Return! Return!
(No. 2931)
A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, APRIL 13, 1905,
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON LORD'S-DAY EVENING,
DECEMBER 17, 1876.
"Return, you backsliding Israel. Turn, O backsliding children. Return,
you backsliding children." Jeremiah 3:12,14,22.
IT is, indeed, a horrible thing that a saved soul should ever wander
from its Savior. After having had so much of past sin fully and freely
forgiven and, after having then made to rejoice in perfect pardon, can
it ever turn away from those dear pierced hands which lifted its heavy
burden from its shoulders? Can it ever wander from the Fountain in
which it was washed whiter than snow? If so, it will, indeed, have
committed a shameful sin! After so many spiritual benefits have been
enjoyed and the soul has not only been washed, but also robed, fed,
adopted into the family of God and been taught many wonderful
lessons–can such a child as that leave such a home and such a
Father–and go back to "the beggarly elements" from which it has been
delivered? Ah, if it even thinks of doing so, it has, by that very
thought, committed treason against the Sovereign Love of God!
No, Beloved, with so much sin forgiven and so much favor bestowed, we
ought to feel ourselves bound with cords to the horns of the altar! And
with such bright prospects before us, such a Heaven prepared by such a
Savior–with the assurance that we shall forever be with Him where He
is, beholding His Glory–and with such exceedingly great and precious
promises as He has made to him that overcomes, why, Brothers and
Sisters, if we think of turning our backs in the day of battle, or of
forsaking the King's Highway for a meadow path, the very thought must
be most grievous to God as well as most shameful on our part! It ought
to be intolerable to us to even thinkof such a thing! For any Believer
in the Lord Jesus Christ to actually go astray; to actually sin against
the Light of God and knowledge; to sin against Infinite Love and mercy;
to sin against Your wounds, Emmanuel, and against Your crown of
thorns–to offend against Your matchless love–oh, this is dreadful,
indeed!
Well did the Lord say, concerning Israel's backsliding, "Be astonished,
O you heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid." Brothers and Sisters
in Christ, let me remind you that there is nothing for us to gain and
everything for us to lose by forsaking the ways of God, even for a
moment! We are not like those who have never known His ways, for we
know them to be to paths of pleasantness and peace. We are not like
those who are still deceived by the world, for we have proven how false
she is. Her painted charms once bewitched our hearts and we were
enamored of her, but we have been undeceived, and now we cry with
Solomon, "Vanity of vanities; all is vanity!" This empty world does but
mock and deceive all who seek for true treasure in it–are we going
back to it after all that we have received from Christ, forsaking the
real for the imaginary, the substantial for the shadowy?
Can it be that we are going to commit these two evils–to forsake the
fountain of Living Waters and to hew out for ourselves broken cisterns
which can hold no water? If any of us have done so in the past, let us
be ashamed of ourselves! And if some of us have done so almost without
knowing what we were doing, let us prostrate ourselves in the very dust
before the Most High, for this is no common sin. It is a sin that has a
high degree of heinousness and aggravation, when any of us who have
known the way of righteousness–and who have enjoyed sweet and hallowed
fellowship with God and the liberty with which Christ has made us
free–go back to wear, again, the chains of sin's slavery and even, for
a while, or in part, have a guilty complicity with that vain world
which we professed to have forsaken once and for all.
Every man, however great his experience may be, is in danger! I have
heard that more horses fall at the bottom of the hill than anywhere
else because the drivers fancy they have no need to hold them back when
they have reached the bottom of the hill. And I have noticed that some
of the saddest falls I have ever witnessed among Christian men and
women have been among elderly Christians–among they who said of the
young people, "Ah, they ought to be very watchful, for they have strong
passions, and they may very easily be led astray. But as for us, we
have had such a long experience that we
have passed out of the range of temptation." The most dangerous place
in the world is that which is supposed to be beyond the reach of
temptation! The power of the devil is most often to be feared when he
has left you alone for a while, for he has then probably left you to
something or someone who will be more dangerous to you than he,
himself, would be. That is to, say, when a man says, "I shall never be
tempted again," he has already fallen into one of the devil's most
dangerous snares, for the pride of his heart has deceived him and made
him an easy prey to the great adversary.
Satan delights to pluck gray beards and to prove their owners to be
fools! He has great joy in tripping up young men, in the fullness of
their strength, to show that he is more than a match for the very
strongest of them! But he is even more glad to waylay a man in middle
life and to teach him that, even when he thinks he has all his wits
about him, he is not so shrewd as the old tempter is! But I think it is
his chief delight to waylay those who imagine that their long
experience will preserve them from the his snares. Therefore I say that
we are all of us, from the little child to the man who is on the very
brink of Heaven–from the most timid up to the bravest of us all–in
danger from our great adversary. Remember the dreadful conflict with
Satan which John Knox had just as he was about to enter Heaven–and
remember Martin Luther's desperate fight with the arch-fiend even in
the midst of the waters of Jordan–and learn from the experience of
these mighty men of God that we are all, always, from the first to the
last, in danger! And, therefore, all of us have need to cry unto the
Lord unceasingly–
"Keep us, Lord, oh keep us forever!
Vain our hope if left by Thee.
We are Yours! Oh leave us never,
Till Your face in Heaven we see,
There to praise Thee
Through a bright eternity!
All our strength at once would fail us,
If deserted, Lord, by Thee–
Nothing then could aught avail us,
Certain our defeat would be.
Those who hate us
Thenceforth their desire would see." Now, supposing that I am
addressing any persons who have unhappily fallen into this sin, what is
the message that I am to give to them from my Lord? After this
morning's service, I was talking with a Brother in Christ who was in
this sad condition. If he is here now, I would very affectionately
commend to him the message which the Holy Spirit sends to him and to
all who are like he–the Word of God which comes over and over again in
the three texts upon which I am about to speak to you–"Return!
Return!"
I. In trying to press that one simple message home to the backsliding
heart, I shall, first of all, speak of THE
SURPRISE WHICH THIS MESSAGE OUGHT TO AWAKEN–"Return!" Does God really
mean that? After I have
wandered so far from Him, does He invite me to come back to Him? Yes,
Beloved, He does, and He does so fully realizing all that the word,
"Return," involves. There is a holy jealousy in the heart of God which
causes Him to feel a righteous anger when any of His children wander
away from Him. Yet this word, "Return," proves that He has put aside
that jealousy in a marvelously gracious manner!
Let me read to you what the Lord says in the first verse of the chapter
from which my texts are taken, for I want to keep you to God's own Word
which will do you far more good, and give you far more solid comfort
than any word of mine. "They say"–that is, everybody says it–"If a
man puts away his wife and she goes from him and becomes another man'
s, shall he return unto her again? Shall not that land be greatly
polluted? But you have played the harlot with many lovers, yet return
again to Me, says the Lord." I cannot say much about the illustration
which the Lord here uses–it is a thing to be thoughtof rather than to
be talked about–but do you not see that the delicacy which makes a man
feel that he cannot take back his erring spouse is far more developed
in the mind of God? Yet, over the head of that delicacy, there rides
this Omnipotent Love which makes Him say, even to you who have wandered
the furthest from Him, "Return unto Me, notwithstanding all that has
happened."
Are you not surprised at the Lord's message when it is set before you
in such a light as this? Yet, surprising as it is, I pray you to
believe it and promptly to obey it! The wonder is increased when we
remember that the sin of going away
from God has, in some cases, been so grossly committed as to involve a
terrible mass of guilt If you read the whole of this chapter–which is
more suitable for your own private reading than for the general
congregation–you will see that Israel had wandered from the Lord in
the most shameless manner. And yet He said to her, "Return, you
backsliding Israel." Now, if you are, indeed, a child of God, although
you may have become neglectful of the Sabbath. Though it may have been
a long time since you bowed your knee in prayer. Though your Bible has
become covered with dust through your neglect and though you have so
acted that even mere worldlings might have been ashamed to act as you
have done–yet, still, Almighty Mercy, with the tears of pity standing
in its eyes, says to you, "Return, return, return!" It condemns your
sin and you, also, must condemn it, for it is an exceedingly loathsome
and horrible thing–but you, yourself, that same Mercy would gladly
save–and it still says to you, "Return, return, return!"
To add to the wonder that this message excites, remember the obstinate
adherence to evil which some of you have evinced even when you have
been suffering for your wrongdoing. Turn to the third verse–"Therefore
the showers have been withheld, and there has been no latter rain; and
you had a whore's forehead, you refused to be ashamed." God had kept
back the rain and thus had prevented the ripening and ingathering of
the harvest! Famine and need had stalked through the land and smitten
multitudes of the guilty people with death. Those who were spared knew
why this judgment had come, yet they did not return to the Lord. They
had a forehead of brass and they would not acknowledge their guilt, but
obstinately clung to their sin.
Brother, Sister, have you had this painful experience? Have you been
Divinely afflicted again and again, and yet have you not repented and
turned to the Lord? And notwithstanding that the blows of His rod
appear to have been lost upon you, and though He has scourged you again
and again, apparently to no purpose, still does His blessed Spirit
yearn over you! And the message He sends to you is not one of
condemnation or threat, but simply this, "Return, return, return!" Oh,
this is indeed amazing love that puts up with your ill manners and will
not take, "no," for an answer from you, but still sweetly invites you
to return to the Lord from whom you have wandered so far–and against
whom you have sinned so grossly!
Notice, also, that these sinful people had refused repeated invitations
to return to the Lord. How tenderly He says, in the fourth verse, "Will
you not, from this time, cry unto Me, My father, You are the guide of
my youth?" As if the Lord meant to say to the sinning one, "Have you
not had sufficient suffering as the result of your sin? The showers
have been withheld, poverty has come upon you, your barns are empty and
there is no corn in the fields to fill them. Will you not, at least
from this time, begin to call Me, 'Father,' and ask Me to be your
Friend?" Yet the guilty nation put all this pleading aside! But, even
then, the Lord still cried, "Return, return, return!" And if, dear
Friends, you have heard a great many earnest, faithful sermons and had
many loving entreaties from Christian men and women–and yet have put
them all aside–it is unutterably grievous that it should have been so,
yet still there is only this message for you, even now, "Return,
return, return!"
Worse still, these people had even turned the Grace of God into
licentiousness, and had made mischief out of God's goodness. Read in
the fifth verse, what they said–"Will He reserve His anger forever?
Will He keep it to the end? Behold, you have spoken and done evil
things as you could." Because God is so merciful, they were the more
sinful–and because He does not keep His anger forever, therefore they
dared to provoke it again and again! This is one of the worst ways in
which sinners prove how exceedingly sinful they are. A man is very far
gone in guilt when he reads Divine Grace the wrong way upwards and
infers, from the long-suffering of the Lord, that he may continue in
sin! Still, if you have done this, my Brother or my Sister, the Lord's
message to you is, "Return, return, return."
Give me your hand and come back with melting heart and streaming
eyes–and seek your Heavenly Father's face, again, for the great bell
still rings out from the hospice of mercy and its message to you is
this, "Though you have lost your way in the blinding snows of
despondency and doubt, mercy is still proclaimed to you; therefore,
Return, return, return." Can you not hear that great bell swinging in
the tower of God's love and compassion? Turn your head that way and ask
the Lord to lead you where that bell' s message summons you–"Return,
return, return."
II. Now, in the second place, we will change the run of our thought a
little by noting that THIS VOICE MUST AWAKEN MANY MEMORIES IN THE
BACKSLIDER'S MIND. He has long been going away from God, but even while
he has been sitting in this place, he has been obliged to think of
former and happier times in his history. And now
that word, "Return," causes him to recollect the time when he first
came to the Lord. Ah, my Brothers and Sisters, with what a broken
heart, and with what terrors and alarms, and with what weeping eyes you
loved up to Jesus on the accursed tree! And, as you looked to Him, you
found, as you thought, and as I hope you really did, peace, pardon and
everlasting life! Where have you been, my Brother, my Sister, since
that memorable day? Where have you been?
Wandering from that dear Cross, always going further and further away
from that Divine Love Incarnate which hung bleeding there for you!
Peter, your Lord's loving, pitying eyes are still fixed upon you though
you have denied Him and have falsely said, "I know not the Man." Still
do the glances of His eyes say, "Peter, return to Me. Return, My poor,
foolish, sinful disciple. You have sadly fallen by your iniquity, but,
although you have so greatly changed, I have not. My heart still yearns
for you. Return unto Me, for I have redeemed you."
That word, "Return," must also awaken in your memories recollections of
the happy days you used to have when you were living near to God. Some
of you have had times of great joy and gladness in this very
Tabernacle. You used to sing as sweetly and as joyfully as any,
especially when we sang the song of songs–
"Worthy the Lamb, for He was slain." Ah, you loved Him then, did you
not? You were not a hypocrite, were you? You meant what you sang and
you felt it, did you not? You have often had, since then, to question
yourselves to know whether you really were sincere at that time, or
not. I hope you can truthfully say, "Lord, You know all things, You
know that I did love You then." Why, the time was when the very mention
of that dear name used to fire your blood as the sound of martial music
stirs the soldier's spirit in the day of battle! You know how you would
have gone over hedge and ditch to hear the Gospel preached in those
days– and you would cheerfully have put up with the discomfort of
standing in the aisle of the overcrowded building–you were not so
dainty and thin-skinned, then, as you are now!
How you relished the Gospel then! What sweetness, what marrow and
fatness it was to your spirit at these communion times when you sat
among the people of God and remembered the dying love of Christ! Many
and many a time you have joined with your fellow members in singing–
"My willing soul would stay
In such a frame as this,
And sit and sing herself away
To everlasting bliss." Yet now, alas, you have but to sing, or to
sigh–
" What peaceful hours I then enjoyed,
How sweet their memory still!' Well, let the recollection of them come
up in your mind, for it will do you good. While you hear your Lord
saying to you, "Return, return," it will help you to return if you
recall what it is to which you have to return–those halcyon days,
those happy Sabbaths when your heart seemed to have a whole peal of
bells within it and every one of them gave forth the richest melody to
the praise and glory of Jesus Christ, your Lord and Savior!
Do you not also recollect how you used to talk to others about the
Savior? Ah, my Brothers, if I ever wander from my Lord, my sermons will
be a sufficient rebuke to me even if no one says a word! Lord, reprove
me for my backsliding! What are you doing, you who once preached so
earnestly to others? What are you doing, you who used to conduct a
Bible class where you warned young people against going into the world,
yet you have gone there, yourself? You used to tell them that if all
others in the world should be ashamed of Christ, you would never be
ashamed of Him, yet you are! You used to pray very fervently at the
Prayer Meetings. You visited the sick and cheered them. And God made
you useful to souls that are now in Heaven–yet you have begun to doubt
whether you will ever get there yourself! O Soul, remember from where
you have fallen and repent and do your first works! If you are, indeed,
a child of God, let the recollection of your own sermons, addresses,
warnings and prayers rise up before your spirit, to stir your
conscience and to make you feel ashamed of your backsliding!
The Lord's call to you to return to Him will probably also awaken other
memories. It will help you to remember how it was you first went
astray. You went on swimmingly at first, did you not? But where did you
begin to go astray? Nine times out of10, declension from God begins in
the neglect of private prayer. Possibly, it was so in your case. And it
may be that everything seemed to go about as well with you when you did
not pray as when you did. Indeed, everything went far too smoothly with
you–it would have been much better for you if your way had been hedged
up with thorns
and briers. Then you know that you began to get lax in your mode of
life. You would not admit that you were doing anything that was
sinful–and you were very angry with those who told you that you were
in danger. You said that you did not believe in such Puritanical
prissiness as they advocated–you were a man who could think and decide
for himself! And you did so, did you not, and have you not thought
yourself and brought yourself into a sad plight? And you were going to
sail a little closer to the wind than others could do because you felt
that you had a stronger will than they had–and could turn your vessel
whenever you pleased. There were certain amusements that might be
harmful to young people, but not to you, for you felt that you had
greater strength of mind than they had.
That is how you began to wander from God. The declension came on by
degrees. You did not jump down all at once, but you went down just as
surely, step by step. As to your first little slip, as you called it,
you said there was nothing wrong in it. And nothing wrong in the second
slip. And not much wrong in the third slip by itself–but putting them
all together, with all the subsequent slips–where have they landed
you? Yet, notwithstanding all this, I want you to hear the Master still
saying to you, "Return, return, return." Remember how far you have to
go back, for you have to traverse again all that road along which you
came with your face turned the wrong way.
III. Now we will pass on to notice, in the third place, THE REASONS
WHICH ARE URGED IN THE CONTEXT WHY WE SHOULD RETURN. Look at the 12th
verse. I think I will not explain these reasons, but just read them to
you. "Return, you backsliding Israel, says the Lord, and I will not
cause My anger to fall upon you: for I am merciful, says the Lord, and
I will not remain angry forever." Can you hear that verse without tears
coming into your eyes? There is still in your Lord's heart,
forgiveness, mercy, pardon–will not that biased fact lead you to come
back to Him?
Now read the 14th verse, for it contains a second reason why you should
return to the Lord. "Turn, O backsliding children, says the Lord; for I
am married to you." Can you believe that? If you can, you cannot
continue to be a backslider! After all that you have done against Him,
the Lord still acknowledges the marriage bond that exists between your
poor polluted souls and His own holy and gracious Self, and He says to
you, "Turn, O backsliding children, for I am married to you." Who can
hold back when the Lord uses such an expression as that–"married to
you"–you black, foul wanderer–"I am married to you"?
In the East, a man could very easily divorce his wife–he just gave her
a letter and sent her away. But the Lord, the God of Israel, says that
He hates putting away–that is to say, He hates divorce–and He will
never have a divorce from the soul that has once been married to Him!
Come back to Him, then! If He is faithful despite your sin, let your
heart yearn towards Him. Return to your first Husband, for it was
better with you then than now! Now read the 22nd verse– "Return, you
backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings." Is not that
another blessed reason why you should return to the Lord? He promises
that He will remove all the evil that sin has done to you and that into
whatever sin you may have fallen through your wanderings, He will
rescue you from it! He will treat your backsliding as a diseaseand heal
it! I need scarcely stay to tell you what is the remedy that He will
apply to you, for you all know that it is by the stripes of Jesus that
we are healed.
So, come again to that Cross to which you came at first and there you
shall again find that His dear pierced hands shall be laid upon your
wounds, taking the venom out of them, and so perfectly restoring you
that your flesh shall be, again, unto you like the flesh of a little
child! And then you will be able to gratefully sing, "He restores my
soul: He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake."
"Bless the Lord, O my Soul: and all that is within me, bless His holy
name."
IV. I am speaking briefly upon each point, but I trust that each one of
them will abide in your memories without a multitude of words to press
the Truth of God home to your hearts. And I want you, in the fourth
place, to notice SOME GRACIOUS DIRECTIONS WHICH ARE GIVEN TO ASSIST YOU
TO RETURN TO THE LORD. Read the 13th verse if you wish to learn the way
by which you are to return–and give heed to every syllable of
it–"Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against
the Lord your God, and have scattered your charms to alien deities
under every green tree, and you have not obeyed My voice, says the
Lord."
That is the first thing you have to do–make a full confession of your
wrongdoing. Go at once to God and make it! Do not delay another minute.
You have sinned against the Lord–go to Him and acknowledge from your
very heart that you have done so. Then turn to the 20th and 21st
verses–"Surely as a wife treacherously departed from her husband, so
have you dealt treacherously with Me, O house of Israel, says the Lord.
A voice was heard upon the high places– weeping and supplications of
the children of Israel–for they have perverted their ways and they
have forgotten the Lord their God." So, let the acknowledgment of your
wrongdoing be attended with deep contrition of heart Be grieved that
you have grieved your God! Ask the Holy Spirit to melt your spirit so
that you may mourn before the Most High and lament that you have
wandered so far from Him.
Once again, the way to come back to God is plainly set before you at
the end of the 22nd verse–"Return, you backsliding children, and I
will heal your backslidings." "Behold, we come unto You; for You are
the Lord our God." Take the Lord to be your God all over again, Go back
and begin again where you began before with the Father, and with the
Son, and with the Holy Spirit. May the Sacred Trinity graciously enable
you to do so! And, further, come back to the Lord by confessing the
result of your sin, the mischief that it has brought upon you, even as
these ancient backsliders did when they sorrowfully said, "For shame
has devoured the labor of our fathers from our youth; their flocks and
their herds, their sons and their daughters. We lie down in our shame,
and our confusion covers us: for we have sinned against the Lord our
God, we and our fathers, from our youth even unto this day, and have
not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God."
So, dear Friends, you see that the way to get back to God is to confess
the wrong that you have done by wandering away from Him–to lament that
wrong and again to take the Lord to be your God by an act of simple
faith–and to begin once more even as you beganyour spiritual life. It
is possible that you are anxious to know whether you ever were a child
of God or not. Well, that is a knot which you cannot untie, so you had
better cut it! Do you ask, "How can I cut it?" You can do it in this
way. Say to yourself, "If I am not a saint, I am a sinner. And Christ
Jesus come into the world to save sinners, so I will trust Him to save
me." I have begun again, in this fashion, a great many times. Often,
when doubts and fears have arisen within my spirit, and my evidences
have grown dim, I have found that the best thing I could do was to pray
the Publican' s Prayer, and cry, "God be merciful to me a sinner."
I am only asking you, poor wandering Soul, to do that which it is the
delight of God's people to be doing every day. Come, repenting and
humbled, and take the Lord Jesus Christ again to be your All in All,
your living, loving Savior!
V. Now, lastly, I want to encourage you to return to the Lord by very
briefly mentioning SOME OF THE MERCIES WHICH GOD PROMISES IN ORDER TO
KEEP YOU FROM ANY FUTURE WANDERING. Our blessed Master knows that many
of His children wander because they are not well fed. There were many
supposed converts during the recent revival, of whom we have not heard
anything simply because there was nobody to look after them, in many
cases, when the evangelists, whom God so greatly blessed, had gone to
other places. Their converts were left to starve spiritually. Listen to
the 15th verse of this chapter, those of you who have been thus
starved, whose backsliding was, in the first instance, the result of
your not hearing good Gospel teaching–"I will give you pastors
according to My heart, who shall feed you with knowledge and
understanding." Plead that promise with the God who gave it and you
will find that He will fulfill it in your experience!
The next thing that you need, in order to keep you from further
wandering from God, is that you should seek to become more spiritual in
your worship. Some poor souls, who are, we trust, truly converted,
never seem to get beyond mere external, formal worship. They do not get
into the heart of it. Let all such persons note what the Lord says in
the 16th verse–"And it shall come to pass, when you are multiplied and
increased in the land, in those days, says the Lord, they shall say no
more, The Ark of the Covenant of the Lord: neither shall it come to
mind: neither shall they remember it; neither shall they visit it;
neither shall that be done any more." That is to say, mere formal
worship shall come to an end–"At that time they shall call Jerusalem
the Throne of the Lord; and all the nations shall be gathered unto it,
to the name of the Lord, to Jerusalem: neither shall they walk any more
after the imagination of their evil heart."
To be enabled to render true, spiritual worship unto the Lord, and to
learn the inner meaning of His Word, will cause you to be established
in the faith so that you will not likely be carried about with every
wind of doctrine and be caused to backslide. Bear with me just a minute
while I give you another sweet promise which will help to keep you from
again wandering from the Lord. You shall have the Spirit of adoption in
your heart, as the Lord says, in the 19th verse– "But I said, How
shall I put you among the children, and give these a pleasant land, a
goodly heritage of the hosts of nations? And I said, You shall call Me,
My Father; and shall not turn away from Me." O Beloved, get a firm grip
of that precious promise, for it assures you that final perseverance
which is the heritage of the saints! "You shall call Me, My
Father; and shall not turn away from Me." As the Lord promises that
great blessing, there need be no fear of your backsliding to
destruction, whatever your temptations may be in the days and years
that are yet to come.
Last of all, if you wish to be kept from wandering away from the Lord,
come back to the simplicity of your first dependence upon him. Read the
23rd verse–"Truly in vain is salvation hoped for from the hills, and
from the multitude of mountains: truly in the Lord our God is the
salvation of Israel." So that, what you need is to get back, again, to
the place where you first began to worship God in spirit and in truth,
to know yourself to be His child and to be clean cut off from every
trust except in the Lord Himself. You must see that salvation is all of
Grace from first to last–that it is the work of the Holy Spirit and
that it is freely given to you, an undeserving, ill-deserving,
Hell-deserving sinner! When you get back to that blessed position, you
will learn more of the love of God which will hold you with a grip that
nothing can loosen, and from which you shall never escape from this
time forth and forever!
Therefore, poor Backslider, come here and breathe the prayer to your
Heavenly Father, not merely to receive you, but also to keep you, so
that from now on you shall never again go astray from Him who keeps the
feet of His saints. "And now unto Him that is able to keep you from
falling, and to present you faultless before the Presence of His Glory
with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Savior, be glory and
majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen."
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: JEREMIAH2:20-37.
Verses 20-26. For of old I have broken your yoke and burst your bands,
and you said, I will not transgress, when upon every high hill and
under every green tree you lay down, playing the harlot. Yet I had
planted you a noble vine, a seed of highest nobility. How, then, have
you turned before Me into the degenerate plant of an alien vine? For
though you wash yourself with lye and use much soap, yet your iniquity
is marked before Me, says the Lord GOD. How can you say, I am not
polluted, I have not gone after the Baals? See your way in the valley,
know what you have done: you are a swift dromedary breaking loose in
her ways; a wild donkey used to the wilderness, that sniffs the wind in
her desire; in her time of mating who can turn her away? All they that
seek her will not weary themselves. In her month they will find her
Withholdyour foot from being unshod, andyour throat from thirst But you
said, There is no hope. No, for Ihave loved strangers and after them
will I go. As the thief is ashamed when he is found out And there are
many people whose repentance is of no more value than the shame of a
thief when he is found out. Oh, for something better and deeper than
this!
26, 27. So is the house of Israel ashamed; they, their kings, their
princes, and their priests, and their prophets, saying to a tree, You
are my father; and to a stone, You have brought me forth: for they have
turned their back unto Me, and not their face: but in the time of their
trouble they will say, Arise and save us. Some men never pray except in
stormy weather. Their religion is wholly dependent upon their condition
and circumstances. If all is going well with them, they bend not their
knees before the Lord. But when they are in sore distress and
especially if they think they are likely soon to die, then they cry
unto God, "Arise and save us," with no more true faith than these
idolaters had when they cried to their powerless idols.
28-30. But where are your gods that you have made? Let them arise, if
they can save you in the time of your troubles: for according to the
number of your cities are your gods, O Judah. Why will you plead with
Me? You all have transgressed against Me, says the LORD. In vain have I
smitten your children; they received no correction: your own sword has
devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion. So far from accepting
God's rebukes in the right spirit and forsaking their idol gods, they
even turned upon the Lord's messengers and put His Prophets to death.
31. O generation, see you the Word of the LORD.' 'If you will not hear
it, see it."
31. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? Or a land of darkness? Why do
My people say, We are lords. We will come no more to You?''Do you not
see," says the Lord to these rebellious people, "how much I have done
for you? Have you forgotten the numberless mercies I have lavished upon
you? I have kept from you nothing that was really good for you. When
you worshipped Me in sincerity and in truth, you prospered exceedingly.
But when you turned away from Me, you
made a sad mistake. See, then, the sermons which Providence itself
preached to you if you will not hear what My Prophets say to you in My
name."
32. Can a virgin forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? Yet My
people have forgotten Me, days without number The very beauty of a
Believer–his glorious dress–is his God. Then can we ever forget Him,
or all the precious things of the Covenant of Grace which He so freely
bestows upon us? Can we–can we–have fallen so low as to forget the
God to whom we owe so much? Alas, He can still say, "My people have
forgotten Me, days without number."
33, 34. Why do you beautify your way to seek love? Therefore you have
also taught the wicked ones your ways. Also in your skirts is found the
blood of the lives of the poor innocents. I have not found it by secret
search, but plainly on all these things. God's ancient people had so
completely turned away from Him and wandered so far from Him, that they
had practiced all manner of evil in order to prove their love for other
gods. They even went among the heathen and taught them to sin yet worse
than they had sinned before! This was most shameful backsliding, a
horrible evil in the sight
of God.
35. Yet you say, Because I am innocent, surely His anger shall turn
from me. The most guilty people are often the most self-righteous. The
sinful nation, which ought to have pleaded guilty, here, says, "Because
I am innocent, surely His anger shall turn from me."
35. Behold, I will plead My case against you, because you say, Ihave
not sinned. That is the great abuse of quarrel between God and men.
Many a man still says, "I have not sinned," although God's Law condemns
him, and the very office of the Savior proves that the guilty one
needed to be saved by One who was almighty. Self-righteousness is a
thing which God utterly abhors.
36. Why do you gadabout so much to change your way? You shallalso be
ashamed ofEgypt, asyou are ashamed of Assyria. First they trusted to
Assyria to save them. And when that broken reed failed them, then they
trusted to Egypt. And in a similar fashion, we go from one false hope
to another–from one carnal confidence to another, gadding about to
change our way–yet, all the while, refusingto turn to the Lord.
37. Indeed, you will go forth from him with your hands on your
head–You shall go forth as a captive, with your hands bound above your
head, or, like one in great pain or sorrow, you shall hold your hands
to your head.
37. For the LORD has rejected your confidences, and you shall not
prosper in them. May God, in His mercy, save all of us from false
confidences, both now and throughout our whole lives!