers with the reasoning, "We don't have anybody like that who comes here." Of course not — they can't get in the building or not feel wanted or welcomed!  When one church council adopted a goal to bring in needy children and youth, a member complained, “Those kids don't belong to our church!”’Okay — that was sort of the point! Don’t we want kids who need the Lord as much as those who know the Lord?

Then there's the pastor who, like many others, scheduled mornings in the office and afternoons doing hospital calls and home visitation.  Part of the congregation complained they could never reach the pastor because he was always out and about while others said he spent too much time stuck in the office. RIGHT!  Everyone knows more than the pastor how to be a pastor!  Finally, consider the story of one church member who, while visiting friends, had been invited to attend a thriving mission church in Los Angeles. She returned to her own church in Ohio rather indignant because the church was packed on their arrival and they were seated in the very back while the local street people, prostitutes, and addicts were given room in the front. Some of "those people" even participated in the service. She handed her pastor a newspaper article on the congregation and its pastor, inquiring whether this church received any mission support. If so, she was solidly against it. She did not want her dollars going to support a church prostitutes have a front row seat.  Wonder where this church got such a notion? Could it be from someone who ate with tax-collectors and healed lepers?

 "My people are foolish," we could well hear God say about us today. "They have no understanding." How sad it is — the pain and the heartache caused by our own stubborn ‘ways…and doings.” Makes you wonder how the church has survived all these years. Yet, miraculously we are here.    The tragic story of what happened to Jerusalem, and even to ‘the temple of the Lord’ which was burned and destroyed along with the rest of the city, makes an important warning to us, in hopes of waking us up.   The point is that we all share in the responsibility of what happens and what doesn’t happen.  This is one of the most important messages contained in the book of Jeremiah.  What you do to others and what you don’t do for others, will come back to haunt when the world you thought was forever, falls apart, and there is no way back.

THE WHOLE LAND SHALL BE A DESOLATION, YET…. (27)

Stupid children we might be at time, but we belong to God. Suffer the consequences of our foolishness we shall, but God has a plan to save us, and all creation as well.  

And God does not relent, either in judgment or in salvation. "I have not relented, nor will I turn back" (Jeremiah 4:28). God utters a breath of mercy in the midst of the ruins of our human failures:  For thus says the Lord, "The whole land shall be a desolation; yet I will not make a full end” (Jeremiah 4:27).  Here, God breathes love and hope even in the midst of the harsh, hot heat of his anger and judgment. God pledges that humanity will not utterly be destroyed. For some, there is still time and space to turn around, to take our attention off only what we want and to join with Jesus in redeeming the broken, desolate places of our world. 

Here, the prophet reminds us of one thing above all else.  Even when life stands in ruins: Redemption is God's specialty. "For God so loved the world, he gave his only Son," the Bible says. When all the hatred and fear and corruption in the human arsenal had been inflicted upon the Son of God in a place called Calvary, he bore it upon himself and took it to the grave. Scripture tells us the mountains quaked and the heavens grew dim, and the community of disciples sank into despair, much like the experience of Jeremiah. Then God raised Jesus from the dead, and all that hatred and corruption came to nothing. As the Apostle Paul would later write, "God's foolishness is greater than human wisdom." In this we must have confidence.  Even when we are stupid in our behavior, God can still save.

As Rabbi Kushner once said: ‘God's not calling names; he's calling us to life! L'chaim! To life! Kushner writes: "The uniqueness of the human being is captured in the phrase that we are 'created in the image of God.' We have a moral dimension. We can be good or bad, where animals can only be obedient or messy. (He says) "When Charles Darwin shocked the conventions of the 19th century with his theory that human beings were related to animals and did not represent a special creation, someone asked Darwin, 'Is there anything unique about the human being?' Instead of talking about upright posture or brain cavity size, Darwin answered, 'Man is the only animal that blushes.' (Kushner goes on:) "To recognize that we have done wrong, to recognize that more might have been expected of us than we delivered, is part of the uniqueness of the human being. No other creature can do that. Animals (and little children) can realize that they are about to be punished for something they did, but only mature human beings can judge themselves." (Harold Kushner. To Life! (Little, Brown, Inc., 1993) pp. 184-5).

So, dear friends, when we fail or realize our wayward ‘ways and doings,’ we need not duck and cover from God as Adam and Eve did after their sin, or as Judah did when Jeremiah preached.  Let us return to God’s grace and mercy.   Let us trust God and dedicate ourselves to the care and redeeming love God has placed in our hearts, in the name of Jesus.  Are willing to admit or need and judge our wrongs in hope?

Dr. Tom Long of Princeton Theological Seminary quotes a character from a short story by Paul Devries: "There was a time when we were afraid of being caught doing something sinful in front of our ministers. Now we are afraid of being caught doing something immature in front of our therapists.". The essence of good therapy, by the way, is to help us learn to take responsibility for ourselves, and to not take inappropriate responsibility for the actions of others. Jeremiah thought there was a great deal to be responsible for in this world, and we're the only ones around to take responsibility.  Anything else is just plain stupid. Mohandas Gandhi said that these are the things that destroy life -- the stupid things: "politics without principle, pleasure without conscience, wealth without work, knowledge without character,

business without morality, science without humanity, worship without sacrifice." (Source unknown). Gandhi put in modern language; God put it in eternal language. The ten commandments could just as well be known as the ten "don't be stupids.".

Will we be smart enough to understand what God meant?  It's said that a woman rushed up to the famous violinist Fritz Kreisler after a concert and cried, "I'd give my life to play as beautifully as you do." Kreisler replied, "I did.". Will we?  Will we give our life to what is right even in bad times?  We should, and Jeremiah tells us why.  Even when times are at their worst, when all we see in our church or community or in the mirror brings us to the brink of despair, we ought not lose hope in doing good because God did not lose hope for us, or for the world. Because Christ does not give up on us in our foolishness, neither shall we give up on ourselves or others. Releasing our folly and clinging to Jesus we find forgiveness and hope for new life, not for ourselves alone but for the entire world. Amen.