Jeremiah

Jeremiah Chapter 8

• Jeremiah 8:1 At that time, saith the LORD, they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their graves:
• 2 And they shall spread them before the sun, and the moon, and all the host of heaven, whom they have loved, and whom they have served, and after whom they have walked, and whom they have sought, and whom they have worshipped: they shall not be gathered, nor be buried; they shall be for dung upon the face of the earth.

Nebuchadnezzar will cause the graves of kings to be opened and the bones brought out to spread before the sun. Its shows the ultimate judgment of God when He would allow a wicked king to plunder even the graves.

• Jeremiah 8:3 And death shall be chosen rather than life by all the residue of them that remain of this evil family, which remain in all the places whither I have driven them, saith the LORD of hosts.

The judgment was so great that many would have rather died than to go on living away from home into the other lands where they were driven.

I can't stress this enough. As they became slaves unto the nations whose gods they worshipped instead of the real God, we also are slaves to sin. We are under bondage when we are living in sin just as they were under bondage to Babylon. In fact I remember old time preachers who referred to following after the world equivalent to following after Babylon.

If we choose to follow after sin rather than to turn to the one who saves us from sin, Jesus Christ, then the sin that we chose instead of God will eventually enslave us and destroy us. There is no other way of escape except the Holy Way God planned for all mankind to escape judgment for sin and that way is Jesus Christ.

• Jeremiah 8:4 Moreover thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the LORD; Shall they fall, and not arise? shall he turn away, and not return?
• 5 Why then is this people of Jerusalem slidden back by a perpetual backsliding? they hold fast deceit, they refuse to return.

Israel and Jerusalem once knew God. They once knew the law of God and once walked with God. They backslid away from God. This can also happen to a Christian who once knew God and once received Jesus Christ as savior. He can forsake, backslide and remove him or herself from fellowship with God. There are many warnings in the New Testament of this.

• 1Corinthians 10:12 Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. 

This warns us strongly to take heed, pay attention, listen to and stay focused on Christ and refuse to be entangled with the deceitfulness of sin yet also stay focused on whatever calling God calls us to. We are all called to share the gospel that will save others.

• Romans 11:21 For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee.
• 22 Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off.
• 23 And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be graffed in: for God is able to graff them in again. 
• 24 For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert graffed contrary to nature into a good olive tree: how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be graffed into their own olive tree?
• 25 For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. 
• 26 And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob: 
• 27 For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.

As much as I would like to believe in the eternal security like our Baptist brethren, I see too many warnings to prove otherwise. Unbelief is the first step in forsaking God. We cannot be saved if we abide in unbelief. Jesus said if we believe in Him we shall have eternal life. If we stop believing then how would it apply in our case? 

Of course I'm not talking of temporary lapses in faith when we go through hard times. I'm talking of departing from the faith where we don't want anything to do with God and return to sin without a qualm thereby searing our conscience. There are some though that believe such a person that does that was not saved to begin with, so in that case they might have a valid argument for eternal security but there are so many warnings against backsliding that one has to evaluate all of them and study to show themselves approved unto God as the scripture says. 

• Jeremiah 8:6 I hearkened and heard, but they spake not aright: no man repented him of his wickedness, saying, What have I done? every one turned to his course, as the horse rusheth into the battle.

Their biggest failure was the lack of repentance. When one sees that he or she has sinned and acknowledges that they are in need to make that right with God; they can ask forgiveness. If they have a willing heart to let God help them to change, then they can be delivered from sin. Unwillingness to see ourselves as in trouble and in need of God keeps us from being saved. Israel failed time and again, not because they sinned but because when the prophets came to show them their sin, they refused to listen and acknowledge that they had sinned.

This can keep one from obtaining salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. To receive salvation we have to acknowledge that we need salvation. First we have to realize we have sinned against God and need His forgiveness. We need to realize that only His Spirit can help us to keep us from going back under the old bondage to sin. We need to accept Him into our lives so that He can give us His Holy Spirit to abide with us and give us a new nature that hates sin.

Yes we can possibly sin after receiving Jesus Christ but we should not want to. We should immediately repent continually abide in Christ. We can't say that we know God and then ignore everything He says. How can we say we are Christians if we do not do what God says in His word. 

• Jeremiah 8:7 Yea, the stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times; and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the LORD.
• 8 How do ye say, We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us? Lo, certainly in vain made he it; the pen of the scribes is in vain.

Saying that we have the Lord with us and the claim of having God's law is not the same as doing and living by the word of God. Israel could not boast of being God's chosen people and having the commandments given to them if they do not observe and do what the commandments say.

We today may have come from church backgrounds that were strong in faith and taught the word of God in Spirit and in truth but if we are not living in that same word today, we cannot boast of what we once were. We cannot trust in the past but make sure we are living in God's will today.

• Jeremiah 8:9 The wise men are ashamed, they are dismayed and taken: lo, they have rejected the word of the LORD; and what wisdom is in them?

This is a verse that is never outdated. If we reject the word of God we have rejected wisdom and knowledge because the fear of God is the beginning, just the beginning of knowledge and wisdom. We may think the wisest person is one of great education but if that educated person does not fear the word of God, he or she knows nothing. Their knowledge and wisdom is vain.

Why do you think we put so much tax money into schools and we are producing kids who know very little. In the days when teachers feared God, the schools sent out pupils who knew something.

• Jeremiah 8:10 Therefore will I give their wives unto others, and their fields to them that shall inherit them: for every one from the least even unto the greatest is given to covetousness, from the prophet even unto the priest every one dealeth falsely.

One of the results of rejecting the word of God and losing the fear of God is that we become greedy and start to cheat in business. As a result of this, God gave what they had to others. We reap what we sow. If we gain by cheating others, we will lose in the long run.

• Jeremiah 8:11 For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

This is a common trait in all of us. If someone comes to us upset and with a problem, we say kind words of comfort. This is okay if that is what is needed but we really need to be objective (which I rarely am) and really help a friend by telling them the truth. I am one who shies away from this myself. I would much rather comfort because I fear being like one of Job's comforters and saying the wrong thing. Yet if we trust God to help us, we can really be a help to our friends if we tell the truth in the right spirit.

• Jeremiah 8:12 Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? Nay, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush: therefore shall they fall among them that fall: in the time of their visitation they shall be cast down, saith the LORD.

A person who is quick to acknowledge their wrong doing and repents, fairs much better than those who continually are blind to their own sins and refuse correction.

This is why David was a man after God's own heart. Not because everything he did was perfect. He sinned many times. He was justified though because he was always willing to repent if his sin was pointed out to him. This is a trait in a true man or woman of God. Not being perfect, but desiring to be perfect and please God, repenting at once when we discover sin in our own lives.

• Jeremiah 8:13 I will surely consume them, saith the LORD: there shall be no grapes on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade; and the things that I have given them shall pass away from them.
• 14 Why do we sit still? assemble yourselves, and let us enter into the defenced cities, and let us be silent there: for the LORD our God hath put us to silence, and given us water of gall to drink, because we have sinned against the LORD.
• 15 We looked for peace, but no good came; and for a time of health, and behold trouble!
• 16 The snorting of his horses was heard from Dan: the whole land trembled at the sound of the neighing of his strong ones; for they are come, and have devoured the land, and all that is in it; the city, and those that dwell therein.
• 17 For, behold, I will send serpents, cockatrices, among you, which will not be charmed, and they shall bite you, saith the LORD.

Not only would an evil nation oppress them but trouble, sickness, sorrow, and animals would be a threat to them.

• Jeremiah 8:18 When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint in me.
• 19 Behold the voice of the cry of the daughter of my people because of them that dwell in a far country: Is not the LORD in Zion? is not her king in her? Why have they provoked me to anger with their graven images, and with strange vanities?
• 20 The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.

All this and no one was saved. No one was repentant. All still mourned for what had happened to them but did not mourn that they sinned against God.

• Jeremiah 8:21 For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I hurt; I am black; astonishment hath taken hold on me.
• 22 Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?

The prophet Jeremiah mourns and hated to see what was happening to Judah just as it happened to Israel. It is not fun to be a prophet who tells the truth but they had to obey God rather than please men. It is better to suffer the wrath of men which passes away than the wrath of God which could result in a soul being lost for eternity.

• Ezekiel 3:17 Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel: therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me. 
• 18 When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand.
• 19 Yet if thou warn the wicked, and he turn not from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but thou hast delivered thy soul. 
• 20 Again, When a righteous man doth turn from his righteousness, and commit iniquity, and I lay a stumblingblock before him, he shall die: because thou hast not given him warning, he shall die in his sin, and his righteousness which he hath done shall not be remembered; but his blood will I require at thine hand.
• 21 Nevertheless if thou warn the righteous man, that the righteous sin not, and he doth not sin, he shall surely live, because he is warned; also thou hast delivered thy soul.

-Dorna Chambers

Study of Jeremiah 9