My uncle Johnny was an authority on Manfred von Richthofen, better known as the Red Baron. He loved to tell how the famous pilot shot down eighty enemy aircraft during the First World War and how he built a working model of the red Fokker triplane to fly at airshows across Florida. On April 12, 1918, Richthofen was pursuing a Canadian pilot with such intensity that he flew too far into enemy territory. Eyewitnesses said he was flying dangerously low, completely absorbed in the chase, and never realized where he was until he was shot down. Focused desire clouded his awareness, and it cost him his life. Jeremiah describes a similar tragedy in the life of faith. People chase what they want with such concentration that they lose track of where they are. Possessions, pleasures, and positions become the horizon, and the warning signs slip quietly past.
That blindness is exactly what Jeremiah confronts in Israel. After likening them to an adulteress, a corrupt branch, and an irremovable stain, he challenges their denial: “How can you say, ‘I am not unclean, I have not gone after the Baals’? Look at your way in the valley; know what you have done” (Jeremiah 2:23). Their behavior told the story plainly enough. Jeremiah goes further, comparing them to animals driven by instinct rather than reflection. “A restless young camel running here and there, a wild donkey used to the wilderness, in her heat sniffing the wind” (Jeremiah 2:24). Gingrich notes that Judah did not need to be wooed by false gods; she pursued them eagerly. The picture is embarrassing, intentionally so. Desire unrestrained becomes self-parody, and sin advertises itself long before it admits its name.
The New Testament speaks with the same clarity about misplaced pursuit. Paul warns that “those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh” (Romans 8:5), and such focus narrows vision until nothing else registers. Jesus describes it more sharply: “Everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin” (John 8:34). Slaves do not choose their direction; they follow their impulses wherever they lead. Israel ran after idols the way the Red Baron chased his target, unaware of the danger until the fall came. Christ enters that story as the one who restores sight and altitude. Paul writes, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away” (Second Corinthians 5:17). In Him, the chase is broken, awareness returns, and the soul is lifted out of reckless pursuit into a truer sense of where it belongs.