Competing With Horses

Written by Jay Hartwell

Jeremiah 12:1
You are always righteous, O Lord,
When I bring a case before you.
Yet I would speak with you about justice:
Why does the way of wicked prosper?
Why do all the faithless live at ease?

Jeremiah 12:5-6
If you have raced with men on foot
and they have worn you out,
how can you compete with horses?
If you stumble in safe country,
how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?
Your brothers, your own family -
even they have betrayed you;
they have raised a loud cry against you.
Do not trust in them,
though they speak well of you.

Thoughts:
Many of us have asked these question:
Why does the way of the wicked prosper?
How can evil people go unpunished for what they have done?
Where is the justice in this world?

God's answer to Jeremiah:
"If you have races with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with the horses?" Probably not the answer Jeremiah wanted to hear, and to be honest, not the answer I would want to hear. For Jeremiah, this meant - "it only gets worse." We know Jeremiah's future and can see how much worse it got.

We want to hear that justice will be done now. We would rather hear God say "I will come and end all of the injustice today." But for Jeremiah there was more to be done. More life to be lived, more trials, more disobedience, more troubles and more neglect.

What about us? What about our future? We do know a little of our future as the Bible reveals the past, present and future. Though we don't know all of the details and we can't "really" know how bad it will get without the true experience of it. So, what do we do about it?

We prepare ourselves as if we will race against horses. We rely on the hope that God has given us. We follow Jeremiah's example - we cry out to God, we seek to hear from Him, we listen, obey, discern, and speak the truth, we long to see people turn from their wicked ways. We trust in God and not man. We love.