Word of Salvation – Vol.39 No.40 – October 1994

 

Cinderella With Amnesia

 

Sermon: by Revd. J. W. Westendorp

Text: Jeremiah 2:1-13

Reading: Ephesians 4:21-33; Jeremiah 2:1-13

Singing: BoW 65, 167, 489, 121a

 

Theme: God, as spurned Bridegroom, concerned about Israel’s apostasy.

 

Introd:            I have a book on my shelf that has the title: “Cinderella with Amnesia”.

But it’s not a fairy tale book… it’s a book about the church.

The church forgetting who she is.

That figure of Cinderella is a good realistic image of the church.

We know only too well what the church of Jesus is in a fallen world.
The church on earth is usually not such a pretty sight.
To look at, no one would ever imagine her married to a Prince.
She lives and labours among the ruins of a scarred creation.
She is persecuted from time to time by different ugly sisters.

And then the problem is that this ‘Cinderella’ also has amnesia.
So often she forgets that she IS the fiancé of a marvellous Prince.
A Prince who is coming back to claim His Bride.

This is what the 2nd chapter of Jeremiah is all about too.
God comes and (in a sense) He says through the prophet:
            Hey there, Cinderella, have you forgotten who you really are?
            Don’t you really remember whom you belong to?

A]        THE CONCERN OF THE SPURNED BRIDEGROOM.

1.         Jeremiah takes Israel back in time to its earlier history.

To the time of Israel’s youth as a nation.
The days of Moses and Joshua.
And the glory days of David and the early years of Solomon.

And, okay, those days had their problems too.
But compared to now they were good times.
Times when God received Israel’s love and devotion.
Days when she willingly followed the Lord.
Wonderful times of delighting in God.

Israel might have amnesia but the Lord God doesn’t.  He remembers.

And thru the prophet He says:
I remember the devotion of your youth.
I showed you my tender compassion.
And you showed the same loving-kindness back to me.

In fact notice the real nature of God’s relationship to His people.

It’s like a marriage, a Middle Eastern marriage.
The betrothal… the engagement has taken place.
And that is binding.  Ending it was like a divorce.
They now belong to each other as Bride and Bridegroom.
All that remains is for the Bridegroom to claim His Bride at the wedding feaast.

The Lord speaks of Israel’s love for Him.

But He does so in terms of the love in a covenant of marriage.
“As Bride you loved me and followed me through the desert”.
Israel belongs as a Bride to the One who is Ruler of the Universe.
God is reminding a Cinderella with amnesia who she really is.

2.         If Israel was devoted to God, God was certainly devoted to Israel.

And He spells out the strength of His love for His Bride.

Notice how He does that with just a very brief history lesson.
The history of God’s saving work in a nutshell.
Just a few ‘flash-backs’ to remind us what happened.

God knows how to deal with us people who are prone to forgetfulness.

It’s a method that still works with amnesia.
Show the patient some snapshots from earlier times.
Maybe some glimpses of where she has been will jolt her memory.
The sights and sounds of the past become vivid reminders.

And so in verses 6 and 7 the Lord touches on those early times.
The dramatic exodus out of Egypt… while the Egyptians bury their dead.
Those amazing wanderings in the desert.
Inhospitable terrain where they spent forty years.
Constantly they were led by the One who loved them.
Always provided for with all they needed.
And then finally brought into a rich and fertile land.

The imagery of God’s love and care just piles up in these verses.

Look at all the things that are said about God’s treatment of Israel.
Israel is called ‘holy to the Lord’, set apart for Him.
She is the first-fruits of His harvest.  She benefits from His special protection.
            Any who touch had her better know what they are doing.
            Pharaoh found that out to his eternal regret.

So if the Lord God is a Bridegroom, He is a caring Bridegroom.

His great concern is the well-being of His Bride.

3.         But that takes us to the very heart of the issue in Jeremiah 2.

Israel doesn’t remember to whom she is betrothed.
She’s forgotten the love and care of Her Divine Lover.
She’s forgotten the great wedding party to come.

But the sad part is that she doesn’t want to remember either.

It is a wilful amnesia.  A deliberate turning against her betrothed.
It’s like Cinderella stubbornly wanting to stay in her grotty kitchen.
And refusing to come into the arms of her Prince.

Read these verses a few times and you feel the pain in the heart of God.
Pain we can identify with to some extent.
A young man is engaged to be married… the date has been set.
But his fiancé flirts with every handsome guy around.
She ignores her man and flits from one to another.
Even worse, she has actually committed adultery.

With regard to Israel God puts it even more strongly.

She has sold herself into prostitution.

Vs.20:  On every high hill and under every spreading tree you lay down as a prostitute.

Read the rest of the chapter and God paints a vivid ‘R’ rated picture.
Israel is behaving like a donkey on heat.
A randy woman whose sexual urges are out of control.
And that woman is the Bride of Almighty God.

Yet surprisingly, what comes out here first of all is not judgment.
And there is little of the holy wrath of God.  Ok, that comes too, later in Jeremiah.
And in vs.9 God does lay some formal charges.
But the basic thrust is that God lets us see into His heart…
            as He is hurt deeply by those whom He loves.

“What fault did you find in me?”, says the Lord.
“What injustice did I do that your Fathers strayed so far from me?”

Do you sense in those words some of the pain in heart of the divine Bridegroom?
Here is the Divine Lover who still wants His partner back.
Even though the partner is out looking for greener pastures.
God still appeals to His betrothed to remember who she is.
He loves His Bride… His Church.

Applic: How do we today relate to this image of God and His people?

            These days are days of turmoil for the Church.

It seems the Church of Jesus faces one crisis after another.

Sometimes we feel like a Cinderella sitting in the ashes of our own disasters.
The crisis of living out the gospel in the changing secular world.
An identity crisis because the Church doesn’t seem to fit into modern society.
Crisis after crisis because of our own bickering and fighting.

Sometimes when things get tough and messy in the church we want to give up.

We feel like getting out.
Problems, problems and more problems and we’ve had enough.
And life without the church doesn’t seem all that bad anyway.

In moments like that we need to remember who we are.
Cinderella?  Yes..!  Poor little slave girl for whom life is tough.
And yet…?  Betrothed.  Engaged to be married to Christ, the King of kings.

At times when you feel like giving up on the Church… please remember.

In baptism we were brought into the body of her who is to be the Bride of Jesus Christ.

And leaving is really not much different to jilting the Lover of your soul.

B]         THE PROBLEM OF THE UNFAITHFUL BRIDE.

1.         I’d like us now to take a look at the problem from Israel’s point of view.

The Lord pictured the relationship in terms of betrothal.
And He spoke of Israel’s unfaithfulness in terms of prostitution.

That is entirely appropriate.
If God’s relationship with His people is that of Groom and Bride
            then flirting with other religions is spiritual adultery
                        nothing less than prostitution of the soul.

That’s a consistent picture throughout Scripture.
Time and again Israel messes around with false gods.
And repeatedly that is referred to as adultery… even as prostitution.
But here there is a sense of amazement about that.

Verse 10 and 11 point out that changing gods is not a common practice.
Nations don’t usually change their ancestral gods.
Isaiah might well have added that to do so would be fine.
Why not?
            If you trade in your old idol for the latest model has anything changed?
Of course not.
            You merely trade one form of false religion for another form of false religion.
            When a Hari-Krishna becomes a Mormon… has anything really changed?
            Not at the deepest level.  They’ve just swapped one lie for another lie.

Yet the Lord points out something significant.
In the ancient world people usually stick with their ancestral god.
Even though they aren’t really gods at all people still tend to be loyal to them.
Yet look at what Israel has done.  She has done precisely the opposite.
  In fact she has swapped the genuine article for a forgery.
  The God who was her very Glory, exchanged for that which is futile and useless.

2.         But now please notice where it began.

It didn’t begin with an isolated individual here or there.

It didn’t even begin at the grass roots level – with the people in the pew (so to speak).

Sometimes people in the church drift away and leave the church.

And a faithful pastor is left preaching to a small handful of people.
The Lord reminds us that it also happens the other way.
            That the leaders lead the church into spiritual adultery.
            Unfaithfulness can begin in a church’s theological college or seminary.

Here all Israel is unfaithful but it begins with the leaders.
Right across the board all the nation’s office-bearers are guilty.
And one by one they all come in for a mention.

The priests..?  They don’t ask any longer where the Lord is.
The Bible teachers..?  They don’t even know the Lord.
The rulers..?  They rebel against Him.
And the prophets are more interested in the theology of Baal.

What an indictment of the Spiritual leaders of Israel.
What a mockery…
Those who ought to be reminding ‘Cinderella’ who she belongs to
            are actually spend their time leading her astray.

3.         The outcome of all this is seen in the pathetic picture of vs.13.

The illustration of water.

That’s appropriate because water is one of life’s necessities.
You can’t live long without it… and ultimately you can’t live without God either.

But look how our text puts it.  God says:  Israel has committed two sins.
They have forsaken me, the spring of living water.
And they have dug their own cisterns… broken wells that don’t hold water.

What a contrast.

On the one hand water that is fresh and running – a flowing spring.
It provides life-giving water in endless supply.
It’s like an overflowing fountain.
The imagery is used in John 7 for Jesus the water of life.
A symbol of the outpouring of His Holy Spirit.

On the other hand there is the man-made well.
In the Middle East often a cistern gouged into rock.
And the Lord says: false religion is like that… like a well gouged into rock.
But the rock is cracked and the water seeps out.
And you’re left with nothing to quench your thirst.

Applic: That faces us today again with a choice.

            It’s a temptation for us to get caught up in the idols of our age.

There’s ‘new age’ mysticism embraced by some in the church.
Many become preoccupied with whatever is the latest rage in our pop culture.
Secularism and popularity, affluence and power.

They are the idols that threaten to undermine our faithfulness to Jesus.

Entertainment and sport absorb so much of our time, money and energy.

And then a special warning is needed for those in leadership.

It’s easy to get taken in by the latest fad from some (mega church) guru.

To get swept up with some new program that has been taken from the business world.

But unless they focuses us on who we are in Jesus they are empty cisterns.

Today again the choice is before you.
You can follow the idols of your choice… and there’s plenty to choose from.
But they won’t satisfy – they will always leave you thirsty for more.

The living water comes from the Word and Spirit of Jesus.
It satisfies fully and completely the Bride of Christ.

Too often today too the Church is like Cinderella with amnesia.
We become despondent in our worship and Church membership.
The solution lies in drinking deeply from the living water which is Christ Jesus.
Only in that way can we overcome our amnesia and live as the glorious Bride of Christ.

Amen.