Perhaps

God used Jeremiah to warn Israel, as He had done with other prophets.  Time and again, Jeremiah delivers God's message of warning to deaf ears.  However, as Israel is prone to do, when the going gets rough, then run to God for help.

Jeremiah has been talking to Israel for twenty chapters.  He has been beaten and put in stocks for his effort, bemoaning his own birth in the process.  Now, in chapter twenty-one, the king sends his men to Jeremiah with an inquiry, because the enemy is coming.  "Please inquire to the LORD on our behalf...perhaps the LORD will deal with us according to all His wonderful acts, so that the enemy will withdraw from us."  

Perhaps?  That word alone shows that God's people really don't know Him at all.  God is not a haphazard God.  He speaks.  We say, "Amen", so be it!  That's part of the wonder, beauty, and power of God.  That's part of the security of trusting Him.  He is sovereign, sure, and what He says is sound!

Perhaps?  Have they not been listening?  He has told them over and over what is.  Their inquiry is too late.  

Oh, the sorrow and devastation of being too late.  We are the unruly and haphazard ones.  We are the ones who tend toward chance and luck.  God would, a couple of chapters later, use that same word in reference to His people: "stand...and speak...all the words that I have commanded you to speak to them.  Do not omit a word!  Perhaps they will listen and everyone will turn from his evil way, that I may repent of the calamity which I am planning to do to them because of the evil of their deeds."

Perhaps!  Our thoughts of God are too much like our thoughts of ourselves.  We ought to be ashamed that we know so little of the character of our God.  "Study to show yourselves approved to God, a workman that needs not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." (2 Timothy 2:15)