Fallow ground, hardened hearts, idolatrous worship, hypocrisy, and judgment seem to go together. It begins with turning of the heart away from God. "Because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish hearts were darkened", so writes the apostle Paul (Romans 1:21). Sad to say, but even a professing child of God can turn away from God, have a hardened heart, get into idolatrous worship, hypocrisy, and the ultimate end is judgment.
The prophet Jeremiah was dealing with a people of God who thought they had it all made. They were secure. Their security was in false messages of hope and goodness of the people. It was in their temple, and God would never allow anything to happen to the temple (7:4, 8-11). They had listened to the false prophets saying, "There will be peace in the land" (4:10), and one false prophet refused, and mocked the word which the LORD had spoken through Jeremiah saying, "The captives won't be in captive for seventy years, but only two." (Chapter 28). Like the rest of the lying prophets they meet God on His terms; and pay a tremendous price; their eternal souls.
Because of the idolatry, hard heartedness, along with hypocrisy and pretense God was sending an army from the North to invade, conquer, and take captive those who were refusing the Word of the LORD. Jeremiah is calling them to come together.
"Declare in Judah and proclaim in Jerusalem, and say: 'Blow the trumpet in the land;' Cry, 'Gather together,' and say, 'Assemble yourselves, and let us go into the fortified cities.' Set up the standard toward Zion. Take refuge! Do not delay! For I will bring disaster from the north, and great destruction" Jeremiah 4:5-6 (NKJV)
This message from the LORD is not one of, "Let's wait and see", but rather "Gather them together now". It is almost like this was to be and would be their final opportunity to repent, and turn to the LORD with all their hearts. The call was to come by way of the sound of the trumpet; "Blow the trumpet in the land...". The trumpet was to be sounded by the watchmen on the walls of the city. Jeremiah was a prophet of God. He spoke the message of God, though many refused to listen and hear it, because of the soothing, comfortable, easy, lethargic messages of the false prophets. The warning of coming judgment has been given. The time of repentance is before the enemy comes.
This "Cry" was for the purpose of calling people who lived outside the walls of the city, and giving them time to get to safety. From a spiritual and practical point of view it also gives them time to think about their behavior, their sins, and get right with God.
With many Christians of our modern day (2008) we have no "walls" where we can flee. Many people have storm shelters to which they can flee from violent storms here in the United States, and maybe as they are heading to the shelter they should be thinking about getting things right with God. We need Christians who do not just profess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior with their lips, but also by the way we live our lives. Our lives should be a clear reflection of Jesus Christ. We have people walking around today professing they are Christians, when it is comfortable for them to do so; and when its not comfortable to do so, then you could not tell the difference between them and the world.
The warning of "Blow the trumpet..."Cry, 'Gather together" is one of great urgency. Jeremiah sees it as already taking place. He would live to see many taken captive to Babylon, but he himself was not taken there. The city was their place of "refuge", and it was not the LORD. Despite the fact that they had the temple; despite the fact that they were known as "the people of God"; despite the fact they had the ark of the covenant; God was sending judgment upon Judah and Israel.
There is no security for the individual whose security is in things; such as walls and temples, even professions, and confessions, and not in God.
No comments:
Post a Comment