Carried or Sent? Part 1

The following two posts are from a devotional I provided for a meeting I had last week.  

Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7 - Common English Bible

The prophet Jeremiah sent a letter from Jerusalem to the few surviving elders among the exiles, to the priests and the prophets, and to all the people Nebuchadnezzar had taken to Babylon from Jerusalem

⁴ The Lord of heavenly forces, the God of Israel, proclaims to all the exiles I have carried off from Jerusalem to Babylon: ⁵ Build houses and settle down; cultivate gardens and eat what they produce. ⁶ Get married and have children; then help your sons find wives and your daughters find husbands in order that they too may have children. Increase in number there so that you don’t dwindle away. ⁷ Promote the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because your future depends on its welfare. 

 

This was the passage we studied in Sunday school last week.  This passage bothered me because of the idea that God sent the Israelites into Exile.  And I wasn’t the only one it bothered, so we were talking about it. 

 

Jeremiah had spent a whole lot of time prior to this passage trying to convince those who lived in Judah to change their ways – they didn’t.  The people to whom this letter is written are now in exile in Babylonia.  One of the things that bothers me about this passage because the idea that God sent them into exile almost seems to remove their guilt in the matter.  So, we were having that discussion.

 

Jeff Taylor is a member of our Sunday school class, and he loves words.  He pointed out that the verb used in the Common English is carried.  “proclaims to all the exiles I have carried from Jerusalem to Babylon.”  God didn’t send them, he carried them.  God went with them.  They were without their land and their freedom, but they were not without God.

 

What difference does that make?  What is the difference between sent and carried?

 

In 2011, our older son, Grant, was a senior in high school.  Our younger son, Josh, was a freshman.  All through their lives, Josh had been dragged – uh, invited – to events that involved Grant – track meets, band concerts – whatever Grant was involved in, we, his parents, attended, and Josh went with us.  On this day in 2011, Josh was the one who was playing in the band concert.  Grant really wanted to go to a basketball game at Cabell Midland High School – on the other side of the county.  We told him he had to go and support Josh, at least for the first part of the concert, and then he could go the game.

 

He grudgingly did so, and then left to drive to Ona once he was finally released by his mean parents.  Not much later than that, my husband, Steve, got a phone call from Grant.  Grant had been pulled over for speeding, and the Barboursville police officer made him call us.  Grant had been driving 96 miles an hour.

 

In the city of Barboursville, when you get a ticket for driving 96 miles an hour, you can’t just pay the fine.  You have to go to court.  So, when the time came, Steve and I drove Grant – he was no longer driving at this point - to court in the Senior Center in Barboursville.  Its rows and rows of chairs, with a table up front, at which are seated the judge and a police officer.  When it is your turn, you approach the table and have a seat for the hearing.  When Grant’s time came, he went up front, and we went with him.  We all sat at the table to talk to the judge and police officer.

 

After it was over, and we were walking back to the car, Grant said, “I didn’t know you were going to come with me to the front.” It was a statement of thanksgiving.  In a time of fear, anxiety, and shame, he was not alone.

 

We didn’t send Grant to court after his ticket.  We carried him there.