Talk about a tough job assignment. In 627 BC the Assyrian Empire, wracked by internal strife, was crumbling. Babylon to the north was rising, Egypt to the west was threatening, and tiny Israel was caught in the middle. Having abandoned their original purpose as a nation under God, worship of Yahweh was a shell. The nation, torn by its own civil strife into two kingdoms of Israel and Judah, had given itself as a prostitute to other foreign gods. Into that maelstrom of political plots and religious apostasy, Jeremiah was called to speak. But few would listen. In the end his warnings proved to be true and the nation was destroyed and carted off into captivity.

What might a crusty old prophet have to say to me in an age of vast inequalities, political gridlock, empty speech, and the specter of demographic, economic, and ecological gloom around every corner?