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Consider that Jeremiah’s advice sounds as if it would be more fitting coming from the mouth of Moses. Jeremiah never lived the privileged life that Moses had at one time enjoyed. He never had the opportunity to become disillusioned with the seats of power. At least early in life Moses had tasted the fruits of the life that the world calls great. He would have known first-hand the hollowness that stalked the lives of those that we call “movers and shakers”. Jeremiah’s life was almost the mirror reverse. Like many of us, Jeremiah struggled to reconcile his calling with the conflicts and troubles he endured. Unlike Moses, there was no before and after, no example that would have empowered him to speak with authority about the perils of craving what this world calls great.
As rapidly as our culture is changing today, it is easy to identify with the apostle Paul as being one born out of due time (1 Cor. 15:8). Jeremiah lived his life with his ministry and message being rejected. It seemed as though he was a man living before his time. Putting people to sleep with our preaching is not quite the same as having them rise up and publicly denounce it. Both are intimidating. Yet one demands a sense of humor while the other may call for a hasty retreat. Everyone expects that God’s calling is going to make them seem great to those to whom they are called to minister. I once had someone tell me they were being called to the nations. Why not press for a ministry like that of the apostle Paul who was called to stand before kings (Acts 9:15)?

Yet we need to understand that God is not intimidated when His calling in our lives has produced disillusionment. He does not regret what He has given to us or called us to do (Rom. 11:29). Though Jeremiah anguished greatly over the fact that he was called to a very unpopular ministry, God never did. In fact, if there was a prophet whose ministry most mirrored that of God’s beloved Son it would have been that of Jeremiah. Like Jeremiah, Jesus came to His own and His own received Him not (John 1:11). Just as it pleased God to bruise His Son with the rod that purchased our salvation and healing, it pleased Him for Jeremiah to suffer the rejection and wrath of those for whom he had been called to give his best (Isa. 53:10). We can only conclude that disillusionment is the reaction of the carnal man to the stress of God’s calling.
Circumstances wring out of us the juice of our carnal nature. They are God’s means for bringing us face-to-face with our false expectations of what He has called us to do. Moses left Egypt offended that the people could not grasp the high calling God had placed upon his life (Acts 7:25). The Moses that was raised in Pharaoh’s house was a willing vessel. By the time God got through with him, he had lapsed into being little more than a “desert redneck”. Now that God was ready for him, he was no longer a willing vessel (Ex. 3:11). We get God’s calling and think He had better hurry up and use us before circumstances destroy all the tools we can bring to that calling which will make us effective.