“A sliver of hope?”

By Rev. Michael Stonhouse

Meditation – Saturday, December 28, 2024

Jeremiah 31:15-17 (Forward, p. 60) CEV p. 801

This passage is one of the numerous passages that Matthew, the author of the first gospel, quotes as a prediction or foreshadowing of the things that would later take place. In this case, it was Herod’s massacre of ‘the Holy Innocents’ in Bethlehem (see Matthew 2:16-18). There, in verse 18, he quotes only the first part, verse 15 of Jeremiah: “In Ramah a voice is heard crying and weeping loudly. Rachel was mourning for her children, and she refused to be comforted because they were dead.” Rachel was the mother of Joseph and Benjamin, two of Jacob’s twelve sons. Joseph’s two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, were the ancestors of the leading tribes of the northern kingdom of Israel, and under the vicious onslaught of the Assyrians this kingdom was conquered, decimated and scattered among the nations of earth (the so-called ‘Lost Tribes of Israel’). No wonder Rachel was said to be weeping and mourning.

But then Jeremiah offers some hope to his original audience (see verses 16-17): “But I, the Lord, say to dry your tears. Someday your children will come home from the enemy’s land. Then all you have done for them will be greatly rewarded. So don’t lose hope. I, the Lord, have spoken.” Interestingly, Matthew doesn’t include these latter two verses—though possibly his readers, probably fellow Jews—might have recalled them nonetheless. Maybe it was because of the mothers of the children so cruelly slain in Bethlehem were not ‘quite of that mind’, not yet, anyway. Later the church would honour these infants or small children as proto-martyrs, as unintentional martyrs, but that would have been of little comfort to those bereft parents in Bethlehem!

But what of the overall tenor of Jeremiah’s message? All through chapters 30 and 31 he conveys a message of hope. Its headings in my present Bible, the Contemporary English Bible, convey this well:

“The Lord will rescue Israel and Judah” (30: 1-11)

“The Lord will heal Israel and Judah” (30: 12-17)

“The Lord will rescue Israel and Judah (30: 18-24)

“Israel will return to God” (31: 1-2)

“The Lord will rebuild Israel” (31: 3-6)

“Israel will return to its own land” (31: 7-14)

“The Lord offers hope” (31:15-22)

“The Lord will bring Judah home” (31: 23-30)

“The new agreement with Israel and Judah” (31: 31-37)

“Jerusalem will be rebuilt” (31:38-40).

Clearly these utterances are prophetic, future oriented promises, designed by God and spoken by Jeremiah to give hope to God’s people. But—here’s the million-dollar question—can we also apply them to ourselves? I think so, for three reasons:

-firstly, they were still far in the future when Jeremiah shared them,

and—this is important—still in the future when Matthew quoted them.

The northern kingdom of Israel would not be resettled by Jewish

people until the establishment of the nation of Israel in 1948! So,

God’s message of hope still stands.

-and secondly, what Jeremiah suggests is, to our human minds and

reasoning, clearly impossible. If Rachel’s children are dead, then

there is humanly speaking no way that her children can come home.

And so God, Jeremiah, are speaking of what we would consider

impossible. In other words, even with the seeming impossible, we

can have hope!

-and finally, because I would consider us, the Church, to be the new

Israel, and so the promises made here also apply to God. Thanks

be to God.

Forward notes:”A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more” (verse 15).

Commemoration: The Holy Innocents

“We know that voice from Ramah. We have heard the cry of Rachel. We have seen the images of mothers weeping for their children because they are no more. From the brutality of war-torn places to the epidemic of gun violence across our nation, we know only too well the bitter tears of families torn apart, lives shattered, and hopes dashed.

“Today, the church pauses to remember the Holy Innocents who were killed in search of the Christ Child. We rightly remember those who lost their lives through no fault of their own. We stand with those who continue the cry of Rachel in the place of hurt, loss, grief, and pain. The church is at its best when we stand with those going through the worst.

“Today, the blood of the Holy Innocents cries out from the ground. And our reply will make all the difference because we worship a God who knows the agony of losing a child. Today, we stand in lamentation; tomorrow, we create a world of safety and hope.”

Moving Forward: “What can you do to protect the innocent?”

A concluding note: Following upon our author’s concluding thought, what about the unborn, so frequently deprived of life, or what about those children robbed of their childhood through abuse or parental drug use or other additions, or through social media posts or societal influences. I dare say, that we often do a very poor job of protecting the innocent.