Therefore thus says the Lord: “Behold, I will plead your cause and take vengeance for you.
– Jeremiah 51:36
What an encouraging word to God’s people experiencing injustice. Hearing God say, “I’ll plead your cause and take vengeance for you”.
Jeremiah 51:36 teaches us to trust God’s justice over our own.
This is a reality that we see all throughout Scripture. And then you think about in the New Testament how in a place like Romans 12 as Paul’s writing to people who are experiencing injustice, and he says in verse 19, “Beloved never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God for its written vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord”. That’s a direct quote from Deuteronomy in the Old Testament and Psalm 94, in places like we see here in Jeremiah 51, and then he goes on to say to the contrary, “If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he’s thirsty, give him something to drink. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good”.
I just want to encourage you with the practical implications of this. You and I are free to love our enemies. We’re free to love those who do evil toward us by overcoming that evil with good as we trust in God, the perfectly just King overall who will bring about justice in due time.
Jeremiah 51:36 shows that God fights on behalf of his people.
It doesn’t mean we passively sit back. Obviously, we know God tells his people to work for justice, to do good works, to love our neighbors as ourselves. We see this all over the Bible. At the same time, we don’t avenge ourselves. We trust the vengeance of God. He says to his people, over and over again, “I will take vengeance for you”. And so we pray, God help us to trust you. Help us to trust your justice and your ultimate just rule and reign over all the world.
God, we pray that you’d help us to do justice, to do good works, to love our neighbors as ourselves, and when we are unjustly treated, we are treated in evil ways. Lord, we pray that you would keep us from trying to avenge ourselves and keep us from doing evil in response. God, please help us by the power of your Spirit in us to overcome evil with good. If our enemy is hungry to feed him, if he’s thirsty to give him something to drink. Jesus, we think about you, the cross, being crucified for our sins, and praying, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do”.
Help us, God, to live with the heart of Jesus in an unjust world when we are unjustly treated. God, even as we pray all this, when we think about your justice coming for the world and we think about thousands of people groups and billions of people who haven’t heard the good news of your mercy, who are right now under your holy judgment in need of your grace and mercy in Jesus, we pray.
Prayer for the Segidi people
God, we pray for the spread of your grace and mercy in Jesus to a hundred thousand Segidi people in India, where none of them right now, or hardly any of them, have even heard the good news of your love and your mercy and your grace in Jesus.
God, please change that. We pray, we intercede for the Segidi of people of India. Please cause your mercy to spread to them. That they might know Jesus has paid the price for their sins so that they could be justified before you by faith in him. Please, God, may it be so. We pray all this with trust in you, your ultimate justice, and your ultimate mercy. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
