For Jeremiah was saying that the destruction of the kingdom did not matter. Israel was still the chosen of the Lord. It could perform the mission given to it by God just as well in exile and dispersal as within the confines of its petty nation-state. Page 77
Jeremiah was the first to perceive the possibility that powerlessness and goodness were somehow linked, and that alien rule could be preferable to self-rule. He comes close to the notion that the state itself was inherently evil. Page 84
I find myself thinking, "But not yet, Lord, not yet."
I don't usually think of myself as more than moderately patriotic - patriotic, yes, but not overtly so. In my shallow little mind, I often think of myself more as a God-fearing (Christian) American than as a patriotic being. Yet, when I think of Jeremiah's mission, to prepare his nation for exile because he believes it is going to be taken over by a foreign power, and I read the brief explanation given by Paul Johnson, I find that I am, all of a sudden, more patriotic than I thought.
It's good to be an American. Although we grunt and grumble, we fuss and fume, our politics have a foul odor, and we think we have it bad, we live in a land where we can not only think and do what we want, we generally get by with it. We are free to be however we want to be. We are free to come and go, to choose our associations, to believe or not believe, to praise or criticize, to marry or not, to raise our families or not ... As a rule, we are not afraid that someone is hiding in every shadow, that our neighbor is reporting our every move to the authorities, that our every coming in or going out is being monitored and puts us in danger.
Our country and our lives in this country provide us with a freedom unmatched anywhere on the earth. We are, in the words of those of us who who are God-fearers, blessed.
So I find I am patriotic to my core. Being an American is something I've always known and take for granted. It is very much part of the foundation of who I am. I find myself singing:
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
Jeremiah's message is good advice, it is meaningful, and I know it is true. But my deepest prayer at this moment is that it's not something we need to know, that God will preserve this wonderful country and protect us against our foes - even when one of our foes may be ourselves.
God Bless America,
Land that I love.
Stand beside her, and guide her
Thru the night with a light from above.
*** I have thoroughly enjoyed two of Paul Johnson's books: A History of the Jews and A History of Christianity. I grin ear to ear, though, when I read his Wikipedia bio (I linked to this site in the first line of this post). Oh, there's so much about his life that I wouldn't applaud, so much of his politics that are contrary to mine, so much about him that gives me pause for thought; but I really do enjoy his writings. God can use any of us for his purposes - Paul Johnson, Jeremiah, that person I don't care for in the super market, me. The whole of it is so much bigger than the sum of its parts - you and me.
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