Jeremiah

Study of Jeremiah 

Chapter 2

• Jeremiah 2:1 Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying,
• 2. Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the LORD; I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown.

After Israel was first delivered from the bondage of Egypt and God dwelt among them showing them many signs and miracles, they were walking in their first love for the Lord. 

• Jeremiah 2:3 Israel was holiness unto the LORD, and the firstfruits of his increase: all that devour him shall offend; evil shall come upon them, saith the LORD.

Holiness is the word ko'-desh -  a sacred place or thing; rarely abstractly sanctity: - consecrated (thing), dedicated (thing), hallowed (thing), holiness, holy, saint, sanctuary.

Israel was walking with God and considered a sanctified, holy people. God would protect them against any and all enemies. Those that came against them would be judged severely by God. What a privilege they had, to have God as their protector.

• Jeremiah 2:4 Hear ye the word of the LORD, O house of Jacob, and all the families of the house of Israel:
• 5 Thus saith the LORD, What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me, and have walked after vanity, and are become vain?

God pleads with the house of Jacob and asked what fault they found with Him that would cause them to go far from Him. They had access to everything yet that was not enough. They desired to be like the nations around that did not know God and worshipped false gods. How would a husband feel if when he and his wife first married, they were in their first love. He worked to provide for her, he cherished her and she lacked nothing. Then in later years she finds another and forsakes her marriage vows and goes to someone else. Or a husband that does the same thing to a faithful wife. It hurts. It destroys. It kills. All for an instant of what we think is pleasure.

We can also wonder why today that many reject God or after knowing God and do not walk in His continuing fellowship. What fault do we find in God that we do not want to serve Him.? What can the world around us possibly offer us that can be better than a life walking with God.

He made a way that someone else would pay the price for our sins. All have sinned and the sin separates us from God, so he made a way for us to be reconciled to Him after being far from Him. Not only did God make a way for all who believe to be saved, but He made a way that none of us would ever be alone.

He gave us His gift of the Holy Spirit to abide with us forever after we receive Jesus as our Lord and savior. He promised the gift of eternal life. He is preparing a place for us who believe. It is a place so beautiful that eye has not seen neither the ear heard what God has planned for those that love Him. He gives us life in place of eternal death, His presence can be constantly with us and all He asks is that we believe in Him and turn from our sins.

Why would we reject eternal life? Why would we turn from Him after knowing Him? Yet just as Israel did many times, we today fail to walk with God and contend for the faith once delivered to us. A great price was paid for our salvation and we sometimes take it for granted.

• Jeremiah 2:6 Neither said they, Where is the LORD that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought, and of the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt?
• 7 And I brought you into a plentiful country, to eat the fruit thereof and the goodness thereof; but when ye entered, ye defiled my land, and made mine heritage an abomination.

Israel could have had everything and been the greatest nation ever to exist. They could have risen to the greatest power but instead God had to stop them because of their sin, idolatry and abominations they allowed in a land that was to be holy.

• Jeremiah 2:8 The priests said not, Where is the LORD? and they that handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things that do not profit.

Even the teachers and priests prophesied by Baal instead of God. They that handled the law, did not know God. They might have occasionally used the law to exercise control over the people but they used it deceitfully and did not live by the same law.

We have ministers today that are blind leading the blind. Some have allowed sin into the church, some have denied the truths of the bible, some have denied the virgin birth of Christ, His resurrection and the truth of His teachings. They have twisted scriptures to mean something other than what the Holy Spirit had inspired men write.

If Satan cannot get us to turn from God, he will try instead to corrupt our understanding of the word of God and get us into error that will cover up the simple gospel of Jesus and get us into religion instead. We can do this by trusting in rituals, ceremonies, ordinances to save us instead of simple faith in Jesus Christ that brings us salvation when we turn from sin and believe in Him.

• Jeremiah 2:9 Wherefore I will yet plead with you, saith the LORD, and with your children's children will I plead.
• 10 For pass over the isles of Chittim, and see; and send unto Kedar, and consider diligently, and see if there be such a thing.
• 11 Hath a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods? but my people have changed their glory for that which doth not profit.

Even the nations which served idols and false religion did not change their gods and were faithful in that which they thought was truth even though it was lies, yet Israel who had the law and the truth; Israel who had the privilege to be in God's very presence, were not faithful to what they knew was the truth but forsook the fountain of living water and trusted in broken cisterns which could not even hold water. That is what sin is. Dry, dusty, boring and profits nothing. False religion of any kind is like clouds without water or broken cisterns which hold no water. They are empty of anything real and true.

• Jeremiah 2:12 Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid, be ye very desolate, saith the LORD.
• 13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.
• 14 Is Israel a servant? is he a homeborn slave? why is he spoiled?
• 15 The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made his land waste: his cities are burned without inhabitant.
• 16 Also the children of Noph and Tahapanes have broken the crown of thy head.
• 17 Hast thou not procured this unto thyself, in that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, when he led thee by the way?
• 18 And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt, to drink the waters of Sihor? or what hast thou to do in the way of Assyria, to drink the waters of the river?
• 19 Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord GOD of hosts.

When a nation is given over to wickedness and have forsaken the fear of God, their own wickedness reproves and corrects. We reap what we sow. If we sow evil, we reap evil. Leaving God and walking in a backslidden condition is not a happy life. It is miserable. God does not even have to do anything or send any judgment. Sin has a way of returning upon our own heads. If we commit adultery and fornication, we risk disease, being killed by a jealous spouse, and many other consequences of that lifestyle. All sin of one kind or another will bring a natural consequence. We do not get by with anything.

• Jeremiah 2:20 For of old time I have broken thy yoke, and burst thy bands; and thou saidst, I will not transgress; when upon every high hill and under every green tree thou wanderest, playing the harlot.

God set them free from bondage, (Slavery in Egypt) yet they returned to bondage, (Slavery in Babylon.) because of forsaking the Lord. They desired to be like the Babylonians and as a result, became enslaved to the Babylonians. As far as Egypt is concerned, they kept going to Egypt in times of famine and became in bondage to Egypt in latter times.

When Jesus Christ saves us and frees us from sin, we are delivered from a type of bondage. We were once a slave to sin. In the Son, we have been made free from sin. When we backslide and stop living for God, we return to the bondage of sin again. 

Sin is like drugs and alcohol to an addict. They are slaves to drugs and alcohol. They can't live without it. The more they drink and take drugs, the more addicted they become. They cannot free themselves.

This is what sin does. It drags a soul down and enslaves them. It cannot be free. Only through the power of the Holy Spirit that comes through faith in Jesus Christ can we be free from the bondage of sin.

• Jeremiah 2:21 Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me?

God made them a good plant but they chose to not abide in the Lord and they became a strange plant.

Jesus taught something similar in John 15. 

• John 15:1 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.
• 2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.
• 3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
• 4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.
• 5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
• 6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.
• 7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

We see that we have to abide (stay with) Christ after receiving Him as savior. Israel could have had constant fellowship with God but they did not abide in Him.

• Jeremiah 2:22 For though thou wash thee with nitre, and take thee much soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord GOD.
• 23 How canst thou say, I am not polluted, I have not gone after Baalim? see thy way in the valley, know what thou hast done: thou art a swift dromedary traversing her ways;
• 24 A wild ass used to the wilderness, that snuffeth up the wind at her pleasure; in her occasion who can turn her away? all they that seek her will not weary themselves; in her month they shall find her.
• 25 Withhold thy foot from being unshod, and thy throat from thirst: but thou saidst, There is no hope: no; for I have loved strangers, and after them will I go.
• 26 As the thief is ashamed when he is found, so is the house of Israel ashamed; they, their kings, their princes, and their priests, and their prophets,
• 27 Saying to a stock, Thou art my father; and to a stone, Thou hast 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.

It is a serious thing to know the truth and to know the word of God and then forsake that Holy way. They lost the fear of God and dwelt in unbelief. Instead they served other vain gods which were nothing.

• Jeremiah 2:28 But where are thy gods that thou hast made thee? let them arise, if they can save thee in the time of thy trouble: for according to the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah.

They were to find out that the false gods could never save them from bondage or oppression from the enemy. Since they wanted to serve other gods, God said to them that if they got in trouble, the other gods would have to save them. Of course they could not since idols were not God.

• Jeremiah 2:29 Wherefore will ye plead with me? ye all have transgressed against me, saith the LORD.
• 30 In vain have I smitten your children; they received no correction: your own sword hath devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion.

Even when God allowed judgment, they refused to receive it as correction. They refused to acknowledge their sin even after being sent warnings from the prophets and teachers. The hardest person to convert is the one who does not see himself as guilty. 

This will keep us from receiving God's salvation today. If we do not acknowledge that we have sinned and do not repent of that sin, then we cannot be saved. We have to recognize that we have sinned in order to see that we need a savior. God could turn His back to us and allow storms, hurricanes and even attacks from the enemy but we would refuse to see it as judgment.

• Jeremiah 2:31 O generation, see ye the word of the LORD. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness? wherefore say my people, We are lords; we will come no more unto thee?
• 32 Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? yet my people have forgotten me days without number.

To forget the Lord is to go about ones life without acknowledging Him in any way. It is living how we want to live regardless of whether it is right or wrong and totally ignoring the Word of God. 

• Jeremiah 2:33 Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.
• 34 Also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents: I have not found it by secret search, but upon all these.

They apparently had been slayers of innocents. This could mean that they were partakers in the idolatrous practice of sacrificing children to idols as surrounding nations were doing or else the blood of innocents were the prophets who were killed because they tried to warn of the truth.

Today in the United States the murder of the innocents are in the form of abortion. In other nations both in the past and in the present time, the blood of the innocent are the slaying of preachers and teachers of the gospel. It is also the slaying and enslaving of people who disagree with the established religion or the politics of oppressive countries. 

When those who claim to represent God such as preachers, priests, prophets give into sin and are not faithful to the word of God, they influence others also. I wonder how many people are lost because the ministers were unfaithful to the truth.

• Jeremiah 2:35 Yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent, surely his anger shall turn from me. Behold, I will plead with thee, because thou sayest, I have not sinned.
• 36 Why gaddest thou about so much to change thy way? thou also shalt be ashamed of Egypt, as thou wast ashamed of Assyria.
• 37 Yea, thou shalt go forth from him, and thine hands upon thine head: for the LORD hath rejected thy confidences, and thou shalt not prosper in them.

They copied after and followed the false gods of other nations, so God allowed them to become enslaved and in bondage to the very nations they were forsaken Him to serve.

We today we can become a slave to the very sin we embrace when we reject and God to return to it. Sin does not pay and does not profit. In the end it will destroy us. However though faith in Jesus Christ we can be free from that bondage and inherit eternal life.

• Romans 6:18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.
• 19 I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness. 
• 21 What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death. 
• 20 For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.
• 22 But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.

Yet in all these things, in all this bondage, sin and despair, there is a way out. There is an answer, there is hope. DC

• Romans 8:1  There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 
• 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 

 
Study of Jeremiah 3