August 14, 2022
Daily Devotion:
"Whatever Happens Here, Stays Here..."
Jeremiah 23:23-24
New International Version
23 “Am I only a God nearby,” declares the Lord “and not a God far away? 24 Who can hide in secret places so that I cannot see them?” declares the Lord. “Do not I fill heaven and earth?” declares the Lord.
Signs often seen in well-known tourist destinations promise that "whatever happens here stays here." The suggestion is that you can go wild in that faraway place without having to worry about a ruined reputation back home. The fact that such signs even exist confirms our tendency to think that if we can keep our sins secret enough, we're safe. Yet as our focus passage reminds us, no holiday port of call is so remote or business trip so distant that God doesn't know what we're up to. By now the myth of "secret sin" is a familiar theme. Despite the obvious implications of today's passage, the sin Jeremiah is railing against is hardly a secret sin. Jeremiah is castigating counterfeit prophets for delivering false oracles to the people. For lying, for pandering, for misleading God's people-all of which was being done openly and brashly, not in secret. So why the reference to "secret places"? Apparently the prophets were so callous about their public sin that they were wholly indifferent to God's watchful eye. So which is worse: to sin in secret somehow hoping God doesn't see, or to sin in public and still be convinced that God doesn't see? If perhaps the former is a misguided illusion, the latter is a mad delusion! Either that or it is merely the ultimate extension of secret sin. Become sufficiently blasé about our secret sins and, before we know it, we will be so callous that sinning in open defiance of God means nothing at all. This takes us full circle back to secret sin. In which case maybe there should be signs saying: "What begins here doesn't lust stay here."
The escalating question is: If I would never brazenly sin in some open way, dare I risk sinning in private, hidden ways?
