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Morning Devotion for the Season after Pentecost
August 9, 2024
Edith Stein
The Invitatory
The earth is the Lord’s for he made it: O come, let us adore him.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son: and to the Holy Ghost;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.
Reading: Jeremiah 31:31-34
The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord’, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.
Meditation: Jo Ann B. Jones
Recall that in my meditation on the call to Jeremiah, that six verbs define the ministry of Jeremiah: pluck up, pull down, destroy, overthrow, build and plant. And, indeed, throughout much of the book, Jeremiah’s ministry has embraced all of these at one time or another. What is prominent in Jeremiah’s thinking at this point is the Babylonian conquest and the deportation of the people to Babylonia. Looking specifically to build and plant, these words were most relevant to the dispirited exiles who desperately needed to be built up. Jeremiah felt that it was critically important to provide comfort or consolation to the people. In fact, this particular passage is counted among those in “The Book of Consolation.”
Among the consolations were the promises that God would put his anger aside and return the people to their home. God’s love and faithfulness will be realized in the people’s prosperity.. Such promises would be remarkable enough just by themselves; however, this particular passage promises even more.
This is made evident in Jeremiah’s promise of a new covenant between God and the people. The offer of a renewed covenant is itself a display of God’s forgiveness. Through the words of the prophet, God promises to write the law on the hearts of the people.
Even if God restores the people to the land, enables them to experience prosperity and joy and shows love to them again, that will not be enough. Something must change within the people themselves. Here God promises to heal them from the inside out. God will change not only their outward circumstances, but their very hearts.
In the promise of a new covenant, there is also a reckoning of the people’s position vis à vis God. For it is God who is in the position of determining the conditions of the agreement; whereas, between two or more people, a covenant involves promises from the more powerful party in exchange for the proper response from the other party. Here God takes responsibility even for the response from the people. God will empower the people to uphold their end of the agreement. Can one imagine a more profound relationship in which God gives and the people are enabled by God to respond appropriately! This promise of God doing for us what we cannot or will not do on our own can then become a welcome word of refreshment. God will write the law on our hearts. Our growth, our being made holy and acceptable is not all up to us. More than being a welcome word of refreshment it should also serve as the breadth and depth of God’s love for God’s people. This does not mean that, in this case, the people will be immediately restored to their country; that will take time, but they have not been abandoned. Their captivity will come to an end and they will be restored. In our times of difficulties it is the greatest comfort to know that one has not been abandoned. That for God there are difficulties for him to overcome in time. He is not a magician. He is God. Our obedience is God’s will for us. God will accomplish God’s purposes.
A Collect for Guidance
O heavenly, Father, in whom we live and move and have our being: We humbly pray thee so to guide and govern us by thy Holy Spirit, that in all the cares and occupations of our life we may not forget thee, but may remember that we are ever walking in thy sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen.
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