“Then the Lord said to me, ‘Look, Jeremiah! What do you see?’” (Jeremiah 1:11).
“I spy with my little eye …» The simple game makes us deem the things we see as «marvelous» things.God asked Jeremiah that same question during the children of Israel ‘s greatest time of apostasy and rebellion. He was called to be alone, disdained, mocked and abandoned by his fellow countrymen. And all because he saw something marvelous by faith.
God asked him several times, «What do you see?»
One time he saw the branch of an almond tree (Jeremiah 1:11); another time, a pot of boiling water (1:13). And the last time, he saw figs (24:3). Each one of those visions represented something God wanted to show him regarding the future of His people and the role he would play as a prophet.
In his book, we read some of the most heartbreaking cries, but also some of the most comforting promises in the Bible.
The future didn’t seem very promising, but God promised His presence. It demanded firmness and loyalty, repentance and conversion, but the hope it transmitted was so bright, that it allowed Jeremiah to glimpse, by faith, what would happen later on.
Jeremiah’s life wasn’t easy, but in the imminent captivity and desolation, he saw God’s perpetual faithfulness and the abundance He provided for His children.
What do we see? Often, when facing trials, our prospects don’t seem necessarily marvelous. We don’t always have the faith that allows us to see beyond what’s happening.
When we focus on our inability to speak or insist that we’re children, we don ‘t allow God to touch our mouth and send us out. We don’t believe the tears that will come with our mission will show a comforting God. We don ‘t believe the loneliness our message will provoke will reveal the Holy Spirit’s constant company.
May our faith lead us to see what God sees. May it also be written about us, “Yet amid the general ruin into which the nation was rapidly passing, Jeremiah was often permitted to look beyond the distressing scenes of the present to the glorious prospects of the future, when God’ s people should be ransomed from the land of the enemy and planted again in Zion.”(Prophets and Kings, ch. 34, p. 408). What did he see? What do I see? A marvelous thing!
