Whenever the Old Testament Lesson is introduced as being read from the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah . . . I internally cringe, . . . and I say to myself, reflexively, “Oh dear, another Old Testament prophet is going to rant and rave at me about Israel’s breaking of the Law and of her harlotry.”  . . . I cringe because I expect that I’m supposed to draw parallels between Israel’s sins and my own.  . . . Otherwise, why would the lectionary include such tedious readings.  . . . And so, I was delighted this morning to hear a more cheerful conversation between God and Israel.  . . . Did you notice?

A voice on the bare heights is heard, the weeping and pleading of Israel’s sons, because they have perverted their way, they have forgotten the LORD their God.  . . . “Behold, we come to thee; for thou art the LORD our God.  . . . Truly in the LORD our God is the salvation of Israel.

In the technical language of biblical scholarship, this is called a sub motif, . . . after the Hebrew word for “supplication.”  . . . It is a supplication motif . . . rather than one of prophetic condemnation.  . . . And then Jeremiah responds to Israel’s supplication by saying,

“If you return, O Israel, says the LORD, . . . and if you swear, ‘As the LORD lives,’ in truth, in justice, and in uprightness, then nations shall bless themselves in him, and in him shall they glory.”

Isn’t that interesting?  . . . The good of being united to the Lord God Almighty . . . and to Him alone . . . as a child to its Father; . . . the good of being united to the Lord God Almighty . . . is that everyone around us benefits:  “the nations shall bless themselves in Him.”

    Now, . . . consider the Gospel Lesson which has just been read to you.  . . .

Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God [Saint Mark says]; Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel.”

. . . “Repent, and believe in the gospel.”  The customary interpretation for that word “repent” is that we are being commanded to stop doing sinful things.  . . . But in light of what Jeremiah has shown us today, . . . perhaps this saying of Jesus to “repent”; . . . perhaps this saying of Jesus is a “sub saying,” . . . a supplication saying.  Perhaps, instead of commanding us to stop being sinful; . . . perhaps Jesus is supplicating (appealing) for us to do something else.  . . . Now what do you suppose that “something else” might be?  . . . Well, consider this:  if the Lord God Almighty is exactly that, almighty; . . . then perhaps everything is exactly as He is willing to permit it to be for the sake of Creation’s best possible outcome.  . . . And if we cannot accept and honor that, but must blame God when things seem to go in a direction we decide to be wrong, . . . or if we think of God as being ignorant of need and must give Him prayerful instructions for fear He won’t “get it right,” . . . then perhaps what Jesus means by “repent” is to be reconciled with God; . . . perhaps what Jesus means by “repent” is that we permit in our hearts the possibility of the Lord God Almighty’s competence; . . . that we permit in our hearts the possibility of our own ineptitude at giving God instruction; . . . the possibility that we have (as Jeremiah puts it) perverted our ways because we have forgotten the true Nature of the Lord our God.

    And so, Jesus comes into Galilee, saying, “The kingdom of God is at hand; everything is precisely as God desires to allow it to be, and so, be reconciled to God’s gracious reign . . . and believe the Gospel.”  . . . Because, you see, Jesus lived in a cruel and vicious time; . . . a time when His nation and God’s people were dominated by a foreign, mercenary army and governed by an unsympathetic government, completely uninterested in the civil or religious rights of the people they ruled.  . . . If ever there was a time for the Lord God Almighty to rain down fire upon the oppressors of His people; . . . if ever there was a time for the Lord God Almighty to raise up a Messiah to command the swords both of men and of angels in order to establish justice, defeat cruelty, imprison tyrants, and create worldwide peace . . . it was in the time just after John the Baptist was arrested.  . . . And yet, what did Jesus do?  . . . He gathered to Himself an Ecclesia:  a community of disciples; . . . He gathered to Himself a church.  And what did Jesus tell His church to do?  . . . He told them that they are citizens of God’s gracious reign which He (Jesus) has brought to them . . . and that in the midst of cruelties and injustice and terrorism and wickedness of every kind . . . they must be reconciled to God, and, instead of instructing God or slitting throats in His Name, they must manifest God’s reign by doing seven merciful works:  feed the hungry, . . . give drink to the thirsty, . . . welcome the stranger, . . . clothe the naked, . . . care for the sick, . . . visit those in prison, . . . and bury the dead.  . . . Jesus tells His disciples, “Follow me and I will make you become fishers of men.”  . . . Or, as the prophet Jeremiah reports, the Word of God declares that, “if you swear, ‘As the Lord lives,’ in truth, in justice, and in uprightness, then nations shall bless themselves in him”; … in other words, . . . if you will be reconciled to God and act accordingly, . . . thereby teaching the rest of the world to be reconciled to God, . . . then everyone around you benefits; . . . you shall become a blessing to all peoples.