September 17th Reflection - In Your Face - by Bill Lynch

Jeremiah 8:18—9:1
The Prophet Mourns for the People

My joy is gone, grief is upon me,
   my heart is sick.
Hark, the cry of my poor people
   from far and wide in the land:
‘Is the Lord not in Zion?
   Is her King not in her?’
(‘Why have they provoked me to anger with their images,
   with their foreign idols?’)
‘The harvest is past, the summer is ended,
   and we are not saved.’
For the hurt of my poor people I am hurt,
   I mourn, and dismay has taken hold of me.

Is there no balm in Gilead?
   Is there no physician there?
Why then has the health of my poor people
   not been restored?

O that my head were a spring of water,
   and my eyes a fountain of tears,
so that I might weep day and night
   for the slain of my poor people!

Reflection
Jeremiah feels deeply the compassion and love of God for his people. The Israelites have fallen deeply into sin and separated themselves from God. They have chosen sinful lives over a relationship with the God that has saved them all along. Jeremiah, in this passage, expresses in compassion, the feelings of God for his people. The pain that God feels in our absence when we choose to turn from him. Jeremiah feels the anguish and agony that God feels when we choose sin over God.

When I turn from God and pick my own will and my own way over his; this passage reflects the feelings of God as God hurts for me. When I turn to any other god than God, God is in pain. When I'm in my sin, that painful suffering of Jesus is in my face. The blood running down from that crown of thorns brings pain to my Savior. I caused Jesus to feel pain and submit to abuse and punishment for my sin. This was God's answer to sin. God took the compassion of the pain of separation and united himself with us in the flesh of Jesus and the spirit of the Holy Spirit and came to us. God took action for our separation and closed the gap on his own. God took on that pain of separation in Jesus and made a way for unity in him and with him and through Jesus.

So, what now? Now, I feel the pain of Jesus. I see the love of God right in my face and before my eyes. I know of God's love and see how deep and impossibly wide this love is and love God right back. I turn around and face my Savior and run to him and cling to him for life. I give myself to God in Jesus out of compassion and love. I repent and bow before my King.

Prayer
Lord, thank you! Thank you for your love and compassion. Thank you for feeling the separation that I have caused. Thank you for closing the gap and showing me what I have done to you. Thank you for your in my face compassion and love that I can't refuse. Thank you for spinning me around in my sin to see your love. I love you... today... tomorrow... and forever. --- Amen