You Can't Spell Hopeless without "Hope"

Like many of the earlier passages in Jeremiah, the 16th chapter begins with unqualified messages of judgment (e.g., "these people will die from terrible diseases" vs. 4, "I have taken away My unfailing love and mercy" vs. 5, etc.)

Yet at verse 14 begins we begin to see a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. It is only a glimmer, however. This is no sudden message of immediate pardon and forgiveness such as we are wont to demand--perhaps to the point of inserting it into the text when it does not exist. Rather, what the LORD has to say to Jeremiah is:

“But the time is coming,” says the Lord, “when people who are taking an oath will no longer say, ‘As surely as the Lord lives, who rescued the people of Israel from the land of Egypt.’ Instead, they will say, ‘As surely as the Lord lives, who brought the people of Israel back to their own land from the land of the north and from all the countries to which he had exiled them.’ For I will bring them back to this land that I gave their ancestors.
“But now I am sending for many fishermen who will catch them,” says the Lord. “I am sending for hunters who will hunt them down in the mountains, hills, and caves. I am watching them closely, and I see every sin. They cannot hope to hide from me. I will double their punishment for all their sins, because they have defiled my land with lifeless images of their detestable gods and have filled my territory with their evil deeds.”

-- Jeremiah 16:14-18

The LORD leaves no doubt that punishment will be meted out--indeed, it will be "doubled." Yet after the necessary suffering, redemption will ensue. How should we interpret this? As with many things in the Divine-human relationship, I suspect we see that which we are looking for. The one who already resents the notion that One other than himself is worthy of the title "God" will see in this evidence of a capricious and punitive Deity, unwilling to suffer the slightest indignity. Conversely, he who believes in a compassionate God will see in this evidence of painful, but necessary, purgatory suffering. This latter man will acknowledge--even if he does not like--the truth that the alcoholic often must hit "rock bottom" before he is willing to forsake the bottle. The drunk must suffer the full effects of his own degeneracy before the "scales will fall from his eyes" and he is willing to see himself as he truly is.

What I find especially interesting from a canonical perspective is the LORD's promise that he will send forth "fishermen" (vs. 16) to "catch" the people. In this context, the fishermen (along with their land-based compatriots, the hunters) are enablers of God's wrath upon the sinful. How fascinating then, that the One who embodied God's ultimate act of compassion, self-revelation, and sacrifice should extend to a handful of common men the possibility of being instruments of His peace by the calling "Follow Me, and I will show you how to fish for people." -- Matt 4:19