Osceola Sermon Jeremiah Pastor Bob Vale / May 19th, 2013 In Jeremiah: May 19th, 2013 Book Theme: He is your balm of Gilead, the soothing salve for your sin-sick soul. Sermon Title: Jeremiah A Man of Metaphors: Sermon Topic: Repent and Listen to God. Sermon Text: Jeremiah 8:20-22; Speaker: Pastor Bob Vale Biblical Focus: Jeremiah 8:22 “Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no

physician there? Why then is there no healing for the wound of my people?” Scripture Lesson: Jeremiah 8:20-22 "The harvest is past, the summer has

ended, and we are not saved." JER 8:21 Since my people are crushed, I am crushed; I mourn, and horror grips me. JER 8:22 Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is there no healing for the wound of my people?” 8:30 a.m. Traditional Worship Service Hymn of Praise: # 375 There is a Balm in Gilead Prayer Hymn: #361 Rock of Ages Cleft for Me. Hymn of Response: # 375 There is a Balm in Gilead 11:00 a.m. Contemporary Worship Service: Please See Matt Boggs List. Children’s Sermon: Yoke around the neck; which is why pastors wear the stole around their neck. or a healing balm or salve.

History of the Book of Jeremiah 1. The Book of Jeremiah is one of the Major Prophetic books. It is the 2nd book of prophecy out of 17 in the Bible. It was written 600 years before the time of Christ. Jeremiah wrote the book, and presented it to his secretary. (Baruch) 2. Jeremiah has a broken heart with a sad message. He is known as the weeping prophet. Sad for the Hebrew nation who is not following God and judgment is in the form of the 70 year Babylonian captivity. 3. He preaches judgment against the wicked generation of the southern kingdom during the Babylonian captivity. 4. Jeremiah was persecuted as a prophet. (Put in chains, thrown in a well, forced from his home town and tried for his life by other priest and prophets. 5. Jeremiah loved to use physical metaphors to prove a point that God wanted the people to hear. Some of these acts by Jeremiah may see rather strange or odd. (The clay and potter)

Today I want to share with you Five great metaphors the Prophet Jeremiah used to share a spiritual point. a. The Yoke around his neck: Jeremiah wore a yoke around his neck to show that all the people of Israel and even the animals would be subject to a foreign King. (Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon) (Jeremiah 27:1-7)

Jeremiah 27:1-7 Early in the reign of Zedekiah son of Josiah king of Judah, this word came to Jeremiah from the LORD: 2 This is what the LORD said to me: "Make a yoke out of straps and crossbars and put it on your neck. 3 Then send word to the kings of Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre and Sidon through the envoys who have come to Jerusalem to Zedekiah king of Judah. 4 Give them a message for their masters and say, `This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: "Tell this to your masters: 5 With my great power and outstretched arm I made the earth and its people and the animals that are on it, and I give it to anyone I please. 6 Now I will hand all your countries over to my servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; I will make even the wild animals subject to him. 7 All nations will serve him and his son and his grandson until the time for his land comes; then many nations and great kings will subjugate him. b. The Potter and Clay Metaphor: Jeremiah also used another metaphor to teach this same lesson. He went to a potter’s house to watch the potter make a pot. Jeremiah 18:1-10

JER 18:1

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: 2 "Go down to the potter's house, and there I will give you my message." 3 So I went down to the potter's house, and I saw him working at the wheel. 4 But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him. JER 18:5 Then the word of the LORD came to me: 6 "O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter does?" declares the LORD. "Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. 7 If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, 8 and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. 9 And if at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted, 10 and if it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it. c. Potters were important craftsmen in the ancient world, and watching the potter work would have been a delightful event for families, and especially children. Potters smash the wet clay to get all the air bubbles out, and, placing the clay on their wheels, they form and shape the pots. At times the clay isn’t centered on the wheel, and the forming pot wobbles. It then must be smashed down and re-centered, and a new pot formed. This is the metaphor God gives to Jeremiah, saying that because the people have gone over to worshiping other gods, they must now be re-centered and reshaped, which will be a painful process.

I like these two pictures and don’t they share a great message.

d.

Jeremiah Smashed Pottery as a metaphor: (Jeremiah 19:1-6)

JER 19:1

This is what the LORD says: "Go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take along some of the elders of the people and of the priests 2 and go out to the Valley of Ben Hinnom, near the entrance of the Potsherd Gate.

There proclaim the words I tell you, 3 and say, `Hear the word of the LORD, O kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem. This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Listen! I am going to bring a disaster on this place that will make the ears of everyone who hears of it tingle. 4 For they have forsaken me and made this a place of foreign gods; they have burned sacrifices in it to gods that neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah ever knew, and they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent. JER 19:10 "Then break the jar while those who go with you are watching,

e. Hide Your Underwear: God told Jeremiah to travel over 300 miles and bury his underwear under a rock, and then go back some time later to find it to dig it back up. (Thank the Lord, I have no pictures for this! Please use your imagination.) 1. Go Buy Some Underwear: This is what the LORD said to me: "Go and buy a linen belt and put it around your waist, but do not let it touch water." 2 So I bought a belt, as the LORD directed, and put it around my waist. 2. Go Hide Your Underwear: JER 13:3 Then the word of the LORD came to me a second time: 4 "Take the belt you bought and are wearing around your waist, and go now to Perath and hide it there in a crevice in the rocks." 5 So I went and hid it at Perath, as the LORD told me. 3. Go Retrieve You Underwear: JER 13:6 Many days later the LORD said to me, "Go now to Perath and get the belt I told you to hide there." 7 So I went to Perath and dug up the belt and took it from the place where I had hidden it, but now it was ruined and completely useless. 4. God Said: This is why I told you to do that: JER 13:8 Then the word of the LORD came to me: 9 "This is what the LORD says: `In the same way I will ruin the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem. 10 These wicked people, who refuse to listen to my words, who follow the stubbornness of their hearts and go after other gods to serve and worship them, will be like this belt-completely useless! 11 For as a belt is bound around a man's waist, so I bound the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah to me,' declares the LORD, `to be my people for my renown and praise and honor. But they have not listened.'

The last metaphor I want to share with you is about the song we sang this morning. There is a Balm in Gilead: Jeremiah teaches us to have the courage to keep our faith in the face of all opposition. He is living proof that if you care passionately about God, people will question you, diminish you, and possibly even attack you. All of us have been with people, at times, who criticize or ridicule us for our faith. They will tell us that there is no God, and that religion is a bad thing. Have the courage to stand up in the face of them. We will always face these kinds of people, but Jeremiah reminds us that we can’t let their doubts and criticisms rule our lives. The whole point is that Jeremiah not only spoke 2600 years ago, but he is still speaking today. The question is whether we are still listening. In chapter 8:22, Jeremiah refers to a healing agent called The Balm of Gilead. JER 8:20

"The harvest is past, the summer has ended, and we are not saved." JER 8:21 Since my people are crushed, I am crushed; I mourn, and horror grips me. JER 8:22 Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is there no healing for the wound of my people?

The Balm of Gilead is an actual salve or oil that is used both today and in Old Testament times for healing purposes. It comes from a tree found in the Holy Land area of Gilead.

The balm of Gilead comes from the plant known as the “Ximenia aegyptiaca” or better known as the Jericho balsam, and desert date tree. It grows around the Middle East, Africa and India. It is from this tree that the oil or balm for healing is taken. In the area of Gilead, it is well known for its pure healing balm. An oily aromatic resin was pressed out of the leaves and buds from the trees and shrubs in hot desert countries. It was believed to contain healing assistance and was very rare, expensive and hard to find.

The prophet Jeremiah asked this famous rhetorical question Jer. 8:22. "Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then has not the health of the daughter of my people been restored?" The dire spiritual conditions of the people of Israel that caused them to need balm was given in the verse previous. "For the brokenness of the daughter of my people I am broken; I mourn, dismay has taken hold of me." Jeremiah was dismayed, and maybe even disgusted, that the condition of the people has gotten so bad. (You can see in this verse why he is called the weeping prophet. He is mourning and broken for his people, who have decided not to follow God.) Balm, of course, is a medicinal salve. The people were wounded from their sins and idolatries and needed to be resorted to the faith. This brokenness is compared to physical maladies and physical cures to illustrate how unnecessarily tragic it was. People had sought the balm of Gilead to help their illnesses for centuries. In fact, the caravan that Joseph was sold to was heading to Egypt carrying balm from Gilead. (Gen. 37:25) A few years later when Joseph sent his brothers back for their remaining brother Benjamin (before he had revealed himself to them) their father Jacob said to take the best products of the land "to carry down to the man as a present, a little balm." (Gen. 43:11) After the Babylonian captivity, when Israel took back the promised land, Gilead, on the west side of the Jordan, became part of their land. The tribe of Gad settled there. The balm trade then became as Israeli one. (Ezk. 27:17) The reason for all this was that one of the trees there secreted a turpentine like resin that was highly sought after. It is said the this balm was worth twice its weight in silver. So Jeremiah's question is, "How can a people who traded in balm be so sick?" Jeremiah is using a physical sickness metaphor to highlight a spiritual sickness. The healing balm can take care of physical healing, God’s love and the Law of Moses can heal the soul. The real question Jeremiah is asking behind the illustration is, "How can the

people of God, with the Law of Moses in their midst, be so sinful?!" How can a chosen people, choose not to follow their God?

Are we any different in America today? We live in a country lavish with wealth and opportunity all around us. We have more food, clothing, electronic gadgets, cars, big houses, travel trailers, entertainment than anyone else on the planet. We live in a country that has the best medical research, doctors and cures the world has ever seen. We are without question the modern day Gilead. Over the past 300 years the hand of God’s blessing has touched us like no other nation on earth. We live in a country where most big cities have hundreds of different churches. Even small towns less than a thousand people have three or four churches inside their community. The gospel message of salvation can be heard in these churches, it can be heard in the thousands of Christian radio stations across the airwaves, it can be seen on television and even viewed with some great movies like, Moses with Charelston Heston, The Passion of the Christ seen a decade ago. It can be seen in the new Christian movies put out by unique churches gifted in the art of movies. Movies such as Fireproof to strengthen marriages, Flywheel, Courageous to strengthen the Christian role of the father. Jesus Christ is being proclaimed in this country, yet are the people of America listening? Jesus is the balm for the healing of the American soul. Yet America is so sinful.

If there ever was a land flowing with Milk and Honey, it is the United States; in all aspects of our natural resources, physical blessings, material blessings, health blessings and of course spiritual blessings. Yet why are we struggling so much with one of these blessings in our country? (Spiritual Blessings) Why do we have such a sin problem in a land flowing with Milk and Honey blessings?

In America: We have more people in prison per capita, than any other country on the planet. We are the number one creator and exporter of pornography in the world. We are the number one creator and exporter of weapons of war in the world. We have a steady problem with drug abuse, alcohol abuse, gambling abuse, all of which rips apart the families in our country. We have a violence problem in America and in some large cities it is epidemic. Gambling is on the rise in nearly every state in the country. Yes, sin is healthy and very much alive in America. Yet, should this be the case in America, with so many blessings, and so much of the gospel being shared so freely in our country?

In the Michiana area there are four great hospitals to keep us healthy. 1. Memorial Hospital 2. St. Joseph Hospital 3. Elkhart Hospital 4. Goshen Hospital In the Michiana area there are close to 500 spiritual hospitals called churches to help heal the soul, yet 60% of our population, don’t enter the church doors. In America there are 300,000 churches. That is one church for every 1,000 people in our country. Perhaps as Jeremiah was a weeping prophet for Israel 2,600 years ago, perhaps we need to weep for our own parents, uncles, brothers, sisters, sons and daughters, and grandchildren who are not following the loving path of the gospel of Christ. Perhaps we need to weep for a nation that is running away from God rather than towards him. I am finding it increasingly odd to see how being a Christian in America is seen as a weakness or that a person is somewhat delusional. With the rise of vocal agnostics and atheist in the media, their new media blitz is to make Christians appear to be out of step or odd for their moral beliefs. Why would a faith group that believes in love, peace, forgiveness and giving service and financially to help the poor seem odd or out of step or weak. I believe it takes much more courage to be a Christian in our culture than to not. Perhaps Jeremiah’s message rings true for us today. There is a growing element of a sin-sick soul in our country.

Please look at the words of the great song we sang earlier. There is a Balm in Gilead: # 375 by: William Farley Smith There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole. There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin sick soul. Sometimes I feel discouraged and think my work’s in vain. But then the Holy Spirit revives my soul again. Don’t ever feel discouraged, for Jesus is your friend and if you look for knowledge, He’ll never refuse to lend. If you can’t preach like Peter, if you can’t pray like Paul, Just tell the Love of Jesus, and say he died for all. You see the goodness of this song is the answer to the problem of a sin sick soul. The answer is a relationship with Jesus Christ. God can heal and save the sin sick soul. Not only can he heal and save it, He can make it new again. There is eternal hope, grace and a good life in being a Christian. Let us pray, There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole. There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin sick soul. Sometimes I feel discouraged and think my work’s in vain. But then the Holy Spirit revives my soul again. Don’t ever feel discouraged, for Jesus is your friend and if you look for knowledge, He’ll never refuse to lend. If you can’t preach like Peter, if you can’t pray like Paul, Just tell the Love of Jesus, and say he died for all. Amen

Words of Wisdom: These are the seven deadly sins by Mahatma Gandhi: 1. Wealth without work. 2. Pleasure without conscience. 3. Science without humanity. 4. Knowledge without character. 5. Politics without principle. 6. Commerce without morality. 7. Worship without sacrifice. Mahatma Gandhi also said, hate the sin, but love the sinner.

Benediction: May the road rise to meet you. May the wind be always at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face. May the rain fall soft upon your fields. And until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of His hand. Amen.

Pastor Bob’s Sermon Notes The Five Great Metaphors of Jeremiah 1. The Yoke around the Neck.

2. Watch how pottery is made.

3. Break the clay pot at the city gate.

4. Go hide your underwear.

5. The Balm of Gilead.