How To Break God’s Heart
Jeremiah 2:5
Thus says the LORD:
"What injustice have your fathers found in Me, That they have gone far from Me,
Have followed idols, And have become idolaters?”
"What injustice have your fathers found in Me, That they have gone far from Me,
Have followed idols, And have become idolaters?”
What a bizarre
thing for God to ask. This is asked as a
rhetorical question. A rhetorical
question, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is: “a question not
intended to elicit an answer but asked for rhetorical effect with an assumption
that only one answer is possible.” As in
– “What mother doesn’t love her children?”
Rhetorical is defined as: “A question asked in order to make a
statement rather than get an answer.”
God is asking what
injustice, or sin, or wrong has He done to the Jewish people that made them
leave worshipping Him and turn to idol worship.
The answer is, of course, God had not wronged the Jewish people and
committed no injustice against them. The
failure was all on the part of the people themselves. They were delivered from slavery but had not
even left Egypt before they began grumbling and accusing God of trying to kill
them in the wilderness. Their whole
history had been one of complaining and failure to trust God even though He
delivered them from enemies time and time again. God led them to a good land that was fertile
and well watered. Yet they turned
quickly to idol worship and stopped worshipping God despite His many attempts
to call them back to Him.
After the Northern
kingdom fell and was taken into captivity you would think the Southern kingdom
would learn the lesson and turned back to God – even if just for protection –
as they were surrounded by three powerful enemies, Assyria, Egypt, and Babylon.
While there were brief revivals, overall the people backslid further and
further away from God. Now, in the last
extremity before the Babylonians were used by God to take them into captivity,
Jeremiah is told to write to the people one last warning. And God, with broken heart, asked them why
they turned away from Him and went to worship wood and stone instead of Him. He warns them that when the time of trouble
comes upon them, they can call to the gods of wood and stone to come and save
them, but not to call on Him. How
frightening this should have been! God
is laying His heart open to them and telling them He will not hear their cries
for help! But they did not listen and
the Babylonians came and destroyed their cities and took them captive. It all happened just as Jeremiah said it
would happen.
I see a parallel in
our country today and it frightens me.
God freed us from servitude to Britain.
It’s all in the Declaration of Independence which was not written to
King George but written to God. It is a plea for His justice. He blessed our land and it is fertile and
well watered. We grew and became strong
under Godly leaders who prayed and sought His face. Then we began to turn away from God. Just in my lifetime I have seen God kicked
out of every government agency.
We have embraced
the idea that we happened by chance and not created for a purpose. I’ve seen slime floating on ponds, and can’t
imagine how anyone can believe we grew from that stuff. I’ve been to zoos and seen monkeys and feel
no relationship to them. Yet millions of
people in our country believe this and teach this and it is the prevailing
belief in our country. When troubles
fall on our land, will the monkeys rise up and defend us? Will slime flow out and overwhelm our
enemies? No! We will be undefended because these things
can’t help us and after abandoning God He will not answer our cries for
help.
And the question
begs to be asked, "What injustice have your fathers found in Me, O
America, that you have gone far from Me, have followed idols, and have become
idolaters?” “Whoa!” you say to me. “We
don’t set up idols in our homes and don’t have sacred groves on the hills to go
to. We’re not dumb idol
worshippers. We’re too enlightened for
that kind of thing.” If you don’t think
we’re an idolatrous people you’re not looking too hard at our society. Any people who put something else before God are
an idolatrous people. That which you put
before God is an idol. That which keeps
you from praying is an idol. That which
keeps you from living a holy life is an idol.
I repeat: we are an idolatrous
nation.
What right do we
have to call on God to heal our nation?
We reject Him, ridicule His followers, blaspheme His name, and then
think He will come to us and solve all our troubles? Our nation is heading for a crash and God
will allow it to teach our leaders humility.
Every people who rejected God have been humbled. Read all about it in history. My heart is sick to see it happening to us and
I fear it is coming quickly.
Our nation has
turned away from God and we have crossed a line He has warned us not to
cross. Is it too late for our
nation? I really don’t know, but I fear
it is too late. Too many of our people
have developed deaf ears and blind eyes and do not hear His cry to turn back to
Him. Will God punish us? I don’t think He has to. He will do as He did to the Southern kingdom;
He will take His hands off and allow us to spiral out of control and then an enemy
will come and humble us. Our proud
nation will be chastised by another.
The Southern
kingdom had false prophets telling their leaders all would be well. We have false preachers today preaching that
all will be well. They dress in nice
suits and have big congregations and talk pleasing words and smile a lot but
they are still false preachers. Any
preacher telling you we are going to be OK is bearing false witness to
you. This week read the first six
chapters of Jeremiah, the Weeping Prophet, and I pray your heart breaks and you
weep for our land and for our families.
Stephen Cram September 29, 2013
Beware lest
any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, following the tradition
of men according to the rudiments of the world, and not in accordance with
Christ. Colossians 2:8
Visit my pastor’s blog at http://pastorjonrhinehart.blogspot.com/.
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