Gedaliah, or Ishmael, or Johanan? (3)

“In the seventh month Ishmael the son of Nethaniah, the son of Elishama, of the royal family and one of the chief officers of the king, along with ten men, came to Mizpah to Gedaliah the son of Ahikam. While they were eating bread together there in Mizpah, Ishmael the son of Nethaniah and the ten men who were with him arose and struck down Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, with the sword and put to death the one whom the king of Babylon had appointed over the land. Ishmael also struck down all the Jews who were with him, that is with Gedaliah at Mizpah, and the Chaldeans who were found there, the men of war.”

Thus begins Jeremiah Chapter 41, thus the respite of peace is shattered for the Jews who remained in Judah with Gedaliah, thus the rebellion of Judah’s royal family is perpetuated, and thus more misery descends upon a people already racked with anguish and despair. Gedaliah, a man of peace, a trustworthy man, is killed while providing hospitality to a man he was warned about. As noted in the previous post, it is likely Gedaliah and Ishmael knew each other, which helps us understand why Gedaliah could not take Johanan’s warning about Ishmael seriously. A trusting Gedaliah entertains Ishmael with hospitality and food, no doubt bread and wine were included, and Ishmael delivers a gift of betrayal, a gift of death.

What were Gedaliah’s thoughts as the sword pierced his flesh? What would Shakespeare have put into his mouth? What were Jesus’ thoughts as He shared a meal with Judas Iscariot on the night of His betrayal? What was Jesus thinking as Judas approached Him in the garden and kissed Him? Jesus’ followers abandoned Him in the garden, Gedaliah’s associates died with him.

Love thinks no evil - O Gedaliah!

Love bears all things - O Gedaliah!

Love hopes all things - O Gedaliah!

Love believes all things - O Gedaliah!

Gedaliah’s father, Ahikam, had saved the life of Jeremiah, who will save Gedaliah’s life?

Was it necessary for Gedaliah to die by the hand of a friend to punctuate the tragedy of Jerusalem’s destruction? Need an innocent man, a faithful man, a trustworthy man die?

Did Gedaliah begin to think at some point during the meal, “...the hand of my betrayer is with me on the table”? (Luke 22:21).

Did he call to mind Psalms 41:9 and think the words that Jesus would one day utter (John 13:18), “Even my close friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.”

Or perhaps the words of David from Psalms 55:12 - 14 were on his lips as Ishmael’s nefarious plan unfolded, moments before the sword was plunged into the heart of noble and trustworthy Gedaliah, “For it is not an enemy who reproaches me, then I could bear it; nor is it one who hates me who has exalted himself against me, then I could hide myself from him. But it is you, a man my equal, my companion and my familiar friend; we who had sweet fellowship together walked in the house of God in the throng.”

Which is the better, which is the godly and righteous way? The way of peace or the way of violence? The way of obedience or the way of rebellion? Who shall we follow, who shall we emulate? Gedaliah? Ishmael? Johanan?

God has not said that we are to choose the lesser of two or more evils, He has commanded that we should be holy as He is holy. When we choose evil rather than the Way of holy peace, the Way of the Prince of Peace, we align ourselves with the present evil age. When we rationalize evil in order to preserve ourselves we reject the Cross of Christ. We also become identified, in the eyes of the world, with the evil we have associated with and thus marr our witness for Jesus Christ.

Gedaliah’s heart may well have echoed the sentiments of Psalms 120: “Woe is me, for I sojourn in Meshech, for I dwell among the tents of Kedar! Too long has my soul had its dwelling with those who hate peace. I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war.”

Our society hates peace, we are a people thriving on turmoil, feeding on destruction, gorging ourselves on violence. The more polarized we become the more we justify hatred and violence; violent words, violent economics, violent entertainment, violent “sports”, and...not the least...violent politics. Driving on a highway now requires that we be conscious that any moment may turn violent. We violently destroy morals and ethics by crushing those who maintain the innate standards of right and wrong, good and evil, with which our Creator endowed us. Much of the professing church is drawn into the so-called political “culture war” identifying with this side or that side regardless of the fact that all sides “spin”, lie, are for cultural war, and only desire to use professing Christians as pawns and dupe them by the seduction of power. Shall it be Ishmael or Johanan or Gedaliah?

Jerusalem is falling and we cannot see it. We persist in our narcissistic ways and if we encounter someone like Gedaliah we consider him impractical and someone to be disposed of. While Rome and the Jewish leadership of Jerusalem had little love for each other, they could both agree that Jesus and His followers had no place in their world. Yet others in the ancient world could see a distinction between Christians and the world around them, including the powers around them. Can others see such a distinction today in our land? Can others see a people distinct from the world? Distinct from political parties? Distinct from power economics and power politics and unbridled consumption? Distinct from violence?

Is it better to live and die as Gedaliah or to kill as Ishmael and Johanan?

To be continued...

Gedaliah, or Ishmael, or Johanan? (2)

When Jerusalem falls to Nebuchadnezzar, Jeremiah is released from imprisonment and we read (Jeremiah 39:11 - 14): “Now Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon gave orders about Jeremiah through Nebuzaradan the captain of the bodyguard, saying, “Take him and look after him, and do nothing harmful to him, but rather deal with him just as he tells you.” So Nebuzaradan the captain of the bodyguard sent word, along with Nebushazban the Rab-saris, and Nergal-sar-ezer the Rab-mag, and all the leading officers of the king of Babylon; they even sent and took Jeremiah out of the court of the guardhouse and entrusted him to Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, to take him home. So he stayed among the people.”

We know from Jeremiah 40:1 - 4 that Jeremiah was  bound in chains in prison, and we also know from Chapter 38 that at one point Jeremiah’s condition while confined was life - threatening. Jeremiah was not in a “country club prison”; there were those who wanted him dead.

While Jeremiah’s own people wanted him dead, an Ethiopian, Ebed-melech, did what he could to save Jeremiah’s life (38:7ff) for Ebed-melech trusted in God (39:18). God promised Ebed-melech that He would deliver him and preserve his life during the destruction of Jerusalem. Sometimes people who are not a part of our immediate culture, whether the general society or the church, can see things that we cannot see - rather than reject their observations out-of-hand, perhaps we should ask whether they know something that we don’t, whether they see something that we don’t see. Our prideful arrogance, our introversion, can be the death of us.

The captain of Nebuchadnezzar’s bodyguard, Nebuzaradan, also knew that God’s hand was in the destruction of Jerusalem (40:2 - 4): “Now the captain of the bodyguard had taken Jeremiah and said to him, “The LORD your God promised this calamity against this place; and the LORD has brought it on and done just as He promised. Because you people sinned against the LORD and did not listen to His voice, therefore this thing has happened to you. But now, behold, I am freeing you today from the chains which are on your hands. If you would prefer to come with me to Babylon, come along, and I will look after you; but if you would prefer not to come with me to Babylon, never mind. Look, the whole land is before you; go wherever it seems good and right for you to go.” ”

So again we see non-Jews seeing and understanding more than the Jews of Jeremiah’s day - these were the very people who were the means of Jeremiah’s safety. If we can get over our arrogance we can learn from those with different perspectives, we can learn from those not immersed in our own culture (whether the general society or the church) - our culture is not the measure of Truth, God’s Word is the measure of Truth...we ought not to deceive ourselves on this; the people of Jeremiah’s time deceived themselves and they lost everything, and even as they were losing everything they were still in denial.

Now we come to Gedaliah; we see in 39:14 that Nebuzaradan entrusted Jeremiah to Gedaliah, and in 40:5 we read that the king of Babylon placed Gedaliah over the cities of Judah. Gedaliah was the son of Ahikam the son of Shaphan. Ahikam had not only witnessed the revival under Josiah (2 Kings 22:12; 2 Chron. 34:20), but he had also saved Jeremiah’s life from king Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 26:24). It appears that Gedaliah had been raised in the Way of the True and Living God, that just as Ahikam was faithful to God and His people, so was Gedaliah faithful. There must have been something about Gedaliah that caused Nebuchadnezzar to trust him - trustworthy people in times of calamity are hard to find, when it is every man for himself who can find a man or woman who can be trusted to put the welfare of others before their own interests, their own self-preservation?

Jeremiah decides to remain in Judah with Gedaliah rather than move to Babylon. (This raises an interesting hypothetical scenario, what would it have been like had Jeremiah moved to Babylon and lived with Daniel and Daniel’s three friends? Had Daniel and Jeremiah known each other before Daniel was taken to Babylon, for both prophets lived under king Jehoiakim. Also, how did Daniel and his friends influence Nebuchadnezzar’s understanding of the role he played in attacking king Zedekiah and destroying Jerusalem? How did Daniel influence the treatment Jeremiah received? Whether the influence was direct or not, certainly Nebuchadnezzar had come, through Daniel, to respect Yahweh, the God of the Jews, and one can see how that respect could be transferred to Jeremiah, the prophet of Yahweh.)

The chaos and heartbreak, however, were not over for Jeremiah, for Gedaliah, or for the people who remained in Judah and Jerusalem. Some of the royal family had escaped the Babylonian army, among them Ishmael who had fled to the neighboring kingdom of Ammon. Ishmael was still in denial of God’s judgment and still in rebellion against God. When we refuse to listen to God, when we refuse to repent, when we insist on persisting in our wicked ways...we go mad. People go mad, societies go mad, civic leadership goes mad, and religious leadership goes mad. Gedaliah had not gone mad but Ishmael had.

In Jeremiah 40:13 - 16 Johanan, one of the remaining army officers in Judah, goes to Gedaliah to warn him against a plot by Ishmael to assassinate Gedaliah. Gedaliah refuses to believe this could be, he could not believe such a thing would be in Ishmael's heart. Gedaliah and Ishmael had likely known each other since Gedaiah’s family served the royal family, perhaps they had grown up with each other, played with each other, watched one another as they both grew to manhood and into their respective careers. After all the carnage and suffering Gedaliah could not believe that Ishmael would think to cause more grief by turning against Gedaliah and the remaining people of Judah.

Johanan wants Gedaliah’s permission to make a preemptive strike and kill Ishmael, he even tells Gedaliah that he will make sure no one associates Gedaliah with the killing, but Gedaliah not only does not give his permission, he accuses Johanan of lying - Gedaliah just can’t imagine that Ishmael would want to kill him.

There was a respite from famine and suffering for Gedaliah and his people, for we see in 40:12, “Then all the Jews returned from all the places to which they had been driven away and came to the land of Judah, to Gedaliah at Mizpah, and gathered in wine and summer fruit in great abundance.” It must have been a time of sunshine, a time of peace, a time of rest, a time of thinking that the nightmare of war and famine was over.

As we consider Gedaliah, Johanan, and Ishmael; as we think about their courses of action in Jeremiah chapters 40 - 43, let’s ask ourselves, “Who would I choose to be? Gedaliah, Johanan, or Ishmael?” Will I choose to be caught up in the realm of violence, or will I choose the way of peace? Will I choose the Way of the True and Living God, or will I choose the ways of man? Will I choose to live a polarized life that tears at the fabric of society, or will I choose to follow the Word of God? Will I take up instruments of war and rebellion, using any means at my disposal to destroy my enemies, or will I submit my life to God and His Word?”

Today we have our Gedaliahs and Johanans and Ishmaels, we see them all around us, we play their roles, we align ourselves with them - which one are we? Which one am I? Which one are you?

To be continued...