Are you a covenant breaker?

Jeremiah 11:9-17

Are you a covenant breaker?  Many of us are who show up at church on Sunday, and yet we do not understand, or we do not believe that our Father in heaven cares.  That is wrong to the bone and it’s misguided and it is dangerous!  That is where Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem find themselves.  God was watching then and now and these are His words to Jeremiah; “A conspiracy exists among the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. They have turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers, who refused to hear my words. They have gone after other gods to serve them. The house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken my covenant that I made with their fathers. Therefore, thus says the Lord, Behold, I am bringing disaster upon them that they cannot escape. Though they cry to me, I will not listen to them. Then the cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will go and cry to the gods to whom they make offerings, but they cannot save them in the time of their trouble. For your gods have become as many as your cities, O Judah, and as many as the streets of Jerusalem are the altars you have set up to shame, altars to make offerings to Baal.”

 

It seems that what was happening was a revolt, it was a wide or general conspiracy against King Josiah’s call to reform and to turn back to God.  It was not a rebellion in a political action, but a revolt against God’s leadership and of the little gods that they were worshipping.  Tomorrow if your pastor stood and preached against your little gods, like wealth, the desire for more, or your time spent playing golf, or not being with your wife and family, or your selfishness in retirement to do as you please with no regard for the time and money that the Father has entrusted to you; you might be conspiring against Him.  I’m also fearful that I can see your little gods but I am blind to my own, and I pray that when they are exposed you and I will repent and turn back to the only true God.

Once again God gives this command to Jeremiah; “Therefore do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their trouble. What right has my beloved in my house, when she has done many vile deeds? Can even sacrificial flesh avert your doom? Can you then exult? The Lord once called you ‘a green olive tree, beautiful with good fruit.’ But with the roar of a great tempest, he will set fire to it, and its branches will be consumed. The Lord of hosts, who planted you, has decreed disaster against you, because of the evil that the house of Israel and the house of Judah have done, provoking me to anger by making offerings to Baal.”

Can you imagine God telling you, do not pray for America any longer, they have gone too far, it’s now too late, that should frighten the hell out of you?  Judah is God’s beloved, and her sins can no longer be overlooked by a Holy God and like a son or daughter whose privileges have been removed so has Judah’s.  Often God used a metaphor, as when He calls Judah “a green olive tree, beautiful with good fruit.”  Now that olive tree is going to be destroyed, and that does not bring joy to Jeremiah or to God.

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice