You, LORD, reign forever; your throne endures from generation to generation. – Lamentations 5:19

Today’s Scripture Reading (April 5, 2014): Lamentations 5

With the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany in 1939, the Polish Government went into exile. The Polish Government-in-exile ruled Poland, at first, from Paris, France. But when France fell to the advancing German army in 1940, the Polish government-in-exile moved to the United Kingdom. And there the Polish Government-in-exile would function for the next 50 years.

During the Second World War, the rule of the Polish Government in exile was actually quite effective through the Polish Resistance at home. But following the war, Poland became a puppet regime of the growing Soviet Bloc of nations. And so the Polish Government in exile began to shadow the decisions of the puppet nation. No longer did the exiled Government have any pull at home, but they continued to refuse to accept the reality that the nation that they loved was now under Communist control. It was not until 1990 when Communist rule in Poland came to an end that the Polish Government-in-exile gave up their fight and formally bestowed their power onto the Third Polish Republic.

Part of the struggle in Judah was that so much of what the people understood as power was centered in Jerusalem. And now, with Jerusalem in ruins, it was not just the seat of power that was gone – the power itself had disappeared. I am not sure that the Jewish people could even conceive of a “government-in-exile.” Power belonged in Jerusalem, and Jerusalem was gone.

But the situation went even beyond the loss of national political power. God’s home on earth was also in Jerusalem. Solomon’s temple had been built in Jerusalem for the express purpose of giving to God a resting place on the earth. But that resting place was gone. And in many ways, the words of Jeremiah would have sounded strange. How could God’s throne endure, how could God rule on earth from generation to generation, when the temple was gone.

But Jeremiah’s message is one that seems so obvious to us now (especially after 1900 years of God’s rule without a temple in Jerusalem.) His message is simply this - God’s rule transcends place.  The earth, all of it, was created by God and he rules throughout it. He is always present, and he always sees, even in those moments when we think is deaf or blind. Jeremiah needed the people to understand that God does not rule in exile, because there is no place where he does not belong, and no place where he is not still the reigning King.     

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2 Chronicles 36