In Jeremiah, chapter fifteen, verses nineteen through twenty-one, “Therefore thus saith the Lord, If thou return, then will I bring thee again, and thou shalt stand before me: and if thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as thy mouth: let them return unto thee; but return not thou unto them. And I will make thee unto this people a fenced brasen wall: and they shall fight against thee, but they shall not prevail against thee: for I am with thee to save thee and to deliver thee, saith the Lord. And I will deliver thee out of the hand of the wicked, and I will redeem thee out of the hand of the terrible.” Unfortunately, Jeremiah accused God of not being as faithful to him as he should have been, as in verse eighteen. God told him to repent of such words and went on to give him a promise and a renewal of his call.
It is a matter of comfort that we have in God, to whose knowledge of all things we may appeal. Jeremiah pleads with God for mercy and relief against his enemies, persecutors, and slanderers. It will be a comfort to God’s ministers when men despise them if they have the testimony of their own consciences. But he complains that he found little pleasure in his work. Some good people lose much of the pleasantness of religion by the fretfulness and uneasiness of their natural temper, which they indulge. The Lord called the prophet to cease from his distrust and to return to his work.
If he attended thereto, he might be assured the Lord would deliver him from trouble or carry through it. Many things appear frightful, which do not at all hurt a real believer in Jesus Christ.