Jeremiah 23:23-29
23 Am I a God near by, says the
Lord, and not a God far off? 24 Who can hide in secret places so that I cannot
see them? says the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the Lord. 25 I
have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy lies in my name, saying,
"I have dreamed, I have dreamed!" 26 How long? Will the hearts of the
prophets ever turn back—those who prophesy lies, and who prophesy the deceit of
their own heart? 27 They plan to make my people forget my name by their dreams
that they tell one another, just as their ancestors forgot my name for Baal. 28
Let the prophet who has a dream tell the dream, but let the one who has my word
speak my word faithfully. What has straw in common with wheat? says the Lord.
29 Is not my word like fire, says the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks a
rock in pieces?
If you’ve owned a working television
in the past twenty-five years and have never seen an episode of the show Seinfeld, I’m afraid you’ve been using
your television incorrectly. Seinfeld began airing on the National
Broadcast Company in July of 1989 and ran for nine seasons, with its season
finale airing on May 14, 1998[1].
It came to be known as “the show about nothing,” yet Seinfeld was truly a show about everything—everything from
uncomfortable family situations, awkward incidents at work, and unusual
relationship problems. It was the kind of show that addressed topics and
personalities in such a way that every person watching at home could say, “Yes!
I know someone just like that!”
There’s one episode of Seinfeld that comes to my mind this
morning. It’s the first part of a two-part episode titled “Raincoats” (episode
18, season 5). In this episode we’re introduced to Elaine’s new boyfriend,
Aaron. Aaron is an extremely nice, generous, and all around friendly
guy—there’s just one thing about Aaron though that makes him…shall we say a bit
odd. Jerry refers to Aaron as a “close talker.” Aaron has a habit of invading
one’s personal space—even strangers—when he has a conversation with them. In
fact, any time Aaron speaks to someone, their bodies begin to twist and contort
as if they’re taking part in an invisible game of limbo. Aaron’s habit of
“close talking” invades the personal space of whomever he chooses to speak with,
and personal space is not something we so casually surrender.
Personal
space is something very important to us, especially in our culture. It’s that
invisible bubble that surrounds us whenever we are in situations involving
other people. We begin defining our personal space at an early age, about three
or four, and by the time we reach adolescence, the bubble of personal comfort
that surrounds us becomes permanent. Our concept of personal space is generated
by the part of our brains that controls fear[2],
and is likely an evolutionary result of having to protect ourselves and our
food from the predatory tactics of others.[3]
Whether we acknowledge it or not, we all have that radius around us of personal
space, and we’re all made just a bit uncomfortable when someone invades it.
I have this theory that in some ways
we treasure our personal space because it is so easy to control, and we live in
a world where so many things are beyond our control. We can control the two to
four foot radius of personal space that surrounds us simply by moving, by
walking away from someone if they invade our space. Things that fall within our
atmosphere of personal space are usually things that belong to us anyhow,
things we possess and control anyway. So you see, I think we like our personal
space not only because of some defense mechanism left by evolution, but because
we like control. And what’s easier to control than our personal space?
But what do you do when something invades your personal space? What can
you do when something or someone is so invasive that you cannot run from them,
and your personal space all but evaporates? You give in. You change.
In the text we’ve read this morning
from the prophet Jeremiah, our personal space is invaded immediately with three
questions in verses 23 and 24: “Am I
a God near by, says the Lord, and not a God far off? Who can hide in secret
places so that I cannot see them? says the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and
earth? says the Lord.” Now, the first two questions are phrased in such
a way that they require a negative answer[4]:
“Am I a God near by, and not a God far off?” “No, you are not a God far off.”
“Who can hide in secret places from me?” “No one can hide from you.” The third
question is worded so as to require a positive answer: “Do I not fill heaven
and earth?” “Yes, you do fill heaven and earth, O Lord.”[5]
These words come through the prophet
Jeremiah as he speaks out against the false prophets of Judah. These prophets
were proclaiming that peace and prosperity would remain with the people of
Judah, despite the ever-growing threat of Babylon just beyond the border. They
were claiming their dreams had some sort of supernatural authority, and they
used the claims that they had dreamed of safety and comfort as a sign of hope
for the people of Judah. But Jeremiah had the unenviable task of speaking God’s
truth to God’s people: things were not as good as these other prophets would
have them to believe, and the threat of Babylon was real and closer than they
could imagine.[6] But
the people of God (as they so often do even today) chose the safer, softer
words of the false prophets—the more familiar words, and continued to live with
the false hope of a future of safety and comfort, a future in which their
personal space would remain intact and their lives unchanged.
It is into this rose-colored world
of hope that God speaks through Jeremiah, and it is into such a world that
these first three questions invade. You see, for many people of the Ancient
Near East, the gods were physical, geographical deities; the gods were confined
to the laws of time and space. Gods were primarily connected with things like
altars, idols, and temples. The god’s were understood as beings who inhabited
their own personal space, and the humans who worshipped them could seldom
breech that space, and the gods would rarely (if ever) actually inhabit the
space occupied by humans. The gods, as they were understood, could manipulate
the elements of the world, but they didn’t necessarily inhabit every nook and
cranny of creation.
The
people of Judah had a similar understanding at times when it came to YHWH.
God’s place was in the temple in Jerusalem, more specifically, God’s place was
in the Most Holy Place at the center of the temple. From there, God would hear
the prayers of the people and accept their offerings as they were brought to
the temple. God had God’s personal space, and the people had their personal
space, both collectively and individually.
Now, you may be thinking to yourself
right now, “How ludicrous! God is not confined to a building, to a room in a
temple! God is not confined to any one place at all.” But I think if we’re
truly honest with ourselves, we may find that our understanding of God is not
too different from that of those ancient, Semitic people. I know that to be
true because I’ve seen too many pictures of God, and there aren’t many of those
pictures depicting the Almighty in the ordinary places of creation—in the
personal spaces of humanity.
If you walk through the
dark-stained, hardwood doors at the front of Hodges Chapel at Beeson Divinity
School on the campus of Samford University, your eyes will gradually be drawn
upward, towards the grand fresco on the domed ceiling. It is an ethereal scene,
replete with bleached-white clouds and golden rods of sunlight. Saints from the
history of God’s people encircle the dome on some sort of heavenly porch, but
your eyes are quickly drawn to the central figure in the dome. With his
porcelain white skin, straight red hair (with maybe a hint of blonde
highlights?) and light-colored eyes, Jesus (or as I call him, Jesus O’Christ)
gazes down from heaven as a line of angels swirl their way up to higher places
in glory.
That’s where most of us like to put
God—up there, beyond the clouds, with all those who have died before us. We
like to put God up there, with his skin the same hue as ours, his language and
dialect the same as ours. We like to put God up there, out of our personal
space, where God can hear our prayers, bless our food, our troops, and our
country, where he can watch over us as we travel and look down on us when times
are hard. We may not lock God away in the back room of a gilded temple, but we
have certainly developed a habit of pushing God into a tiny box and keeping it on
the highest shelf in heaven—a place up there, beyond the sky, a place
inaccessible to us in this life, a place that doesn’t invade our personal
space.
So you see, just as these words from
Jeremiah spoke to a people who felt like they had God figured out, people who
felt like they could keep God under lock and key at a safe distance from their
personal space, these words speak to us. They speak to us when we think we’ve
got God figured out, when we fool ourselves into believing that God is up there
and not right here. They speak to us when we fool ourselves into believing that
God isn’t near, so God won’t know our actions, our thoughts, our true
motivations for the way we behave in this world. They are words that speak to
us of a God of personal space—a God who invades our personal space. And when
God invades our personal space, we can’t outrun the discomfort because God is a
God who “fills heaven and earth,” a God who inhabits every nook and cranny of
creation.
These prophet’s words echo the words
of another prophet, Isaiah, as they are recorded in the gospel of Matthew, “they
shall name him Emmanuel, which means, ‘God is with us.’” These words
were used to describe the birth of Christ, a birth that proved the invasion of
God into our personal spaces. Christ proved to the world that God is a God near by and not a God far off. Christ proved to the
world that there is no one who can
hide in secret places so God cannot see them. Christ proves to us that God is with us, right here in our
personal space, and that is a truth of both comfort and fear.
If you have spent your days trying
to hide from God, perhaps even trying to hide form God as you’ve sat year after
year on a pew in this room, know now that you cannot hide from God. There is
nowhere you can go and nothing you can do that can remove God from your
presence. God’s invasion of your personal space can be a frightening thought
when you don’t want to let go of control, when your life is too much your own,
and when your life is overcome with selfishness.
But oh what joy comes when one
thinks that God is here—right here—with us, in our personal space! When we are
afraid, God is with us in our personal space. When we are lonely, God is with
us in our personal space. When our hearts are breaking, God is with us in our
personal space. When life seems too much, the way too dark, and there isn’t
anyone there for us, God is with us in our personal space.
May you recognize God in your
personal space this morning. May you let go of the sinful desire to control and
turn your life over to the God who not only resides in heaven, but in every
corner of creation. May you be comforted by the God who is with us. May you
give in, let go, and allow God the rightful place in your personal space.
Let
us pray…
[4] Green,
James Leo. The Broadman Bible Commentary. Edited by Clifton J. Allen. Vols. 6:
Jeremiah-Daniel. Nashville: Broadman Press, 1971, pg.125.
[5]
Ibid.
[6] Bright,
John. Anchor Bible Commentary. Edited by William Foxwell Albright and David
Noel Freedman. Vol. 21: Jeremiah. Garden City, New York: Doubleday &
Company, Inc., 1965, pg. 153.
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