Too hard for God?

Every year for a number of years, I’ve read through the Bible starting at Genesis and finishing at the end of Revelation. Sometimes I change the version, but no matter how often I read it, I’m amazed at how fresh and relevant it is, unchanging yet always revealing to me things I’d never noticed before.

Today my devotional guide pointed me to Jeremiah 32. As I read it, verse 27 encouraged me: “Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh. Is there anything too hard for Me?”

My thoughts go to those I pray for. My last thoughts at night before dropping off to sleep are often prayers for unsaved family members. Every day they are on my heart. When I see no change in them, or a particular stubborn streak of resistance against God, I might get discouraged, but the Lord often gives me something to turn my eyes off their attitude or behavior and remember His ability to change people.

In Jeremiah, God talks to this prophet about what He is going to do. His people have been stubborn and disobedient; therefore, He is giving them over to their enemies. They will go into captivity in a foreign land because they have provoked Him to anger with their rebellion, idolatry, and abominable behavior. They “shall be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence” (verse 36).

This is where I see some of my family. They are in a constant struggle with life and within themselves. They are empty, but try to fill that blank space with things that do not satisfy their famine. They are in bondage to the enemy (Satan, the world and the flesh) and seem totally blind to their spiritual condition.

When I read what happened in history to God’s people, I see the parallels in my own life too. I’ve rebelled, been bound up in this sad state, and can look back and marvel at the patience of God my stubbornness. Yet here in Jeremiah His patience seems to run out. He is fed up with the apathy and refusal of His people to listen, trust, and obey Him. Then He says this:

“Behold, I will gather them out of all countries where I have driven them in My anger, in My fury, and in great wrath; I will bring them back to this place, and I will cause them to dwell safely. They shall be My people, and I will be their God; then I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear Me forever, for the good of them and their children after them. And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from doing them good; but I will put My fear in their hearts so that they will not depart from Me. Yes, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will assuredly plant them in this land, with all My heart and with all My soul.” For thus says the Lord: “Just as I have brought all this great calamity on this people, so I will bring on them all the good that I have promised them. . . .”

Everything that happened to them was under the power of God. While God did not cause their rebellion, He did drive them into bondage because of it. However, He had no intention of leaving them there. One day He would bring them home, give them the heart they needed to follow Him, and bless them with every promise He had ever made. That is incredible. What an amazing thing for God to do!

As I pray, I know that God has not changed. He holds the lives of every contemporary rebel in His hands. He can put them into a deep, yet soul-awakening bondage and He can bring them out of that into the glorious liberty of the children of God.

My devotional book uses phrases that talk of what God can do. He creates “the movements of godly fear in our hearts” and “all its tendencies are toward life and the Source of life; toward hatred of sin and love of holiness; toward a desire after the enjoyment of heavenly realities, and a deadness to the things of time and sense; toward a knowledge of Christ in the manifestation of Himself, and a longing to live more to His praise, to walk more in His footsteps, and to be more conformed to His suffering image.”

When I look at someone determined to go their own way and do their own thing, someone who is totally resistant to the Lord, I am discouraged. But when I listen to what God says, and remember what He has done in the past (even in my own life), my heart is not only encouraged, but I am motivated to continue in prayer, even to rejoice that no matter how bad things might look, He is able to turn things totally the other way. Nothing is too hard for Him.