Jeremiah 46 begins the final major section of this prophecy, in which Jeremiah proclaims oracles against the nations. The first nation to come under a declaration of judgment is Egypt, likely because it had served as a purely human hope for deliverance against the oppressive power of Babylon that still menaced Judah even after the fall of Jerusalem. The significance for us today is that we must cast off all hopes in human helps for deliverance and turn to the God of our salvation, who has most clearly presented his own desire and ability to save his people to the uttermost through the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.
But while believers might find this to be a compelling idea, it’s worth reflecting on how the truth of Jeremiah 46 can be applied to the unbeliever. After all, though Jeremiah is primarily preaching to the remnant of Judah and Jerusalem (and subsequent generations), the subject matter of this chapter directly addresses another nation’s future, and not even in exclusively negative language (cf. v26). Perhaps an Egyptian might benefit from Jeremiah’s prophecy; perhaps in our day, an unbeliever might benefit from giving consideration to the words of the prophet.
Immediately, however, we can face a significant obstacle, which is the well-documented phenomenon of the rise of the “nones,” i.e. those who do not identify with any religious tradition or organization. In extreme cases, an anti-religious campaign of indoctrination may even make it seem like there is no point of contact, no mutual point of departure, for having a conversation about even any kind of deliverer. One scholar has pointed to the historical example of East Germany as “the heartland of the homo areligiosus [the non-religious human]” after “some decades of communist government.”[1] The effect is that even asking a hypothetical East German in the 20th century, “What is the higher power that pervades the background of all existence,” would be fruitless because a higher power is a religious concept that has been eradicated from the consciousness of the individual.
As something of a response to this obstacle, J.H. Bavinck highlights three points that draw this potential defeater back into a point of contact. First, for all the diversity displayed in humanity, there is still unity. Second, “man is a limited being” which means “that at every crossroad he has only a few choices, and it is incredible on how few ideas mankind has lived.” Third, humanity “must always and everywhere give answers to the same questions.[2] Even those who are completely a-religious still exist on the basis of answers to unasked questions, for everyone, when faced with a fearsome enemy will, consciously or not, is in the process of answering the question, “Who is my deliverer?” For our hypothetical East German, it is quite likely that the government was, for all intents and purposes, his higher power as well as his deliverer. Moreover, the government was the unchallenged lawgiver and unifying factor in the life of society, because it was the driver of activity. In a similar way, though likely to a lesser degree, an unbeliever today may have answers to these unasked questions that actually reveal much about the hidden religious life of much of Western secular society.
Actually, the East German thought experiment helpfully provides a historical parallel to the oracles against the nations, for it cannot but influence one’s view of higher powers and deliverers when they fall, as East Germany did in 1990. This historical example provides one way forward in conversations today. Though Self is a rather formidable stand-in as a higher power and deliverer, the self is in constant flux and quite vulnerable to overthrow by means of social pressures or the accumulation of internal conflicts. Much like an Egyptian reading Jeremiah’s oracle against Egypt, reflecting on the truth of what had happened and likely will happen, so today we can begin conversations by pointing people to the rather insecure footing of self-made deliverance and then pointing them to the solid rock, who is Christ Jesus, the Lord of all and God over all.
[1] Stefan Paas, “Religious Consciousness in a Post-Christian Culture: J.H. Bavinck’s Religious Consciousness and Christian Faith (1949), Sixty Years Later,” Journal of Reformed Theology 6, no. 1 (2012): 39, https://doi.org/10.1163/156973112X644001.
[2] J.H. Bavinck, The Church Between Temple and Mosque: A Study of the Relationship Between Christianity and Other Religions (Glenside, PA: Westminster Seminary Press, 2023), 25.
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