Exile

Is there no balm in Gilead?
    Is there no physician there?

O that my head were a spring of water,
    and my eyes a fountain of tears,
so that I might weep day and night
    for the slain of my poor people!

On a first visit to Rwanda tears are never that far away, in a country where 10 million people were massacred in a hundred days, as you visit schools turned into open mausoleums, where bodies of school children are preserved in lime and laid to rest on the benches where they were slaughtered. My saddest moment came in a vision of extreme beauty looking down on three countries: Rwanda, Burundi and DR Congo, over a vast green forest where you could imagine somewhere hidden from human view the very lost Eden of God The very garden of delight where God first walked with Adam and Eve, now barred from view by fiery Cherubs. Now is only left the slaughter of Abel repeated by so many people, many times, over the years and still ongoing in Congo, although Rwanda is experiencing something of a return to joy as we visit happy churches with young people joyfully singing and dancing in worship to God. Deep in the heart of all of human-kind is a deep longing to go back to Eden.

Jeremiah is a book of deep emotion, it is difficult to separate the words of Jeremiah from the words of Father God as they are so empathic and in tune. As Jeremiah weeps so does God in heaven, at His wayward children who were given so much, but always turned their backs on His infinite kindness to pursue other Gods and puff up their own pride. Despite sending prophet after prophet to bring them back, they always rebelled. The threat of exile was always present as they refused to return to worship only the one true God, many times God relented and sent them yet another chance, a powerful prophet or a king with a reforming heart turned towards Him. Eventually God was forced to act decisively and send His people into 70 years of exile. Withdrawing His shekinah glory from the temple which was then utterly destroyed by the Babylonians along with the rest of the Holy city. His people were deported to Babylon where they sat down and wept besides the waters of a foreign land.

Exile was not only a punishment, it was the tool of a loving God to turn his people back to him. With all the props of religion gone, and pride crushed there was room for a new love affair with the living God. Such was the fiery passion of the three young men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, whose flaming love was not crushed by the fiery furnace, but rather a meeting place for an intimate encounter with their saviour in the midst of the flames.

We eventually have a return under Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel; however, the temple was never rebuilt to its former glory and occupiers never left the land so in the time of Jesus the Jews were still pining for a Messiah to drive out the romans and accomplish a true return. However, Jesus was a very different kind of Messiah. He did bring his people back into a relationship with the three persons of the Trinity if they believed and trusted in Him, and eventually all His redeemed church, will be joined together and welcomed as a bride into the new heavens and the new earth to dwell united with the triune God.