Be not afraid of their faces: for I am with you to deliver you,
says the LORD.
Read Chapter 1
Gregory the Theologian
AD 390
Some readily complied with the call, others deprecated the gift... Isaiah readily submitted (Is 6:8), but Jeremiah was afraid of his youth.
Ah, ah, ah, Lord God: What is it that has induced this fear in me, that, instead of supposing me to be needlessly afraid, you may highly commend my foresight? I hear from Moses himself, when God spoke to him, that, although many were bidden to come to the mount, and Moses alone to draw near, and the people were not to go up with him. Exodus 24:1-2 For it is not everyone who may draw near to God, but only one who, like Moses, can bear the glory of God. Moreover, before this, when the law was first given, the trumpet-blasts, and lightnings, and thunders, and darkness, and the smoke of the whole mountain, and the terrible threats that if even a beast touched the mountain it should be stoned, Hebrews 12:18 and other like alarms, kept back the rest of the people, for whom it was a great privilege, after careful purification, merely to hear the voice ...
You should not consider the matter of age, he said, for you have learned through another prophet’s words that “a man’s gray hair is his wisdom.” May you only be willing to continue, for you will have me as a companion by whose assistance you will accomplish everything: “Open your mouth, and I will fill it.” Neither should you consider the number of those against whom you are about to speak, but consider me only, who is with you to deliver you, says the Lord. The Lord delivers, however, not so that the prophet will be free of persecutions and difficulties, for we read that he was severely afflicted. Instead, the Lord liberates one who suffers everything to overcome these tribulations rather than yielding to them. - "Six Books on Jeremiah 1.4.1–2"
