The cost of obedience and faith in God

"You seduced me, LORD, and I let myself be seduced; you were too strong for me, and you prevailed. All day long, I am an object of laughter; everyone mocks me. Whenever I speak, I must cry out, violence and outrage I proclaim. The word of the LORD has brought me reproach and derision all day long. I say I will not mention him, I will no longer speak in his name. But then it is as if fire is burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones; I grow weary holding back, I cannot!" (Jeremiah 20:7–9)

This anguished confession of the prophet Jeremiah captures the paradoxical cost of divine vocation. In brutally honest language, Jeremiah accuses God of seducing and overpowering him—a metaphor that expresses the overwhelming nature of the prophetic call. The prophet feels deceived, not because God has lied, but because the path of obedience has led not to vindication or acclaim, but to suffering and scorn. The vocation to speak God's word has placed him in perpetual conflict with his people, who do not want to hear the truth. Yet the prophet cannot remain silent, for the word of the Lord is like fire within him—a consuming and inescapable force.

This passage illuminates the interior life of the prophet as one marked by tension between divine compulsion and human resistance. Jeremiah's lament is not a failure of faith but a window into the cost of authentic fidelity. His words echo the broader biblical theme that true discipleship entails suffering. The prophet becomes a type of Christ, whose own mission was marked by rejection, sorrow, and the necessity of proclaiming truth at great personal cost. The metaphor of divine seduction (pātāh) highlights not manipulation, but the irresistible allure of divine truth, which captures the heart and claims the whole person.

Jeremiah’s attempt to silence himself—“I will not mention him”—represents the temptation of every disciple to withdraw from mission in the face of rejection. But the word of God is not a neutral possession; it is living and active (cf. Hebrews 4:12), and in the case of Jeremiah, it becomes a fire shut up in his bones. This image conveys both the pain and the vitality of the divine message. The prophet is not driven by ego or ideology but by the uncontainable force of God’s will. Silence becomes more unbearable than suffering, and thus the prophet continues to speak, not out of personal resolve, but because he is inwardly compelled by grace.

This passage offers profound encouragement to all who experience fatigue, discouragement, or misunderstanding in the service of the Gospel. Whether one is a preacher, catechist, religious educator, or Christian witness in secular society, the cost of proclaiming God's truth often includes mockery, isolation, and inner conflict. Jeremiah reminds the faithful that such trials are not signs of failure, but of authentic participation in the prophetic vocation of the Church. The consolation is not the removal of suffering, but the certainty that God’s word is active within, sustaining even when it wounds, and calling forth fidelity beyond what the human heart thinks possible.

Jeremiah 20:7–9 reveals the mystery of prophetic suffering as a participation in the divine pathos. The prophet speaks not from distance but from communion with God’s own heartbreak over sin and rejection. In this way, Jeremiah foreshadows Christ, who was also mocked, rejected, and compelled by the will of the Father to speak and to save. His fire, too, could not be quenched, even by death. For the Church today, Jeremiah’s lament is a reminder that proclamation is born not of strategy but of vocation, not of ease but of burning love. The word may wound, but it also transforms. And when it lives within us like fire, we cannot hold it back—we must speak, even through tears, because the truth of God is too great, too beautiful, and too necessary to be silenced.