Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Broken Cisterns


For some reason, when I am going through difficult times, I gravitate to the Old Testament. Yesterday, I found myself in Jeremiah, one of my favorites!

The book of Jeremiah was written after the fall of Jerusalem in 586 B.C. My Women's Devotional Bible says, "The people of Jerusalem used to love God with the love of a new bride for her husband; now even the priests, lawmakers, leaders and prophets have begun to worship Baal and other false gods. God has warned the people for 23 years, and now his patience is coming to an end. Judah is about to go into exile for 70 years."

Do you feel as if you are in exile? Has your love for God lost that new bride feeling? Do you find yourself worshiping "things" rather than God? Shamefully, I have to admit yes to each of these questions.

There is nothing more powerful than drama in our lives when it comes to revealing our inadequacies! Yet, drama is also powerful in revealing just how adequate God is in addressing those needs!

As I read chapter two yesterday, these are the observations I made:

1. God warned and pursued His people for 23 years before His patience ran out! He is a patient God, isn't He? He waits for us, not wanting even one to parish! I love that!

2. In verse 6 He reminds them where they have come from, Egypt. How quickly I can forget that! ". . . brought us up out of Egypt and led us through the barren wilderness, through a land of deserts and rifts, a land of drought and darkness, a land where no one travels and no one lives" Here lies the key; we are LED, not left! He is there and was there with them all along, even in a place where no one wanted to be! Hello, I have arrived in that place where I really don't want to live for very long, but I am promised I will be led through it, not left to die in it! What a promise!

3. Verse 7 is where I want to be, "I brought you into a fertile land to eat its fruit and rich produce." That is what is on the other side. We all know we will experience pain, sadness, and sorrow, but sometimes we forget that there is an end to it, and not just heaven. There can be closure for those who return to that "new bride" love for the Lord. This leads me to my next observation.

4. Verse 13 states that the people had forsaken God, the One with springs of living water, and instead dug their own cisterns. How many times have I replaced God's plan with my own ideas? Too many to count! This verse goes on to say that not only had they replaced Him with their own cisterns, but the vessels were broken and could not hold water. That is exactly what happens when we try to replace His plans for our lives with our own; broken promises and broken dreams ,that cannot possibly hold anything else. You would never give a thirsty child a glass with cracks in it, yet that is exactly what we hold up to God. I want my vessel whole and ready to receive all that He has for me not missing one single drop.

5. Lastly, verse 19 states that forsaking God is evil and bitter, "Consider then and realize how evil and bitter it is for you when you forsake the Lord your God and have no awe of me." Do I want to live my life with out awe for God? NO, I do not! All I have to do is simply look around me and I see examples of God's presence in the smallest things. That is where I am in awe of Him; in the gentle whisper of summer nights, in the silence of the dawn, in the flash of lightening that accompanies the rumble of thunder, in the tender touch of a child's hand.

Difficult times come in waves and in seasons. God wants to lead us through those and we have the promise we will not be left alone or behind. Eventually, we will arrive in a place of fruitfulness again, but it is because of those desperate times that the fruit is so much sweeter. I am choosing to believe that I am not in exile, nor have I been forgotten, and to seek out His grace and goodness in the midst of my own barrenness. I will not reside here for long. I see His hand in it all!