Perhaps equal to Jeremiah’s personal suffering at the hands of his enemies and tormentors was his burden of living amongst continual wickedness which was indescribable but people prospered and there was peace, until Jehovah saw fit to send Babylon....and the kingdom of Judah was devoured before Jeremiah’s eyes in 587 B.C.
What caught my eye one day as I was studying Jeremiah was this: Jeremiah became so oppressed by wickedness around him that he complained to the Lord and asked how much longer will he allow this wickedness to persist and the unrighteous to prosper (Jeremiah 12:1-4). It reminded me of Jonah who attempted to escape his calling to preach to wicked Nineveh. So incensed was he at their wickedness which surpassed any of the ancient world, that he felt they did not deserve a second chance, which he knew God’s mercy would afford them should they repent (Jonah 4:2).
In short, the wicked Nineveh did repent and was given almost 100 years more to prove their repentance. That repentance didn’t last. What it proved instead is that God is a God of long-suffering but long-suffering does not mean ‘never’. The destruction of Nineveh was colossal. We will visit that chapter when we study the book of Nahum. Nineveh and the destruction of the Assyrian empire is also a lesson in God’s justice. A huge lesson…..
Our world is getting insanely wicked. Many of us have wondered how much worse it has to get before the Saviour comes and puts an end to the madness. Like to Jeremiah, to some of us our present world seems unbearable. And here is where the similarity between Jeremiah's world and ours lies....the Lord replied to Jeremiah's impatience by asking him if he can't bear it whilst there was relative peace, how will he ever survive when things got worse (Jeremiah 12:1-4)? Like Jeremiah's world, our world will get worse....until He comes. And when He comes, it will not be pretty:
1. Mountains will flow
down at His presence (D&C 133:40; Micah 1:4)
2. The waters on the
earth will boil (D&C 133:41)
3. All nations will
tremble at His presence (D&C 133:42)
4. The sun will hide,
the moon will withhold its light, and the stars will be hurled from their
places (D&C 133:49)
5. The wicked will be burned by the brightness of fire of the glory of the Lord (Malachi 4:1-3; 2 Thessalonians 2:8)
It is now time to become people of valour so that we can endure whatever more is to come....and more will come until the Saviour deems we are ripe for destruction. Now more than ever we need to strengthen our faith in God to be able to endure the oppression, the persecution, the lack of freedoms, increased wickedness and injustice, all of which is coming our way.
In answer to Jeremiah's lament about
the situation of his day, the Lord clearly shows how long-suffering He is in
the midst of human corruption. It would seem He allows us to get to the utmost
worst until the day of reckoning to give as many as possible the chance to
repent and turn to Him. May we recognise and acknowledge His mercy, His
patience, His love, His tolerance, His long-suffering and most importantly, His
saving power trailing from the cross of Calvary, sealed with His hour of agony….
- CATHRYNE ALLEN
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