Today, I am reading and commenting on  Jeremiah 1-3.

Today I begin reading the Book of Jeremiah for this year.  I love some of what we learn about God and His call for us from His call to Jeremiah.  First God tells Jeremiah:
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew^[a] you,
    before you were born I set you apart;”
From this we learn that God formed Jeremiah in the womb, and that He formed each and every one of us the same way.  But there is more to it than that.  Even before He formed our bodies God knew us.  However, I want you to take note of that little superscript “a” there by the word “knew”.  That indicates that there was a translators’ note associated with it.  The translators’ note says that the word “knew” could also be translated as “chose”.  So, even before we began to be formed in our mother’s womb, God knew us and chose us for His purpose in this world.  We have been set apart to serve God.  God goes on to tell Jeremiah that He has put His words in Jeremiah’s mouth.  If we allow Him, He will do the same with us.  As a final part of God’s calling of Jeremiah, He tells him get himself ready to stand up and tell the people what God will command him to say.  God made Jeremiah an iron pillar to stand up against the movers and shakers of his time, and against the people themselves.  Jeremiah did not need to be afraid even though both the powerful people and the mob of common people would fight against him, because God would be with him.  In the same way God is calling on us today to stand up and say the words which He puts in our mouths.  We need not be afraid because God will be with us and He will rescue us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.