Lying Words: Jeremiah 7-10 (2)

Pray Psalm 83.16-18.
Fill their faces with shame,
That they may seek Your name, O LORD.
Let them be confounded and dismayed forever;
Yes, let them be put to shame and perish,
That they may know that You, whose name alone is the LORD,
Are the Most High over all the earth.

Sing Psalm 83.16-18.
(St. Chrysostom: We Have not Known Thee as We Ought)
Fill with dishonor every face that they may seek Your Name, O Lord.
Bring them to shame, dismay, and disgrace, and let them perish under Your Word,
That they may learn Your infinite worth, O God Most High of all the earth!

Read and meditate on Jeremiah 7.28-8.3

Prepare.
1. Why did God instruct Jeremiah to cut off his hair?

2. What was the great sin of Topheh?

Meditate.
Once the nation had forsaken God’s truth, they had no reliable anchor for their lives. With God’s truth “cut off” from their mouths, there was nothing by which any behavior could be corrected, except whatever the leaders approved at any time (v. 28). And they were taking their cues from the surrounding nations, and had set up foreign gods within the temple precincts (v. 30).

God had Jeremiah cut off his hair and cast it away as a dramatic way of symbolizing what the people of Judah and Jerusalem had done with God’s truth (v. 29). Following the lead of their unbelieving neighbors, the people of God sacrificed their own children in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, because they believed this would appease or please the false god Moloch. So many children had been sacrificed, that there was no longer any room to bury in that place (v. 32).

God had not authorized any of this; it had not even come into His heart (v. 31). But the people did it, going along with their unbelieving neighbors to get along on the issues of politics, mutual defense, trade, and so forth.

God’s judgment would be terrible. His people would die in the land, their bodies left to the ravages of wild beasts (v. 33). Every remainder of happiness or mirth or of the familiar status quo would be eliminated, and the land would be left desolate (v. 34). Even the bones of their venerated ancestors would be disinterred and exposed to corruption by their enemies (8.1, 2). And all who remained of “this evil family” – the royal line of David – would be given over to death or driven into foreign lands (v. 3).

When people forsake the Law of God, they lose the ability to love anyone or anything but themselves (Matt. 12.24). They worship the god of self and convenience, and will do anything they think will keep those false deities happy. This was true in Jeremiah’s day, and it’s just as true in ours.

Reflect.
1. What kinds of ideas or other temptations draw us away from God’s Word?

2. Why was God’s judgment going to be so severe against His people?

3. How can we know when we have begun to drift from God’s Word?

The wrath of the Lord, therefore, is just. It is kindled and poured out on a contemptuous and stiff-necked people who are unwilling to hear the words of God. Yet, as we said above, how God continued to send prophets to them all day long and even through the night! Jerome (347-429), Six Books on Jeremiah 2.42.1

Lord, don’t let me drift from Your truth, but show me when I’m drifting so that I…

Pray Psalm 83.1-15.
Pray that God would stay His hand of judgment against His Church, and that He would lead us to seek revival and renewal by His Word and Spirit.

Sing Psalm 83.1-15
Psalm 83.1-15 (St. Chrysostom: We Have not Known Thee as We Ought)
O God, do not be quiet now; do not be silent, nor be still!
See how Your foes erupt in a row and those who hate You chafe at Your will.
Shrewdly they plan, conspiring as one, against Your daughters and Your sons.

“Come, let us wipe them out,” they say. “Let Israel’s name no more be heard!”
Bold they conspire to do us away, and covenant against You, O Lord.
Peoples and nations cast in their lot for this ambitious, wicked plot.

Deal with them, Lord, and bring them down, as You against old foes prevailed,
when You Midian cast to the ground and all her kings and princes assailed –
All who Your pastures sought to possess You brought to ruin and deep distress.

Make them like whirling dust, O God!  Scatter them like the windblown chaff!
Rage like a fire consuming a wood, like flames that burn a mountain pass!
Blow like a tempest, bring them to harm, and terrify them with Your storm!

T. M. Moore

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Except as indicated, Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. All quotations from Church Fathers from Ancient Christian Commentary Series, General Editor Thomas C. Oden (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2006). All psalms for singing are from The Ailbe Psalter (available by clicking here).