¶ Message to Young Graduates
Friends , like I said , I didn't realize how long things went , so I'm going to talk faster than I normally talk with these graduations , but I definitely want to have a message for our young people that are out there , and there are two passages that we folks often , we pastors often go to when we're talking about being young people and encouraging young people .
One is in Timothy , but the second is this one here this morning , jeremiah 1 , where he talks about I'm only a boy and can I be a prophet . So interesting story of Jeremiah the prophet . So Jeremiah is offering his prophecy at a unique time in the history of the Jewish people .
In fact , the Jewish community , the nations are falling , they're getting overtaken by the Babylonians , and so Jeremiah's got a couple of things that make his preaching , make his message right now a little more
¶ Jeremiah's Challenging Prophecy
difficult . One is he is young , as indicated obviously by the passage itself . He's only a boy , I am only a boy . But second , this is significant time and the message that he's been given to share with this community is a tough message to swallow , because the community is falling apart . It's not going to be a positive message hey , israelites , way to go .
No , it's going to be something else . It's going to be talking about how they've made mistakes , how they have failed . But not only that when you're talking about this failure , you're not just talking about how you got overtaken . But in the minds of these people of early faith , the question isn't always centered around did we fail ?
Did we not do the right things ? Or maybe more significantly , maybe even more frightfully , did God leave us ? Did God decide that we weren't worthy of being supported anymore and that's why we've been overtaken ? How bad must we have been that God quit supporting us ?
So the early mindset , the early faith wouldn't necessarily easily be able to distinguish between those two things Our actions actually leading to this place that we're at , versus God deciding we deserve some punishment . God deciding we needed to be taught a lesson of some measure . So you can imagine a young boy given this message to share with this community .
It might feel a little bit tenuous , right , he might feel like that environmentalist out of Sweden . That's what is she ? 17 , 18 now Greta Thunberg . Now , she doesn't lack for courage ,
¶ God's Covenant Written on Hearts
obviously , this young woman speaking out about environmental concerns , but you can see how it might feel . Overwhelming's a message that we need to understand . That comes from the Jeremiah passage . It's in that first chapter , verse 1 , when he's talking .
God's talking to Jeremiah and saying you're only a boy , but I gave you the words you are to say I am with you , I have equipped you to do the things that you need to do to deliver this message to this world . You have what you need . This is Jeremiah , chapter 1 , and God's affirmation to Jeremiah to preach that message .
And I feel like it's a particularly important message for young people . We as adults don't often feel like we are in control of that much that's going on around us in this world and we wrestle with some of that .
Younger people might feel even more so , even more like they're being tossed to and fro , wondering exactly what they have been given to speak in to this , what they had been given to speak into this , so that challenge can be even more difficult for young people .
But I want you to hear the follow-up that comes in the passage in Jeremiah just a little bit later here , chapter 33 , where he says 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 . For us today , it's a good message , it's an important message , it's a comforting message , but it's not one we're too unfamiliar with .
But for those people back 500 , 600 BCE , that was an even more important message , because the temple got destroyed in that overtaking and the temple was thought of as the house of God . That's where God lived right .
And if you were going to go visit God , if you were going to go give sacrifice to God , if you were going to do anything with God , you went to the temple . And so the concern would be when the temple goes down , what does that say about God ? Did God leave , not really trusting the Israelites anymore ? Did God get beaten ?
Was some other force stronger than our God ? You can imagine how that might be floating through in their minds . And maybe even a third concern where do we go to find God now ? Where is God , if indeed God is still here ?
So when Jeremiah preaches this message of saying you know what , we're not going to need a building anymore , because God's coming to us on our hearts
¶ God's Presence Beyond the Temple
. God's going to be with each and every one of us in this really , really intimate way , all the time , everywhere . Hopefully you're seeing a little bit of why I chose this passage for today .
As we are cheering on these graduates , cheering on these scholarship recipients , we want you to know those that I can still see out here floating around that , wherever you go , whatever the new adventures that are ahead of you , in new places or in old places that are becoming new , as you start to wonder exactly who you're supposed to be and what you've been
equipped to do to offer to the world , I hope that you can remember this passage in Jeremiah , which was occurring at an even more difficult time than maybe we live in , that was saying I'm with you . Our God walks with us and always stays as close as our heart
¶ Encouragement for Life's New Adventures
. Amen , amen .