Tryin to Hang Touch - Think Baruch

I read an interesting piece about a little known Old Testament hero this week.  Baruch was secretary to the Prophet Jeremiah whose message was delivered at a time of extreme calamity for the people of Israel.  Their society was plundered and the populace exiled to Babylon.  Quite naturally, Jeremiah’s preaching, pointing out the sinful ways Israel had followed was not popular.  Jeremiah was beaten and thrown in prison. Jeremiah asked Baruch to record God’s words and read them aloud in the temple.  Baruch could have said “no thanks”.  He knew what the consequences of doing what Jeremiah asked would be.  In spite of that, he did read God’s words in the temple and there were consequences.  His hopes and dreams were shattered.  He was courageous but he to felt that he had reached the end of his rope.

In one of my favorite verses in Jeremiah (45:33) he cried out to God as all of us do when the trials we face overwhelm us.

“Woe is me! For the Lord has added sorrow to my pain, I am weary with my groaning and have found no rest.”

In one of those “twists” that only come through in the Bible, God asked him if he was speaking out to bring himself honor or God honor.  And then God promised him, though his life may not be as Baruch imagined it, God would protect him no matter what.

I sit in here and reflect on Baruch a good deal.  Every dream he had for his life – a home, a family, a career – lay in tatters, but God promised him “do as I command and I will see you through”.  No matter how hopeless our situation seems, God’s promise endures.

That is a message that resonates with me.  I can’t change the past.  I can’t make family love and forgive me or friends stand by me.  I can’t make the Virginia legislature reinstate early release.  I can’t make the Governor commute my sentence.

The day I was arrested I had simple decisions to make:  do I come clean and begin the process of getting right with God or do I play the system the way I’d been trained?  Do I contest a divorce and fight over property or do I just say “take it all, whatever you want”?  I chose to do what I thought God required of me.  For almost three years almost every piece of news I’ve received has been bad.  Not a week has gone by that I haven’t found myself, like Baruch, bemoaning my circumstances and asking “what else God?”

Yet if given the same choices today, I’d do the same thing again.  God never promised Baruch that doing the right thing would be easy.  He did promise him He’d never leave him.  And, God always keeps His word.