CAN GOD REALLY USE ME?

Jeremiah 1:6 (ESV) Then I said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth.”

I’ve heard it said that God does not call the equipped, He equips the called, and that God is not looking for our ability, but our availability. In our passage, God has just told Jeremiah that He had appointed Him a prophet to the nations - nations (plural), no less. Jeremiah objected. He was young, though we don’t know how young. The word used here is ambiguous and can refer to an infant all the way to a young adult, or a servant at any age. Either way, he was an inexperienced nobody. He was untried, ill-equipped, untrained - at least for the nations. The local neighborhood? Sure. The village? Perhaps. The entire nation of Israel? I’m thinking “No!” The nation of Israel PLUS all the others? Yeah, right! Are you kidding? Jeremiah’s protest makes a whole lot of sense. He was young and not good at talking in front of people. I think God had heard this one before, remember Moses (Exo 4:10).

I used to be able to identify with both objections, but now that I’m older I can replace the excuses of youth and lack of speaking ability with more “mature” ones, like simple forgetfulness and slow thought processing. How can God use someone who can’t argue His truth well? Last year I was 0-27 in disagreements with my wife. We don’t actually argue that much and I don’t actually keep count, I just know that when we do I lose them all. Okay, I have won a few, very few, but I made her cry in the process, and that’s the same as losing. If I could argue with my wife through email, where I have two whole days to come up with a response, I would win my share, so I totally get that Jeremiah thinks God picked the wrong guy to be His spokesman, yet God, as always, has the final word. “Jeremiah, shut up! I will send! I will give words! And I will deliver!” “Jeremiah, it is I, not YOU.” When we get to this point with God, reason must shut down and faith must take its place; faith is certainty in the unseen (Heb 11:1), and it may have no past to back it up (shall I say 0-27?), and the present reality is very shaky. At the very moment of faith, all the promises are in the future, but we can be sure of this – with God, they are a certain reality. What has God put in your heart to do that your weak objections continue to overrule? Maybe it’s high time to stop objecting and start believing!