Friday 7th August
Read Jeremiah 2:26-30
“‘As a thief is disgraced when he is caught,
so the people of Israel are disgraced –
they, their kings and their officials,
their priests and their prophets.
27 They say to wood, “You are my father,”
and to stone, “You gave me birth.”
They have turned their backs to me
and not their faces;
yet when they are in trouble, they say,
“Come and save us!”
28 Where then are the gods you made for yourselves?
Let them come if they can save you
when you are in trouble!
For you, Judah, have as many gods
as you have towns.
29 ‘Why do you bring charges against me?
You have all rebelled against me,’
declares the Lord.
30 ‘In vain I punished your people;
they did not respond to correction.
Your sword has devoured your prophets
like a ravenous lion.” (NIVUK)
When marriages break down, looking from the outside, sometimes it is easy to see how both parties can consider themselves wronged. With some marriages it is also rather obvious where much of the dysfunction lies. God’s people are confused enough in their loyalties that they seek to defend themselves by questioning God’s fidelity (v29a). Their confusion is mocked by Jeremiah and dismissed by God.
We can see this with the plaintive cry of the people when things turn bad (v27c) – they are fair-weather followers of God. Jeremiah exhorts them to put their hope in the things they have made (v28). But their lust for, and trust in, their idols is itself a thing of confusion. They attribute fatherly traits to the female idols (of wood) and motherly traits to the male idols (of stone) (v27a)! It is a disgrace in every way.
They are sobering words. Drifting away from our first love to chase after other things may be done unconsciously. We might not even understand what we have replaced God with. All the more reason to wake each morning and remember what He has done.
