The Balm in Gilead

Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then has the health of my poor people not been restored? O that my head were a spring of water, and my eyes a fountain of tears, so that I might weep day and night for the slain of my poor people! [Jeremiah 19:22 – 9:1]

As I noted a few weeks ago, the prophet Jeremiah writes to a particular audience at a particular time in its history. The audience is the kingdom of Judah, more particularly, those who live in Jerusalem. The time is roughly 600 B.C.E. As we saw several weeks ago, when we examined portions of the first chapter of Jeremiah’s text, the LORD called Jeremiah to be His prophet while he was still en ventre sa mere [Jeremiah 1:5], an inconvenient fact for some “modern” minds. “Before you were born I set you apart; I made you a prophet to the nations.”

The LORD’s call is for Jeremiah to speak to the people about two primary failings. First, they have wandered out after idols. Second, even worse, they are presumptuous. They assume that the LORD will always care for them and protect them in spite of their willful disobedience. Jeremiah is to relate to the people the consequence of their actions. Their idolatry and insolence have become so endemic, so pervasive, that the die has been cast.

There can no longer be a postponement of consequences. The LORD will allow them to be overrun and conquered by their Babylonian rivals. It isn’t that the LORD is totally done with the people of Judah. In time, He will forge a new relationship with them (and with the house of Israel—indeed, the world) via the Messiah prophesied in Isaiah. But in the meantime, because they have not been mindful of their obligations to their promises and to their obligation to the weak within their community, He will allow them to be pulled through the proverbial keyhole. They will be conquered. Their suffering isn’t so much the LORD’s choice. Instead, it is the result of the choices that they have already made.

It isn’t that Jeremiah disagrees with the LORD’s diagnosis. He finds no fault in the LORD’s assessment of the situation. He knows that the people of Judah have become complacent. He recognizes that for generations they have taken the LORD for granted, that they have treated Yahweh as if He is their little “pet” God. They have deluded themselves into thinking that they are impervious to outsiders. They are immune from the harm meant for them by their enemies. After all, they are sure that Yahweh is bound to them by covenant. What harm can come if they turn their heads and hearts toward the shiny, little idols—the “ungods”—of their neighbors? The LORD will always be there to save them, no matter what. Won’t He?

In spite of Jeremiah’s acknowledged prenatal calling, in spite of his clear understanding that Yahweh is absolutely justified in reacting to the people of Judah as He has (and will continue to do in the years to come), in spite of Jeremiah’s profound inward sense of justice and righteousness, Jeremiah still feels deep pain for the people. He knows their anguish. The Babylonians are literally at their gates. They are suffering under the burdens of military and economic siege. They have already lost more than a few promising young men in skirmishes with the opposing forces. They know that those losses will be multiplied many times in the days to come. The people cry out in fear and pain.

And so, Jeremiah offers the familiar lament found in the Old Testament reading appointed for this upcoming Sunday [Jeremiah 8:18-9:1], the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost (RCL, Year C). In psychological solidarity with those around him, he cries out that his “joy is gone,” that grief is upon him [8:18]. He echoes the cries of the people far and wide. “Is the LORD not in Zion? Is her King not in her?” [8:19a]. And yet, Jeremiah also hears the answering anthropomorphic protestations of the LORD:

Why have they provoked me to anger with their images, with their foreign idols? [8:19b].

Jeremiah continues his lament:

The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved [8:20].

Then Jeremiah adds a question—by the beginning of the 20th century, Jeremiah’s question would be rephrased as a statement in an African-American spiritual hymn:

Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then has the health of my poor people not been restored? [Jeremiah 8:22].

In Jeremiah’s time, the Styrax tree, particularly prevalent in and around Gilead, gave off a resin that had certain medicinal properties. Physicians from that same area were renowned for their ability to cure many illnesses. Jeremiah’s question posits that these natural and human phenomena seem no longer to be active within the house of Judah. The cures to which they had looked in earlier days seemed now to be ineffective. Both the people of Judah and Jeremiah thought, “How could this be?”

Is the LORD not in Zion? Is her King not in her?

The important point to remember here is that the answer to both these questions is “Yes.” The LORD was with them/is with us. The issue in most situations is just the opposite: Are we with the LORD?

Some years ago, a national TV evangelist allowed that some of the suffering that had been experienced on an island in the Caribbean following the flooding of a hurricane was due, at least in part, to the people’s sinfulness. Others have remarked that America’s decline in recent years is explained, again, at least in part, in her turning her back upon the faith that helped formed her beginning. In Jesus’ own time, when His disciples saw the man who had been blind from birth, their question had been, “Was the man blind because of his own sin or that of his parents? [see John 9:2].

Jesus remarks that the man’s blindness was not related to his sin, or that of his parents. Folks who live in “tornado alley” in the U.S., or in the Caribbean, Florida, or Louisiana, where hurricanes are prevalent, don’t suffer because they have a level of sin any greater in degree than our own. They suffer because they live in the path of natural disasters.

Still Jeremiah’s point needs to be considered. That is to say, do we as human beings suffer based upon the poor decisions, poor choices, and poor policies that we adopt? Can we be as presumptuous as the people of Judah, taking Yahweh for granted, thinking that He will always get us out of any difficulty that we face? Again, the answer to both question is, “Yes.”

Our decisions have consequences. To be sure, there are those who are truly innocent who suffer. For the most part, however, many of our “predicaments” are of our own making. We gaze at our shiny objects—I hear the new iPhone 14 is a real gem, or “It’s been two weeks since my black Jag had a bath”—and, if we aren’t careful, we can gaze on past the Cross. We analyze our 401(k) or we contemplate how we might be able to work that mountain place into our budget and we miss the opportunity to help someone nearby who needs some propping up. We gaze at our past, at how things almost always have worked out well for us, and think we have the LORD on our side. But are we truly devoted to that LORD?

The African-American spiritual is correct. Contrary to Jeremiah’s wondering query, there is, indeed, a balm in Gilead. It makes the wounded whole; it heals the wounded soul. It was once and for all brought about by the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord, Jesus Christ. It’s just that we shouldn’t take it for granted.