Recognising and healing our blind spots (Jer 7:16-8:3)

A former colleague shared his experiences after a visit to India where one of his Western team members became exasperated with the way Indian Christians still maintained the caste distinctions in their church context. ‘Why can’t you just get rid of the caste system?’, he asked one of them. ‘Why don’t you get rid of your consumerism?’, retorted the Indian Christian. For us in the West, the caste system goes against our convictions of the equality and value of all human beings and our emphasis on individual achievement rather than on birth and background. For those in India, however, such hierarchy is the norm, birth and ancestry matter and the ordering of society along these lines is deeply ingrained, so that recognising and subverting such a system is difficult and emotionally costly. It is easier to see the deficiencies and compromises of believers from another culture than in our own.

Judah’s blind spots – worshipping God and other gods

Thus, we may wonder how God’s people in Jeremiah’s time could worship other gods and not see it as wrong. Yet in their context, serving many gods was the norm and the description in Jer 7:18 suggests that they were oblivious to the problem. The whole family was happily involved, it was done openly and in conjunction with offering sacrifices to the Lord as well (Jer 6:20). The queen of heaven mentioned is probably Ishtar, if identified by her Assyrian and Babylonian name, or Astarte as she was known in Canaan. She was an astral deity, a goddess of fertility and war and the cakes made in her honour were likely in the shape of a star (cf. Jer 44:19). Exclusive worship of the Lord alone went against the cultural norm of the time and since everyday life was so deeply immersed in the worship of many gods, it must have felt entirely normal and right to the people.

Judah’s blind spots – sacrifices without obedience

God’s accusation about not commanding sacrifices highlights another aspect of the problem (Jer 7:22). The statement is an exaggeration for rhetorical effect. Sacrifices were required, of course (read Leviticus), but the Lord’s primary concern is with obedience (Jer 7:23). In contrast, the worship of gods in the ancient world only involved sacrifices without expectations of any moral-ethical behaviour. Thus, once again God’s people adopt the value system of their culture and neglect God’s call to reflect His character, His justice and mercy, in their interaction with each other (e.g. Lev 19:9-18). It is a lesson they failed to learn or practise from as far back as the exodus (Jer 7:24-28). Their punishment then will fit their crime: where they sacrificed their children to other gods in the valley of Topheth (on the south side of Jerusalem), their own corpses will lie piled up (Jer 7:31-33) and they who served astral deities will lie unburied under the stars, exposed to the gods they worshipped (Jer 8:1-2) but without being helped by them.

Healing our blind spots

What then are our cultural blind spots, values absorbed that go against God’s requirements? Our materialistic focus and our sexual practices are two dominant areas where this is visible. Our deep-seated belief that material goods and experiences can make us better, more attractive, healthier and happier versions of ourselves drives us to pursue these things and advertising constantly reinforces it. In sexual ethics, our culture has determined that as long as there is mutual consent and no one is harmed, almost anything is permissible. It is hard to counter this because connected to sexual activity is the conviction that such experiences provide the ultimate in fulfilment and that these define who we are.

At heart, then, both issues go back to a search for identity and an authentic self. Being true to oneself, becoming what we imagine ourselves to be, however, is incredibly hard when authenticity is measured by how much we are aligned with our internal feelings (which inevitably fluctuate). Healing our blind spots means going back to Scripture to see what the Lord requires because when we go against Him we hurt ourselves (Jer 7:19). He calls us back to be true to Him because we find our real identity in being loved by Him and belonging to Him and the more we imitate Him, the more we become truly who we are meant to be.

For interest – Is Judah’s future predetermined?

A tension is frequently noted in connection with Jeremiah 7. On the one hand, the exhortation for God’s people to turn to God and change their ways if they want to remain in the land (Jer 7:5-7) suggests a future open to possibilities contingent on Judah’s response to God. On the other hand, God forbids Jeremiah to pray for these people because He won’t hear him (Jer 7:16), which, it is argued, reflects a future (i.e. judgment) already decided. It seems to me, however, that the tension is more apparent than real, and the key misunderstanding is around Jeremiah’s intercession. Forbidding him to pray for the people need not mean a closed future. Rather, God is saying that there is no longer room for delay, for a third person to intercede and buy time for the people to repent. Rather, the only way for a different future is for Judah to turn to God. Things have gone too far for an intermediary to push the judgment out further; there must be reciprocity in the relationship between God and His people for a new start. Thus, the future is still open if Judah will respond to God, but the window of opportunity is closing and cannot be extended by intercessory prayer.

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