Is God just love, or is God just love? Reflections on Jeremiah 42-44 and Luke 23

I've been reading The One Year Bible this year and for the last several days, my 3 year old has asked me to read to her as she falls asleep.  The daily readings this time of year (if you start on January 1) are the last few chapters of Jeremiah.  Not really what I would pick to start my daughter on when thinking of easy verses to digest, but they do put her right to sleep at least.  The subject matter of the book of Jeremiah is the destruction of Jerusalem and the kingdom of Judah by the Babylonians.  This would be a very, very difficult book to understand if you came upon it with the preconceived notion that God is just love.  God imprisons, exiles, slaughters, and starves all but the smallest remnant of His people in the book of Jeremiah.  A different notion of God is needed to understand what is going on.  We must consider God, not as just love; but rather as just love. Merciful, but ultimately just love.

God created us to be in communion with Him, but He also created us to worship Him.  This morning in my life group we watched a lesson from Paul David Tripp on parenting 6-12 year olds which focused on teaching your kids that they are idolaters.  It was listening to Dr. Tripp that led me to understand a passage in Jeremiah and I want to elaborate on that today.  After the Fall, we began to choose other things over God.  As Augustine is oft quoted, "Our loves are not rightly ordered." In the book of Jeremiah, we find that the Jews have, for generations, been idolizing other gods and things and ideas instead of devoting all their worship to their Creator.  Although they have been given a special place in Creation by God, they have chosen to follow other 'gods' and disobey the law that God established for them through Moses.  The Mosaic law has a fairly clear penalty for this: death.

So, when Jeremiah starts to receive messages from The Lord of Heaven's Armies as the NLT translates it, he is surrounded by people who, based on the law they have received from their Creator, carry a death sentence.  In chapter 42, we find the last remaining Judean rebel captains have come to Jeremiah claiming they want the counsel of the Lord.  They claim they will accept what the Lord says and do as He asks.  What God says is amazing.  God says, paraphrasing vv. 10-12, "I'm sorry that I punished you all so severely.  I will stop this and turn my weapon, Babylon, away from you if you obey me and stay in Jerusalem.  I will show you mercy, even though you don't deserve it."  What amazing love!  Generations of these people have dishonored their Creator, even though they know Him and are special to Him, and still God decides to show mercy.

Unfortunately for the Judeans, it turns out they were not being honest with Jeremiah and had already made up their minds to do something different than what God has asked them to do.  Of course, God knows this, but still He seeks for these people to choose differently.  In v. 21, Jeremiah tells them exactly that and in v. 22 he reiterates the fate of those who would disobey and seek refuge in Egypt with the Judean ally against Babylon.  Now we get to the part I was having trouble understanding.  If Jeremiah knows that all the Judeans who enter Egypt will die, then why in 43:6 would he consent to go with them?  I was committing the same idolatry as so many before me.  I was putting myself in Jeremiah's shoes and choosing the idol of comfort and safety over submission to the will of God.  Of course, Jeremiah does not do this. Jeremiah is not an idolater.  He is going to Egypt because his loving God is going to make one more plea to His people to obey Him.  Jeremiah's trip to Egypt affords him the opportunity to actually show the Judeans the very place where the Babylonian king will set up his court to dispense justice upon those who had disobeyed God and make one final plea for them to return to Jerusalem.

This is merciful, but ultimately just, love.  This is not just love.  Even Jeremiah's final plea falls on deaf ears and their sentence is read in 44:14.  The Judeans lived after the law had been established but before God's plan for redemption of all His fallen creation had been revealed.  Later, in Babylon, a man named Daniel would be one of the first humans to have God's redemptive plan explained to him.  If you don't know the details of this plan of redemption or have questions about it, please contact me or ask another Christian about something called The Gospel.  It will, quite literally, save your life.  If you've accepted the good news and still want to read my ramblings about how this same quality of just love is revealed in Luke's recounting of Jesus on the cross, then let's continue.

In Luke 23, Jesus is sentenced to execution by crucifixion.  On the day of his execution, it just so happens that two other men have been ordered to be crucified at the same site.  These two men carry a death sentence which has been justly issued under Roman law, just as the Judeans in Jeremiah's day carried death sentences justly issued under Mosaic law.  In vv. 39-43 we have an exchange between these men and Jesus.  One man, seeking a God who is just love, asks for Jesus to save himself and them, even though they don't deserve it.  The other man, recognizing that God is just, knows that he deserves to die and asks only that Jesus "remember" him, a plea for mercy over justice.  One of these men is promised paradise though he deserves only death.  The other man was given an opportunity.  He, though he did not deserve it, was given a model in his fellow condemnee of a way to escape death.  Had he chosen to admit his guilt and plea for mercy over justice as the other man had done, I am certain that Jesus would have granted it.  As the evangelist does not record this act of repentance, we are left to surmise that it did not occur.  Ultimately, Jesus(God), did not show only love for his created and save everyone, but rather displayed merciful just love.