“Return, faithless people,” declares the Lord, “for I am your husband.”

One thing I don’t tell to too many people is that I’m a pastor.  I especially try to avoid letting them know I am a senior pastor.  Why, you ask?  Well, I’ve seen people literally change their behavior on account of me.  While that may not be a bad thing in and of itself, I think it encourages them to put on a mask…just for me.  Then it’s harder for me to get to know them “in the raw”; it’s harder for me to relate to them because they’re covering up or trying to be someone that they’re not.  I don’t change because someone in my presence is a pilot or politician or plumber or poker player.  I’m just me all the time.

One part of being a pastor I kind of enjoy is doing marriage counseling with Jenni, my wife.  We work very well together in this regard.  We both enjoy seeing couples or spouses get to the “breakthrough” moments … when they come.  Unfortunately, they don’t come often enough.  It is amazing how stubborn people can be!  I mean, we’ll hear their problems, offer solutions and strategies, and many times they’ll turn around and almost lecture us about how right they are.  Well, excuse me, I’m not the one with problems, OK?!  That’s on a bad night.  But can you imagine having martial problems for hundreds of years?  Yep, it’s happened…between God and Israel.  And that’s what Jeremiah 3 addresses.

In an analogy used frequently in Scripture — perhaps most notably in Hosea — God says he married Israel and acted like a husband to her.  There have been a great many volumes written about this: God’s faithfulness and Israel’s unfaithfulness.  God’s commitment and Israel’s lack thereof.  God’s love and Israel’s love for other gods.  So after, say, 1000 years of this, God finally “gave faithless Israel her certificate of divorce and sent her away because of all her adulteries” (Jeremiah 3:8).  Even the patience of God has limits.  By comparison, Noah’s generation only got 120 years (Genesis 6:3), and they died when time ran out.  Of course, they weren’t married to the Lord either.

Despite the divorce, however, God had no intention of turning Israel away forever.  This is evident from his appeal: “Return, faithless Israel…I will frown on you no longer, for I am merciful…I will not be angry forever…Return, faithless people, for I am your husband” (3:12, 14).  Notice the present tense “am.”  Despite the divorce, he still considers her to be his wife and he her husband.  But Israel would have none of it.  She continued to prostitute herself with false gods and subject herself to all kinds of indignities and slavery in the process, marrying herself, as it were, to them.  Evidence of this was her giving herself to them.  Now here is the interesting point: In Deuteronomy 24:1-4, Moses prohibited a divorced wife whose second marriage also failed to return to her first husband.  The divorce and second marriage already “defiled” her, so marrying husband number one again would compound it, being “detestable in the eyes of the Lord.”  Yet in Jeremiah the Lord says that even though Israel “marries” herself to another, he is still willing to have her back.  Does this mean that he is violating his own law?  I don’t think so.  John wrote in his gospel, “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” (1:17).  The point is that God’s mercy, kindness, grace, forgiveness and compassion go beyond the law, supersede the law.  His going beyond his own law shows how much, how strong his desire is to have Israel — and by extension, us — back.

Another thought: when we consider a man for leadership (pastor or deacon) in our church, we ask his wife about her husband:  What’s he really like at home?  Is he a spiritual leader there?  Does he teach and train the kids?  Do they respect him?  It is the wife and the kids who know the “dirt” on the guy.  Hopefully we’ll get an honest report.  But we ask them because they’re the ones who know best.  With that in mind, consider the parallel of Israel being the wife of the Lord, or us being the Bride of Christ.  God’s primary relationship to us is as a spouse, our husband.  From a spouse’s perspective, then, we should know best what the Lord is really like up close.  We can testify that there is no “dirt” with God, that he is indeed kind and gracious and loving and forgiving and compassionate.  We know what he expects.  We know that he leads us, guides us, protects and provides for us, and teaches us just as a husband should do.  We know this because he has chosen the most intimate relationship possible: our husband!  He is married to us.

How well do you know your Husband?  How well do you tell others what your spouse is like?