Trickery?
You duped me, O Lord, and I let myself be duped;
you were too strong for me, and you triumphed.
All the day I am an object of laughter;
everyone mocks me.
Whenever I speak, I must cry out,
violence and outrage is my message;
the word of the Lord has brought me
derision and reproach all the day.
I say to myself, I will not mention him,
I will speak in his name no more.
But then it becomes like fire burning in my heart,
imprisoned in my bones;
I grow weary holding it in, I cannot endure it. (Jer 20:7-9)
Jeremiah truly speaks for the vast majority of believers.
There are certain times in our lives where we come to the same conclusion: God has somehow duped us into believing Him or following Him.
Or, maybe, it was not God who duped us. Maybe our parents fooled us into believing.
At least that is what many people think when they are in the pit of despair.
Because, let’s face it, being a follower of Jesus Christ is not exactly the easiest thing in the world. There are problems all around us. There are people who tell us that we are fools for believing. And those people who are telling us that? They are extremely successful or powerful. Their influence is held over a great number of people.
We, on the other hand, oftentimes are weak and in no position to influence a single person.
We wonder if that is fair. We wonder if they know something we don’t. We wonder if, maybe, just maybe, we have been fed a lot of bunk.
That is when we echo the words of Jeremiah.
We feel duped.
We experience the outrage of others against us if we dare to speak up for the Lord. We have others move against us for telling them that what they are doing is immoral or unethical or just plain ol’ wrong.
You know what?
We are right. They are wrong. God has got us covered. That’s all we need to remember.
We have not been duped.
We have been privileged to receive a message from God that needs to be spoken. We have been graced by God to live a life that must be seen by others so that we can witness to the truth.
God has not duped us. He has loved us.
He will never leave our side.
He will see us through.
FAITH ACTION: Pray for the grace to remain firm in your resolution to follow Jesus Christ.