Our God is so astonishingly hopeful about us, even in the depth of our lostness. In today’s reading we see the Lord trying yet again to get the people to repent, directing Jeremiah to create a scroll with all the accumulated warnings written on it. “It may be that when the house of Judah hears of all the disasters that I intend to do to them, all of them may turn from their evil ways so that I may forgive their iniquity” (Jeremiah 36:3). As we’ve noted before, the text shows us the Lord God pondering about different ways the future might turn out: “It MAY be … all of them MAY turn from their evil ways … ”

So Jeremiah got to work on a scroll. He dictated the words, and his secretary Baruch wrote it all down. Then, since Jeremiah was forbidden to go into the temple court (36:5), he sent Baruch to read it to the people there (36:6-10).

When King Jehoiakim’s officials heard about it, they came to listen, and were greatly alarmed (36:16). They told Baruch and Jeremiah to hide, and brought the scroll to report to the king (36:20). The king was not pleased. He had Jehudi son of Nethaniah read it out, and after every three or four columns, the king would cut that material out of the scroll with his knife and burn it in the fire (36:23). (One part of my soul sympathizes with the king. I, too, have sometimes felt like cutting out the verses of the Bible that commanded me to repent.)

Most of the people of the court made no comment about the king’s action, but several of the officials – Elnathan, Delaiah and Gemariah – urged King Jehoiakim not to do this (36:25). He shrugged off their warnings and sent officers to arrest Jeremiah and Baruch. Yet they escaped, for the time being, because “the Lord hid them” (36:26). The next prophecy, predictably, was that things would not end well for Jehoiakim (36:30-31).

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You have such hope for us, O Lord: though we have failed so often, you keep sending someone with a message, thinking maybe we will listen this time: and so often we shrug off the warning, burn the message, and go after the messenger. Yet still you hope the best for us. Grant that our hearts may turn to you, that we may yet learn to be worthy of your hope.