The word for almond here is not the common name but a
poetical name, it is a tree which blooms early and the name here is something
like the tree that hastens to awake, the watcher, so God says this is an image
of Him, watching over His word to perform it, something is about to happen, the
time is near. Like Samuel, whose
prophetic career began with a word against his mentor, the priest, Eli,
Jeremiah’s career won’t be one that blesses people. He will prophesy God’s judgment against the
nation, even in a time when the Babylonians, like barbarians, are at the gate
of the city. Not only will the
Babylonians come against the nation, the nation itself will arise against
Jeremiah and so the Lord tells him to be prepared for this and yet, so long as
he is faithful to the word given to him by the Lord, he will be safe from
harm. It’s tough to be a prophet.
I wonder what the people of the city thought when the woman
said, “Come see a man…can this be the Messiah?”
Did she leave out the part about his Jewishness? At any rate, for whatever reason, they came
out to see this man at her behest and testimony. Similarly, I wonder what the disciples
thought when they saw a crowd of Samaritans coming out to them. Would this be an ugly scene? What was Jesus thinking talking to that
woman, this had the potential to be a serious mistake. His response to their coming is easy to see,
“Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for
harvest.” Picture a group of people
coming out in typical garb for that region and you can see what they saw, the
image Jesus uses here. Amazingly, many
believed in Him and they asked the group to stay with them for a couple of
days. Animosity became belief. If you want to know the rest of the story,
read Acts 8.4-8.
On two separate occasions, His baptism and the
Transfiguration, a voice from heaven proclaimed that Jesus was God’s Son. Paul says here that Jesus, “was declared to
be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his
resurrection from the dead.” The power
of the resurrection speaks the final word on who Jesus is. For Paul, when he heard the heavenly voice,
it didn’t proclaim Jesus to be God’s Son, the voice said, “I am Jesus.” Not only that, the voice called him, Saul, by
name. (The name Saul would have been his
family name, the name his Jewish family called him. It was the name of the first king of Israel,
a Benjamite like Saul, but his legacy was certainly not entirely positive. Paul would have been the Romanized name by
which he conducted business since his father was a Roman citizen.) For Paul to write these words, “I am under
obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the
foolish”, would have required a complete conversion of thought. How far have you been converted to the Gospel
of picking up your cross?
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