Just as the apostles saw the miracles Jesus performed and heard His divine teachings they did not understand what it all meant. They saw but didn’t see. They heard but didn’t hear. Thus, they did not comprehend the reality of the 
divine presence with them in the person of Jesus Christ. One of the latest lessons He taught His disciples was when Peter cut of Malthus’ ear in the garden. Jesus rebuked Peter, replaced the ear which miraculously reattached itself and said, “don’t you know that I could call legions of angels to come fight for me?” Well, they didn’t know! They saw and they heard but they didn’t comprehend. Jesus was indeed the physical presence of God almighty!
Jeremiah suggested that the Israelites saw God’s handiwork as well but didn’t see. God’s greatness, His majesty is apparent to all who will open their eyes and ears to see and hear. Once we do that we will stand in total awe and amazement. In Jeremiah 5:22, he writes to those living in Jerusalem, “Do you not fear me? declares the LORD. Do you not tremble before me? I placed the sand as the boundary for the sea, a perpetual barrier that it cannot pass; though the waves toss, they cannot prevail; though they roar, they cannot pass over it.” God established the basic laws of nature which enable us to live and breathe and exist in the world as we do. William Blake was right, “A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.”
Just as He established the laws that make our lives possible, so too, He established the moral foundations that make our lives meaningful. But, like the citizen of Jerusalem, we see but do not see. We hear and do not hear! I would love to speak the words Jeremiah spoke to Jerusalem to the members of the Supreme Court of the United States. “Do you not fear me? Declares the Lord. Do you not tremble before me? I established marriage in the garden. I set its boundaries. I established its ceremonies and vows and participants. I placed the genders in their proper places and established permanent barriers that should not be crossed. Do you not fear me? Declares the Lord! Jeremiah’s indictment is that God has set bounds for the sea and the sea must obey. He has set bounds for mankind, but mankind has rebelled. I like what T.S. Eliot said; “I had far rather walk, as I do, in daily terror of eternity, than feel that this was only a child’s game in which all the contestants would get equally worthless prizes in the end.”[1] Unfortunately, the United States decided by a vote of five to four that we have no fear of God!
[1] Craig Brian Larson and Brian Lowery, 1001 Quotations That Connect: Timeless Wisdom for Preaching, Teaching, and Writing (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 2009), 126.