Treasures of Hope: Jeremiah 32:1-3a, 6-15 - Sixth Sunday after Pentecost

When God called the prophets, God warned them that the people wouldn’t listen. Their hearts were too hard to receive God’s Word and obey God’s demands.

Enter the prophetic sign act. The idea was that if people weren’t going to listen to what the prophets said, then the prophets would give them something to talk about.

In chapter 13, God commands Jeremiah to buy a girdle; wear it for a while without washing it, then bury it in the ground. Later, he digs it up and finds it rotted and unwearable. This showed what happens when God’s people do not cling to God.

In chapter 27, God commands Jeremiah to make an oxen yoke for himself and wear it in public. This showed that the only way the people could survive the onslaught of the Babylonians was through total submission.

In today’s reading, God commands Jeremiah to buy a plot of land from his cousin while the armies of Babylon lay siege to Jerusalem.

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From a financial standpoint, this was about as sound an investment as buying a house in Pompeii while Mount Vesuvius is erupting. Jeremiah knew that Jerusalem was about to fall, and that he would never live on the land.

But like the other prophetic sign acts, there was a deeper meaning behind it: one day, the Babylonian occupation will end, and God’s people will be able to come back home. Not right away, and certainly not in anyone’s lifetime, but it will happen. God will not abandon his people.

What sets this prophetic sign act apart from the rest was that this one was not an indictment against the proud. This sign act was an encouragement for the despairing.

None of us can understand how traumatic the siege and conquest of Jerusalem was for God’s people. Babylon surrounded the city so that nothing could get in nor out. Naturally, led to mass starvation. One could surrender to the Babylonians, as many did. At least then, you had a chance of surviving the 900-mile march to Babylon.

Still, many believed God wanted them to stand and fight. But Jeremiah said, surrender and wait for your salvation.

I can understand why people took offense at Jeremiah. To them, surrendering themselves and their city meant that they were giving up on God.

But Jeremiah’s purchase of the field tells another story.

The destruction of Jerusalem and the deportation of its people marked a tragic end to a sad chapter in salvation history. But God will have the last word. Not Nebuchadrezzar.

By purchasing land he will never possess, Jeremiah is putting his treasure where his hope is. He is focusing his life on God’s promise of what will be.

Hope, like love, is not just a feeling. It’s a state of mind, for sure, but still, something greater. Hope is the vision of God’s will being done, on earth as it will be in heaven.

Jeremiah’s hope is the restoration of God’s people, not just to their land, but to God’s covenant. It’s a vision of justice, which happens when people love one another as they love themselves. It’s a vision of peace, which is realized when people live in right relationship with each other. It’s a vision of worship, when all idols are forsaken and God is everyone’s heart’s desire.

Amid the chaos of the siege and the inevitability of the exile, Jeremiah is living as though God’s justice and God’s righteousness have already prevailed. In the meantime, he persists in what God has called him to do, and that is to bear the Word of God to God’s people. Even though his obedience brings him suffering, he refuses to give up. He chooses hope. He chooses love. He chooses God.

When I think about the people who’ve inspired my faith, many of them endured unimaginable suffering.

One of my favorite books, entitled Man’s Search for Meaning, was written by Viktor Frankl, an Auschwitz survivor.

Humanity has never conceived anything as monstrously evil as the Nazi death camps, the Soviet Gulags, and the genocides of modern times.

In the camps, everyone knew their survival depended on their ability to work, albeit with minimal food and deplorable living conditions. But Frankl noticed that those who survived the longest were those who lived for something greater than themselves.

He found inspiration in prisoners who shared what little food they had with those who were starving. Others endured by their sheer determination to see their loved ones again, despite not knowing if those loved ones would survive. Then there were those who simply refused to allow the Nazis to break their will to live.

Frankl was prepared to publish a book about finding meaning in life when he was arrested. He survived on his determination to share what he’d learned with the world.

Even though his survival was not guaranteed, he lived as though all his highest hopes had been realized. What about us? What about you?

We believe that God’s Kingdom is coming. We see signs of its coming every day, for it comes not through violence, political power, or military conquest, but by ordinary people just like you choosing love instead of selfishness, forgiveness instead of bitterness, treasures in heaven instead of treasures on earth. It’s congregations like ours who refuse to allow dwindling budgets and low attendance to stand in the way of caring for the neighbor. In a world of unbelief, we will never stop testifying to the life-transforming love and grace of Jesus Christ.

Don’t let comfort, security, control, people’s approval, or material possessions be the treasures you seek. May your treasures be where your hope is. Strive for them. Work for them. Wait for them. Trust and obey God, and they are already yours.

Jeremiah 32:1-3a, 6-15

32 The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord in the tenth year of King Zedekiah of Judah, which was the eighteenth year of Nebuchadrezzar. ² At that time the army of the king of Babylon was besieging Jerusalem, and the prophet Jeremiah was confined in the court of the guard that was in the palace of the king of Judah, ³ where King Zedekiah of Judah had confined him. 

⁶ Jeremiah said, “The word of the Lord came to me: ⁷ Hanamel son of your uncle Shallum is going to come to you and say, ‘Buy my field that is at Anathoth, for the right of redemption by purchase is yours.’ ” ⁸ Then my cousin Hanamel came to me in the court of the guard, in accordance with the word of the Lord, and said to me, “Buy my field that is at Anathoth in the land of Benjamin, for the right of possession and redemption is yours; buy it for yourself.” Then I knew that this was the word of the Lord.

⁹ And I bought the field at Anathoth from my cousin Hanamel and weighed out the silver to him, seventeen shekels of silver. ¹⁰ I signed the deed, sealed it, got witnesses, and weighed the silver on scales. ¹¹ Then I took the sealed deed of purchase containing the terms and conditions and the open copy,¹² and I gave the deed of purchase to Baruch son of Neriah son of Mahseiah, in the presence of my cousin Hanamel, in the presence of the witnesses who signed the deed of purchase, and in the presence of all the Judeans who were sitting in the court of the guard. ¹³ In their presence I charged Baruch, saying, ¹⁴ “Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Take these deeds, both this sealed deed of purchase and this open deed, and put them in an earthenware jar, in order that they may last for a long time. ¹⁵ For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Houses and fields and vineyards shall again be bought in this land.”