Last week, I looked at Old Testament examples of men who sinned and how God handled them in the restoration process. One thing we see is that restoration never takes place unless there is brokenness and repentance. Every time someone sinned, when we see them restored, we see that person go through a period where they truly experienced the conviction of the Holy Spirit and came before God as a broken, shattered vessel, pleading for mercy. If a person refuses this, then we do not see restoration taking place. But let’s take a deeper look into what is actually happening in this process. Last week, I asked you to read Jeremiah 1:10. This is also repeated in Jeremiah 18:7 and Jeremiah 31:28.
Today I am going to focus on this pattern given of four steps of destruction and two steps of starting over. The four steps of destruction are 1) root out/pluck up, 2) pull down/break down, 3) destroy, 4) throw down. Then the two steps to restoration are 1) build and 2) plant. Each of these four steps of breaking down and destruction have their own nuances; partly for time’s sake and for purpose’s sake, I won’t be able to go into that. I can say that Hebrew and general Eastern ideas use multiple images and terms and ideas to speak about the same central message. So, in a nutshell, we see “complete total destruction” of the former, and “starting over” with the latter. Last week, I shared how before restoration can take place with an individual, that person needs to be broken and repentant. The Jeremiah passages are more specific towards a nation, but it applies to individuals as well.
So, before God can restore someone, there must be brokenness. Voddie Baucham has a powerful sermon about brokenness, primarily over Psalm 51. He says if life is a highway and we are going the wrong direction in sin, getting off that highway is repentance, and brokenness is the off-ramp. If you go through a rooting out, a pulling down, a destruction, and are thrown down, “brokenness” would be an apt one-word summary of that. Another thing Baucham addresses in this sermon is how our culture despises the notion of brokenness. It doesn’t matter whether it’s theology or psychology or medicine. The avoidance of pain at any cost is our #1 goal in our culture. How do I know that? Look at how easily we were duped into shutting down our lives for a small virus. News flash. Pain is part of life. Sickness is part of life. Diseases are part of life. You know they are there. Move on. But it is through pain that we learn to do or not do things. How do we know fire is hot? We’ve felt the flames. Likewise, brokenness is the spiritual state when we realize we have sinned against God and have reaped the consequences for it.
The nation of Judah had lived in habitual sin. Ezekiel 23 depicts Samaria and Jerusalem, the capitals of the Northern and Southern kingdoms respectively, as two harlots. Samaria was bad enough as is, but Jerusalem out sinned Samaria. Both out sinned Sodom and Gomorrah, which God reduced to mere ashes. Jeremiah’s message was that God was going to completely level Judah. To save the Jews and maintain the line for the Messiah, he would send the Jews into captivity in Babylon while he cleansed the land from all the corruption done to it. God would root out all seeds of idolatry. He would pull down all traditions and thoughts that were not in agreement to God’s commands. He would destroy the idols and throw down every thought and idea that would come against Him.
When I read through Jeremiah, I kept seeing the United States, not in a replacement or theological context, but in a historical context. As I read what Judah was doing and I see what we are doing and what is happening, I see doom and destruction not merely coming but having just arrived. I do not believe God is warning us any longer about the spanking that will come if we continue down our path. I believe God is currently taking us down the path to go behind the woodshed where He will spank us. There is no turning back now; the spanking is going to happen.
But the brokenness is just one step in the process. We have a choice to make: to submit to the discipline or to defy it. There are many people who hit rock bottom and found Christ because they had nowhere else to go. But there are many others who hit rock bottom and shook their fist at God anyway. Jeremiah 42-43 gives a clear picture of this. I’ll have a separate post on that issue. We need to see our need before God and come to Him, broken and humble. Think of the woman caught in adultery or the Roman jailer in Philippi. Both came broken and seeing their need for salvation.
When we reach this point, and only when we reach this point, can God begin the restoration process. He will build and plant. It may take a while to see fruit and results. In order for God to be able to restore us, He must completely break us. He has to strip us down to the foundation, and then He can begin the process to bring us back. However, there are many false teachers who call for restoration without brokenness or repentance. You can’t have one without the other. A clear example of why that’s true is with David and Absalom. Absalom murdered his brother for raping his sister and sent himself into exile because David didn’t do anything about it. Then later, David made the grievous error of welcoming Absalom back without testing to see if Absalom had any repentance. David was wrong in how he handled Absalom, but Absalom was unrepentant and restored anyway. As a result, Absalom threw a coup and nearly succeeded. This is why God does not restore anyone until they’ve been broken. This is also why it is very dangerous to try to restore your image if it falls on your own strength. If your name falls into ill repute, then let God be the one to restore it. If that means you remain in anonymity, then so be it.
God will be the one to raise us up, and He will keep us there or put us down if He must. Our priority should be to be obedient to Christ and receive His discipline when it is called for. He may break us, crush us, smash us, or grind us to powder, but after He does that, He will bring us back and rebuild us, not only fully restored, but in even better condition than before. If you are not experiencing the discipline of Christ, that means you very likely are not saved. God does not discipline those who aren’t His. But He does judge them. Being broken does not necessarily mean you are saved. Only being restored indicates you are saved. Examine yourself to see where you stand.
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