THE STATE OF THE NATION - JEREMIAH 8-10

THE STATE OF THE NATION

Jeremiah 8-10

Taught by:  Carolyn Sissom

Sunday, October 19, 2008

The first ten chapters of this book have revealed the condition of the nation.  Chapter Nine is the chapter of the broken-hearted Prophet.  Jeremiah is a man of sorrows (a type of Jesus – Isa. 53). 

9:17:  He calls for the intercessors, the praying church:  “thus says the Lord of hosts, Consider ye, and call for the mourning women, (praying church), that they come; and send for cunning women, (skillful praying church), that they may come: and let them make haste and take up a wailing for us, that our eyes may run with tears, and our eyelids gush out with waters.  For a voice of wailing is heard out of Zion.”

20 sins are listed in Chapter 9 alone:

1. They are all adulterous (V.2)
2. The whole assembly is treacherous.
3. They bend their tongues like bows to tell or shoot out lies. (V.3)
4. They are not valiant for truth.
5. They commit one evil after another.
6. They are ignorant of God.
7. Every man is a cheater. (V. 4)
8. They walk with slanders.
9. They all deceive each other. (V.5)
10. They train others to lie.
11. None will speak the truth.
12. They bend every effort to sin.
13.  They refuse to know God. (V. 6)
14. They speak deceit. (V. 8)
15. They plot against each other.
16. They have forsaken the law. (V.13)
17. They have not obeyed God’s voice.
18. They have not walked in God’s ways.
19. They have walked after the imagination of their own heart. (V. 14)
20. They have walked after Balaam.

Jeremiah weeps day and night at the thought of frightful impending retribution.  He moved about among them, begging, pleading, threatening, persuading, entreating, and imploring them to turn from their wickedness and sin.  But in vain…The Prophet is so repelled by their evil ways that he yearns for seclusion (9:2).  The evil ways of Judah are attributed to their lack of true knowledge of God. (9: 3-8)

9:1-2: “Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!  Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men; that I might leave my people, and go from them! For they are all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men.”

I struggled before the Lord to continue in obedience to teach this book of love, intercession and judgment.  I said to the Lord, “Allow me to preach a message of encouragement, peace and hope.”  I then knew that Jeremiah had struggled with the same petition and obeyed the Lord.  I remembered in years past of great revivals and revival preachers.  Our nation was in a great depression and the Lord sent forth revivalists who had the courage to call our backslidden nation to repentance.  From the revivals and times of refreshing, the United States came in to Greatness in Prosperity and Power.   Our nation has been exalted and we are the presently the most powerful nation on earth.

However, like Israel, we are now seeing reverse after reverse.  Due to the above mentioned sins plus many more, our nation is being judged.  Many of the leaders have turned their back on God, His Word, His Son, His Ways and His Law.

8:8-12:  “How do you say, we are wise, and the law of the Lord is with us?  Lo, certainly in vain made he it; the pen of the scribes is in vain.  The wise men are ashamed, they are dismayed and taken: lo, they have rejected the word of the Lord; and what wisdom is in them?  Therefore will I give their wives unto others, and their fields to them that shall inherit them: for everyone from the least even unto the greatest is given to covetousness, from the prophet even unto the priest every one deals falsely?  For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.  Were they ashamed when they had committed abominations?  No, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush: therefore shall they fall among them that fall: in the time of their visitation they shall be cut down, says the Lord.

“The time of their visitation is the same as the harvest and the summer of Verse 20.  This time of year is found eight times in this Book.  Such visitation is found four other times in Isa. 10:3; Hos. 9:7; Mic. 7:4; Lk. 19:44.  God had given them a definite time when all grapes would be reaped and none left on the vine, when there would be no figs on the trees because of the host of invaders.  All that god had given them would be swept away (V. 13) (Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible)

I have felt that we are under such a time of visitation in the U.S.A. and probably around the world.  We can account the hurricanes at this time as well as the present financial storm.

8:5: Why then are this people of Jerusalem slide back by a perpetual backsliding?  They hold fast deceit, they refuse to return.  The Word deceit here in all of the commentaries refers to idolatry; in this men worship that which is false.  Why do they refuse?  Because of a feeling of dislike, because satan deceives the whole world and they lie in wickedness. (1 Jn. 5:19 ;) Rev. 12:9: “And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the devil, and satan, which deceives the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and the angels were cast out with him.  And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ: for the accuser of the brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. But they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.  Therefore rejoice you heavens, and you that dwell in them.  Woe to the inhabitors of the earth and of the sea! For the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knows he has but a short time.”

The Opportunity for repentance can pass.  8:20:  “The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.”  Heb. 12:17: “For you know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.”   (Also Matthew 27: 1-15)

Before leaving chapter 8, let us read verse 2: And they shall spread them before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven, whom they have loved, and whom they have served, and after whom they have walked, and whom they have sought, and whom they have worshipped.”

“When Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem, not only would the living be killed and left in Tophet until there was no more room for bodies, but the Babylonians would also ransack the graves of the kings, princes, and wealthy people of Judah, leaving their bones out in the open fields to be spread before the sun, moon, and various other planets which they had worshipped.” (Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible)

In Chapter 9: 23-24, Jeremiah preaches to the inhibitors of Jerusalem as we must now preach to the inhibitors of the whole earth:

There are three things which men boast of:

1. The wise man glories in his wisdom.
2. The mighty man glories in his might.
3. The rich man glories in his riches.

None of these three classes should boast and glory in their blessings; all should glory in essential and eternal things.

There are two things men should glory in (V.24)

“But let him that glories, glory in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord which exercises loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth: for in these things I delight, says the Lord.

In Chapter Ten, Jeremiah concludes his “Temple Message” (7-10) by reminding Judah that Jehovah is the True God, and that their practice of worshipping idols is vain.  It seems that the threat of the Babylonians invasion spurred the people to great activity in the manufacture of idols.  This was further aggravation of their already appalling sin against God.  The folly of worshipping idols is outlined in verses 1-16 and the judgment to be visited upon it.  They just keep digging deeper in sin and judgment.  God makes the punishment fit the crime.

In Verse 2, “Learn not the ways of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of the heaven: for the heathen are dismayed at them.”

These signs were extraordinary appearances, such as eclipses, or comets, and they were taken by the heathen as indications of calamities on earth. i.e. superstition.

Verses 2-4 is often attributed to our modern Christmas trees.  However, almost all of the commentaries agree that these were tree trunks made into a pillar of an upright god, an image of a man carved in it and covered with silver and gold plates and fastened it with nails.  This make of an idol is the same as described in Isa. 4:17; 44:12-17 where it is plainly stated that they made gods out of the trunks of trees.

The teaching was that the idol made of a tree trunk and covered with silver and gold was the true god and the one to protect the nation.  It was a doctrine of vanities, for every detail of the teaching about the idol was vain.  Now if you worship your Christmas tree, I suggest you repent. 

Jeremiah gives 15 facts about God in this chapter then closes with a prayer.

1. Instructor of Israel (1-5
2. He is great. (6)
3. None like Him (6-7)
4. His name is great in power.
5. King of the nations (V.7)
6. Cannot be compared to an idol made with hands (8-10)
7.  He is the true God. (10)
8. He is the living God.
9. He is the everlasting King (10-24)
10. He is the judge of the nation. (10)
11. Creator of heavens and earth (11-12(
12. He has established earth (12)
13. Established the social system
14. Regulates times and seasons (13)
15. He is the Lord of Hosts (16)

Prayer of Jeremiah: 10: 23-25: O Lord, “correct me, but with judgment; not in your anger, less you bring me to nothing.  Pour out your fury upon the heathen that do not know you, and upon the families that call not on your name; for they have eaten up Jacob ,and  devoured him, and consumed him, and have made his habitations desolate.”

In a final plea, the prophet identifies himself with the suffering people.  In 8:22, Judah was past mercy; there was no remedy for the apostasy; so judgment had to come, and that without fail. (8:22) “Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? Why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?”

Lord Jesus you are our Physician and our balm in Gilead for the Praying church of the nation of the United States of America.  Lord I pray that you turn this nation back to God that we not suffer any more judgments.  I ask you to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  I ask you to cause this nation to repent of its idolatries and to break the spirit of the idol of idolatry off the people of this nation.  Lord we are building pillars of idolatry to finances, politics and religion.  All of these will be pillars of control for the anti-christ.  Cause our leaders to repent.  Cause the Prophets and Priests to repent that you will turn and bless this nation with  safety of our children, that we may have  children who are taught of the Lord, salvations, health, goodness and mercy of the Lord for all generations.

Carolyn Sissom, Pastor

Eastgate Ministries, Inc.

www.eastgateminsitries.com