The Prophet Who Killed The Vibe And Saved The Soul

Collapse makes a lot of noise; real hope often whispers. We walk through Jeremiah’s world as the temple falls and a community scatters, and we ask what faithful leadership looks like when trust is broken. Instead of retreating into despair or doubling down on force, Jeremiah offers a new center: a covenant written on the heart, a promise that God’s presence is not confined to buildings, borders, or headlines, but lives within people who carry truth and mercy into daily life.

We name the hard part first—“woe to the shepherds”—and face how failed leadership scatters communities. Then we follow the thread of promise: God gathers the remnant, raises shepherds who protect rather than exploit, and brings forth a righteous branch from David’s line who executes justice and righteousness. For us, that hope takes shape in Jesus, whose authority arrives in humility, not spectacle. Bethlehem’s quiet power challenges our obsession with winning the argument and invites us to practice courage without cruelty, conviction without contempt.

Along the way, we connect ancient anguish to modern fractures: tribal media, “alternative facts,” and the feeling that every day is the tense version of Thanksgiving dinner. We explore how character becomes infrastructure, how small acts of honesty and tenderness scale into social trust, and how Advent reorients power away from coercion toward care. If you’re searching for leadership that heals rather than hypes, and for a way to move from scattered to gathered, this conversation offers grounding, clarity, and a path forward.

If the episode resonates, subscribe, share it with a friend who needs some steady hope, and leave a review to help others find the show. Tell us: where have you seen quiet leadership change the room?

Chapters

• 0:30 Marker 1
• 2:18 Marker 2
• 3:17 \k333

Transcript

Pastor Darren: 0:00

Now, Jeremiah, like we said, he is the prophet that was ministering during the temple's destruction, at least the first time, the pre-Jesus time. You can see a little bit of the heaviness of that kind of prophet. You can see that he's uh really contemplating things. He's a very heavy, maybe even some would say a bit of a downer prophet. We're trying to get a sense of who he is. So where does Jeremiah fit in, right? And we've been talking about this short history that we're we're working with. Uh we had this age of kings, right, for the uh the Jewish people, the Israelite community, uh, and it was this highlight with King David and King Solomon. Then, of course, it was really, really good until it wasn't good anymore, and the kingdom eventually splits, and then eventually both of those sides of the kingdoms get conquered, and the people are uh taken out, uh, all the wisdom, all the resources, all the wealth taken out. Jeremiah is preaching when the second kingdom goes down, right? So this is sort of the last of it. Uh so uh one would have to say, and this is from a preacher's point of view, preaching during that time had to be a very, very difficult thing. Because you all like the sermons when everything's going good, don't you? You know, those are some smooth, smooth sermons. Hey, hey, the world's pretty good. How about we all just be a little more patient? Okay, you're that's a good sermon, right? It's an easy sermon. You might even come every Sunday for that sermon. But this one, this sermon that Jeremiah's got to preach here, it's more like society is collapsing all around us, and each of you probably have something to do with it. That's a tougher sermon, am I right? Is that right? You know, so I give Jeremiah a little bit of a break, even though he has that reputation uh of a bit of a downer. At the same time, we want to appreciate the weight of the time that he was preaching in. And I want one more painting that I thought was significant. This is from Rembrandt, and you can see the weight of the world on uh this poor Jeremiah, who's doing his best to reflect. And it's actually, this one is called Jeremiah Lamenting the Destruction of Jerusalem. Uh and so uh I just the weight of that that uh uh painting kind of caught me a little bit because I and I felt like it captured a little bit of who he is. He is understood to be the writer of Lamentations, which is another one of our books in the Bible, and uh his his grieving over the fall of Jerusalem. Uh and he is speaking to that grief for the larger body. So I give him some slack, and I want to point out as we add to the picture of who he is, he did speak to one of the best uh verses that are my favorite verses in scripture. Uh this is uh um 31, verses 33 and 34, and I invite you just to hear these words from Jeremiah 31. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my law within them, I will write it on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. I like that idea. I will write it within them, I will write it on their hearts. No longer shall they teach one another or say to each other, Know the Lord, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord, for I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sin no more. I love that for a community, especially as their society was crumbling, to recognize that God was not confined to this temple that was destroyed, or even this city that was destroyed. God is with all of us, God is in each of our hearts. So I actually celebrate Jeremiah and I hope that you will uh maybe in some journey with him come to that same appreciation. So the core message from today's passage, though, it's about leadership. Leadership in uh in their particular community, but we want to understand leadership in a broader sense, and it's a little confusing when we first get started with it. Because he talks about woe to the shepherds. Woe to the shepherds, and we think, well, what did the shepherds do? They're way out there in the fields, they're doing the best they can to keep the sheep all gathered up, but I don't know that we can blame the entire fall of the temple on the shepherds. And then we get a little more wise and we think, okay, maybe shepherds is a metaphor here. And he's probably not talking about the prophets, right? He's not talking about the leaders of the church because they don't necessarily have the power to lead to the scattering of the Jewish people in the way they got scattered, in the way they got conquered. He's really probably talking to the kings and the other leaders of that kingdom, right, of that society, and he's pointing to them saying, You guys have scattered our community. Now we don't know if it's uh if he's blaming them for actions that led to the fall of the kingdom, and that's why they're scattered, or if he's blaming them for exactly how he's blaming these leaders? Was it the cause of the scattering, or maybe it's the result of their actions? That we don't know for sure, but he's blaming them for that scattering. But in that blame, there is lots of good news. First of all, for those of us who would be frustrated in that sense, God's coming and God's first gonna deal with those evildoers who allowed the community to be scattered, or maybe even caused the community to be scattered. But then listen to these words of hope. And you've got Bibles in your pews if you want to look it up, but listen to these things that he says that are gonna be part of the future despite where the Israelites are, despite where the community is. Listen to what he says. But then God's gonna gather the remnant of the flock out of all of the lands and bring them back to the fold where they will be fruitful and multiply. Very powerful, comforting words, hopefully, for the community, especially that is suffering, that is grieving. But God is gonna deal with those shepherds who led us where we're at, and then God is gonna bring us back together. That remnant, that's the remnant of the Israelites who've been conquered. They've been spread out now. He also says, shepherds raised over who shepherd them, no longer in fear or missing. All of these shepherds who used to get oppressed are now going to be able to have a little bit of authority and a little bit of power over those who oppressed them. Words of hope, again, especially for an oppressed community. Then he says he's gonna raise up for David a righteous branch who will reign wisely, executing justice and righteousness. So somebody out of the branch of David, this king who they celebrate, because those were good days, he's gonna raise somebody up from that line who is gonna be just and kind and comforting and bring us back to our days, executing justice and righteousness. And then his name will be called the Lord, our righteousness. So they got that going for them, which is nice. Nobody saw Caddyshack. All right, I threw it out there for us Christians, for us Christians, that name, that person actually came. Right? That is Jesus. Did you notice that last bit? His name will be the Lord, our righteousness. That is Jesus, and we celebrate that presence every year, right about this time, the birth of Christ. And we ask ourselves sometimes, what is it that we're actually so excited about Jesus for? Why does this inform our faith? Why does this enrich our journey to know who God is? What is Jesus actually bringing? Well, these are some of the words of what Jesus brings. The things that Jeremiah is calling for, the things that Jeremiah points to are what we understand to have come with Christ. And this is why we celebrate at Christmas. Because that leader that came to reign with justice, with righteousness, with love, forgiveness, with grace, we celebrate that that authority, that power actually exists and is in our world. We aren't just victims of our own human tendencies and disappointments and brokenness. There's actually these forces, these layers of justice and love and peace and grace that are in and among us. But now we get to the difficult part of the passage. I hope that you are ready and you have girded your loins. We love this thought justice, truth, peace in the world, and certainly if there is a force or a group or even a person in the world that is bringing something dark into our world, we'd want to scatter that darkness, would we not? We are glad when darkness is made weak. We are glad when it is scattered about the earth. But what do we do when we disagree on what that evil is? What do we do when we're not in agreement with what needs to be scattered? We're kind of living that right now, are we not? We have a lot of infighting, we have a lot of tribal positioning, we have a lot of justified dishonesty, we have a lot of poor behavior and actions, a lot of poor language and communication with each other. Let me ask, does sometimes, right, does it sometimes feel like our particular society has become one massive family Thanksgiving? Right? And not the good one, right? Where we go around the table and we, oh, what are you thankful for? What are you thankful for? And what are you thankful for? And all that stuff. Not that Thanksgiving. No, the other kind. Where the whole family ends up at odds with each other, right? The one that all the comedians like to make fun of and poke at with Thanksgiving. Oh, don't, don't bring that up around Uncle Frank. Have you seen his Facebook? We do not want to be in that conversation. Oh, and do you remember that outburst from Aunt Sally during COVID? Thank goodness jello salad is easy to clean up. Right? It's that Thanksgiving. We have this problem that we've made such a mess of things with our society, right? Where now when we hear some fact, somebody's listing a fact for us, our first reaction is, well, where'd you hear that? Where did that come from? And what's worse, we kind of have to ask that question because so many sources of our information have a sort of self-justified, for I assume, some larger priority, giving us things that aren't quite true, telling us things in ways that aren't necessarily honest or with integrity. You know, uh when we open our doors to this world of alternative facts, and I would argue opened our doors to this world of alternative ways of dealing with disagreement, we really turn our world into a bit of a battlefield. Do we not? If we're not even able to agree on how we're going to talk to each other and how we're gonna find some place that we can agree on and move forward together, we're just in this place of fighting. Peter Marty is a retired Lutheran pastor, he's also the editor and publisher of the Christian Century, which I appreciate. He spoke to this challenge, right? And he pointed out its particular relevance this season as we move from Thanksgiving into Advent. And I think I have his first quote right here. Right, Sarah, you had it. There we are. He writes, uh, in the latest issue of Christian Century, wherever we situate Bethlehem, let's be clear that it's far away from the corridors of power. God shows up in profound humility, taking up very little oxygen in that cattle stall. No coercion is in the air, no imposition of will, no compulsion to intimidate those shepherds, angling for a glimpse. In fact, the manger is so small, there's no room inside and decided for arrogance or pomposity, no space for self-righteous power plays or siege mentalities. In the awesome simplicity of a child, God comes to redeem hearts, not to rule nations. When I think about what happened on that night, that night of Christ's birth, I'm reminded of what a powerful thing, so powerful that on most church blocks here in our nation, you are gonna find a community that's dedicated to what happened on that night. That is powerful. Happened in such a small place, not needing the grandeur, not needing the manipulation. I think there's an Advent lesson to be learned about our constant need to convince, to manipulate, to conquer, to save. Peter Marty goes on to say, I'm convinced there is no such thing as a perfect Christmas, or I would argue Thanksgiving in this case. But we can make of it what we will. Either receiving the tenderness of God as an astonishing gift to humanity, or singing a few carols, then returning to a life of giving orders, dishing out insults, and acting as righteous warriors. I know where I want to land on Christmas night. I invite you to open yourself to Peter Marty's words here, especially as we move into this holiday season and then into our more significant one. In that spirit, might we look to become again that place of simplicity, that place of love, and that we have a blessed Thanksgiving. Amen.