God is so faithfully watching over His Word to perform it. Let’s go through the first chapter of Jeremiah, to see how seriously God takes His Word. When he commissioned Jeremiah, he gave him authority to carry His Word with fire and power!
The Word of the Lord Comes
Jeremiah 1:2 “To whom the word of the Lord came..”
Jeremiah 1:3 “It (the word of the Lord) came also…”
Jeremiah 1:4 “Then the word of the Lord came to me…”
God is ALWAYS speaking. Proverbs 1:21-22 says that wisdom cries aloud outside and in the open squares. There is no doubt that His Word comes to us more often than we are even aware of!
The Word of the Lord comes when we are in prayer. It comes while we are waiting upon Him. It comes through what we see and hear in His presence. It comes during worship — we love seeing people pause during worship, and pull out their Bible to read a verse the Holy Spirit is highlighting to them.
And while there is a strong atmosphere for His Word to be heard in church, the Word of the Lord doesn’t only come in church. It comes while you’re driving your car, while you’re fishing, while you’re in town, while your at work, and just doing your daily assignments.
He is not limited. The question isn’t whether He is speaking, it is, are we making ourselves available to hear Him? Take intentional time to listen to His voice today. And remember this, you cannot say God is not speaking if your Bible is closed! Within the Bible is the written will of God for your life.
We are responsible to incline our ear to hear what He is saying to us. We are also responsible to watch for, and remove things that block our hearing—sin, distractions, busyness, compromise, and anything else that dulls our spiritual ears.
Before You Were Ever Born
Jeremiah 1:5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations.”
This verse proves that Jeremiah’s calling was not based on his merit, his abilities, his looks, his eloquence, or any lack thereof! He was set apart and ordained by God while still in his mother’s womb.
God has known you and called you well before you had time to mess everything up. He planted you exactly where He destined you to be born.
Some of you were born into abuse, addiction, chaos and disfunction… But hear the Word of the Lord today;
YOU WERE BORN TO BE A DELIVERER. YOU WERE BORN TO BE A CHAIN BREAKER. YOU WERE BORN TO DESTROY THE GENERATIONAL CURSE.
God knows your origin, and He is not moved by it. He is not intimidated by your past. By His power, you can—and you are—breaking the curse. You break it with your words, with your heart and faith attached to what you are speaking.
Psalm 139:16 “Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in Your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.”
Your days are written in His Book. You were born to break the curse. You were born to bring deliverance. You were born to change the lineage. Do you believe this?
Believing this changes the course of your tongue and your speech. In believing, you will begin aligning your mouth to what God has written in His Book concerning you. We were all born into sin, and we all have to come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. Now, as children of God, we are all called to steward what He’s entrusted to us.
You born for such a time as this! No matter what lineage you were born into—you have a testimony of God’s keeping power, and God’s delivering power!
When God Speaks, There Is Weight
Jeremiah’s response wasn’t, “Lord, I’ve been waiting for this! I knew I was called! I knew I was special!” Instead, he cried, Jeremiah 1:6a “Ahhhh, Lord God!”
This was an exclamation, as if he had gotten punched in the gut! Have you ever had an encounter with God that made you stop in your tracks? That moment where all you can say is… “Ahhh…”
There is weight to the voice and call of God. When God speaks, you feel the depth of it. Sometimes the weight of it is so deep, your flesh trembles in His presence.
Jeremiah did. And then he brought his excuse to the Lord,
Jeremiah 1:6b “I cannot speak, for I am a youth.”
He was a young man surrounded by respected priests. His first thought probably wasn’t, “Everyone is going to celebrate this!” It was more like, “What are they going to think? I’m too young. They won’t believe me. I’ll be persecuted.” Yet beneath all of that He felt the weight of God’s hand upon him. He felt the mighty call of God propelling him into the Lord’s will.
So what about you? What have your excuses been? Where have you been telling God why He can’t use you - as though He isn’t already aware? Let’s give Him those excuses this week.
Every Word from God carries within itself the ability to perform what He has spoken! God is not a man that He should lie. To know Him better is to stop questioning whether His promises are true. Every promise of God in Christ is Yes and Amen.
Guard What God Has Spoken
God answered Jeremiah’s excuse with these words,
Jeremiah 1:7 “Do not say, ‘I am a youth, For you shall go to all to whom I send you, and whatever I command you, you shall speak.’”
What a powerful correction! And a reminder.. Don’t speak against what God has spoken over you!
1 Timothy 4:12 “Let no one despise your youth, but be an example to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity.”
Guard the Word of the Lord inside of you. Protect it. Don’t talk yourself out of your calling. Don’t tell God why He can’t use you, and don’t let anyone despise you for it. Instead, ask yourself: What is God telling me to say and do? Who is He sending me to? What am I seeing in His presence? And boldly declare: I will not disdain His voice!
Don’t Be Afraid of Their Faces
Jeremiah 1:8 "Do not be afraid of their faces, for I am with you to deliver you,” says the Lord.”
God knew Jeremiah would be rejected. And he was. Jeremiah became known as the weeping prophet because his heart broke over the rebellion of God’s people. For forty years he faithfully delivered God’s message while experiencing rejection, persecution, ridicule, and mistreatment.
Yet he remained faithful. Why? Because he valued his encounter with God more than the affection of people. God told him: “Do not be afraid of their faces, for I am with you to deliver you.”
That Word still speaks today! God’s Word is not always the popular word. Paul warned Timothy that people would accumulate teachers who tell them what their itching ears want to hear rather than enduring sound doctrine.
2 Timothy 4:3–5 “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.”
This is for you today! Stay watchful, endure hardship, fulfill your ministry!
God's Word is the Highest Authority
Jeremiah 1:9-10 “ Then the Lord put forth His hand and touched my mouth, and the Lord said to me, “Behold, I have put My words in your mouth. See, I have this day set you over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out and to pull down, to destroy and to throw down, to build and to plant.”
God’s Word is the highest authority. When His authority was transferred to Jeremiah, Jeremiah could face anyone without fear. Jesus has given us the keys to the Kingdom, and we are to use them to bind and to loose. We are to speak God’s Word, in agreement with Heaven. And when we speak it with persistent faith, things change.
The Watchful One
Jeremiah 1:11-12 “Moreover the word of the Lord came to me, saying, “Jeremiah, what do you see?” And I said, “I see a branch of an almond tree.” Then the Lord said to me, “You have seen well, for I am ready to perform My word.”
KJV — “Then said the Lord unto me, Thou hast well seen: for I will hasten my word to perform it.”
In Hebrew, the almond tree (shaqed) comes from the root shaqad, meaning awake, alert, watchful, keeping watch. The almond tree was the first tree to awaken after winter while everything else was still dormant. It became known as “the watchful tree.”
God is speaking to you today. He is saying, “I am here, I AM AWAKE, I AM ALERT, I AM KEEPING WATCH over My Word, to PERFORM IT in your life — I will see to it that it's completed!"
The almond tree was the first to awaken. What a beautiful picture of Jesus! He is our Forerunner. The Firstborn. The Word of God. When we speak God’s Word, Jesus goes before us. He is watching over His own Word to perform it.
Isaiah 55:11 “So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.”
Don't Go for What's Easy
Jeremiah 1: 13-16 “And the word of the Lord came to me the second time, saying, “What do you see?” And I said, “I see a boiling pot, and it is facing away from the north.” Then the Lord said to me: “Out of the north calamity shall break forth on all the inhabitants of the land. For behold, I am calling all the families of the kingdoms of the north,” says the Lord; “They shall come and each one set his throne at the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem, against all its walls all around, and against all the cities of Judah. I will utter My judgments against them concerning all their wickedness, because they have forsaken Me, burned incense to other gods, and worshiped the works of their own hands.”
Jeremiah was not given an easy assignment! He faced great opposition, he was rejected, and he wept over the people he was sent to.
At one point he became so discouraged that he decided he wasn’t going to speak anymore. But then came one of the most powerful verses in all of Jeremiah.
Jeremiah 20:9 “Then I said, “I will not make mention of Him,Nor speak anymore in His name.” But His word was in my heart like a burning fire shut up in my bones; I was weary of holding it back, and I could not.”
That’s what happens when the Word of God truly gets inside of you!! You can not hold it in. Jeremiah watched God fulfill exactly what He promised for forty years. Again and again, God hastened His Word to perform it.
The Commission and The Blessing
Jeremiah 1:17-19 “Therefore prepare yourself and arise, and speak to them all that I command you. Do not be dismayed before their faces, lest I dismay you before them. For behold, I have made you this day a fortified city and an iron pillar, and bronze walls against the whole land—against the kings of Judah, against its princes, against its priests, and against the people of the land. They will fight against you, but they shall not prevail against you. For I am with you,” says the Lord, “to deliver you.”
This chapter closes with a charge and a blessing that is just as powerful for us to walk in today!! I believe the Lord is still saying the same thing to His Church.
Prepare yourself and arise. Speak everything the Lord commands. You are His set apart instruments, dedicated to His Word and His work. The world may fight against you, they may misunderstand and mistreat you, but remember - they will not prevail against you! God is with you and He is faithful to deliver you.
May we be people who hear the Word of the Lord and guard it with fervor. May we speak the Word of the Lord with passion and persuasion. May we be those that know God is faithfully watching over His Word to perform it!