“Then I set bowls full of wine and some cups before the Rekabites and said to them, “Drink some wine.” But they replied, “We do not drink wine, because our forefather Jehonadab son of Rekab gave us this command: ‘Neither you nor your descendants must ever drink wine.”

Jeremiah 35:5-6

The group Jeremiah encountered descended from a certain Jehonadab, son of Rekab, who was once associated with Jehu’s purge of the household of Ahab. Jehonadab issued the commands which defined his descendants’ identity and to which they continued to adhere unwaveringly two centuries later.

Under instructions from the Lord (v 2), Jeremiah tests the resolve of the Rekabites. They were unmoving, proving their loyalty and obedience to their ancestor. This encounter provided Jeremiah with an object lesson for the nation of Israel and their king, who had abandoned the words of the Lord and indulged in Canaanite worship and culture. Their unfaithfulness stood in sharp contrast to the constancy of the Rekabites and attracted God’s severest censure.

Israel, as a community, was meant to be a people steeped in listening to what the Lord had said in the Torah and continued to say through his prophets. Disciples of Jesus are under the same obligation. The decisions and choices we make, the identities we create for ourselves, should conform to and grow out of our understanding of the ways of the Lord – and that demands deep listening.

CLOSING PRAYER

Loving Father, make my walk with you one of obedience, choosing what is right, repelling what is wrong—both in word and deed. I want my life to be a faithful testimony to who you are.

(from Encounter with God)

* Lord I pray that my family and the families of CMI live a faithful life of listening and obeying the words of the Lord like the Rechabites who have kept the teachings of their ancestors for two centuries.