Hunger and Thirst – Jeremiah 2:13
For My people have committed two evils: they have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, to hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water.
A friend knew I was headed off to another of my many construction industry conferences. He asked, “Is this your annual Tar convention?” “Tar!” I thought, “Nooo! It’s the National Asphalt Paving Association’s annual meeting! It’s ASPHALT! Not tar! Dear Lord. Do you not know that asphalt is the most recycled material in the world and that 90% of the roads we use are made from it? Strangely though, as I was mastering my defensive thoughts, I knew that for many of us asphalt devotees, our gathering might be called The National Tar & Broken Cistern Conference.
This is not a blanket judgment on capitalism or its partner, democracy. Not at all. They have helped create the most stable society this earth has yet known. Yet, we do see the cracks, don’t we? Capitalism and democracy are not inherently evil. They aren’t the two specific evils Jeremiah is referring to, but being human institutions, they are infected.
If my construction brethren and I have lost sight of the fact that God is the creator of hydrocarbons and the giver of the intellectual gifts which enable us to produce asphaltic cement and build roads with it; if we are greedily lavishing upon ourselves the spoils of our profits, then we have forsaken God. If our lives are purely financially driven and asphalt is merely our ticket to material blessing, then we have hewn out for ourselves lives that are indeed cracked. Our cisterns will never hold living water – the very thing they were designed to do. This is a great loss because Living Water is the only means of satisfying our native hunger and thirst.
How tragic that by merely living out the American Dream (unedited), we can participate in evil. Evil? Really? I am certain the fine looking (almost exclusively Caucasian) executives with their wives and children walking the granite and marble corridors of the Marriott would find the idea – that they are evil, absurd and offensive. It is quite understandable. Have their pastors, dependent on their tithes, addressed the idolatry of materialism as it may pertain to their hearts? It would be rare. For conservative, upper middle class American Dreamers, only those who commit violent crimes (and those who do not believe as they do) represent evil.
If however, evil is redefined as those things which cause the greatest harm, to the greatest number of people, over the longest period of time, then broken-cistern Christianity, where Living Water is ritually wasted is culpable. If we have discredited the gospel with our lives, which convey that surrender to Christ as Lord, and walking in the Spirit are optional tracks, then an evil (although benign in appearance) has infected our ranks. The enemy will rule us as long as we continue to measure Christianity by our own standards instead of those that Jesus revealed and the apostles preached. How much Living Water leaks out of a pseudo-Christianity where surrender to Christ is optional?
To some, whose grasp of God’s sovereignty disallows questions, this essay will be folly at best and misleading heresy at worst. However, those who are hungering and thirsting may find encouragement because someone is validating their questions. Their broken hearts are not irrelevant. In fact, their holy dissatisfactions (minute as they might seem) likely represent the sprouting of kingdom seeds God has planted. And being of the mustard seed variety, they may ultimately grow into safe spaces where others can find refuge.
Holy dissatisfaction is a pivotal crossroads in our journey. One road leads to liberty and the other leads to bitterness, posing as super spirituality. When the idea of dissatisfaction first crosses our minds, the enemy will be present telling us it is the church’s fault for serving an inadequate diet of spiritual nourishment. He may also throw in a few people who have always rubbed us wrong to sweeten his next proposal, which is typically, “You need to find a new church.”
In a quieter voice, the Holy Spirit is also speaking. He says, “Watch over your own heart. For your own good, don’t pass the blame of your barrenness onto others.” If we follow the Spirit’s path, we will find that He is present and that he has always been present. As we acknowledge who God is, we will discover that he has prepared a feast for us in the presence of our enemies. New opportunities, we have only dared to imagine, will appear on our horizon.
It is the Father’s glory to deliver his children from their worldly affections, from whatever tar we have given our lives to, from whatever cisterns we have hewn for ourselves. To do this we have to know where we have become entangled in this world. We must humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord and ask him to show us.
Father, deliver us from all evil, for Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forevermore. Make us vessels of honor, which not only hold living water, but which also pour it out for those you have placed near to us. Amen.
And, did I mention that asphalt is the most recycled material in the world?