Saturday 15th August
Read Jeremiah 3:19-25
‘‘Return, faithless people;
I will cure you of backsliding.’
‘Yes, we will come to you,
for you are the Lord our God.
23 Surely the idolatrous commotion on the hills
and mountains is a deception;
surely in the Lord our God
is the salvation of Israel.
24 From our youth shameful gods have consumed
the fruits of our ancestors’ labour –
their flocks and herds,
their sons and daughters.
25 Let us lie down in our shame,
and let our disgrace cover us.
We have sinned against the Lord our God,
both we and our ancestors;
from our youth till this day
we have not obeyed the Lord our God.’’
The people have lived and breathed lack of commitment to Yahweh. They are faithless backsliders. Yet Yahweh still calls them to return. The words that follow are stunning. Jeremiah describes the ancient version of the sinner’s prayer!
All the key features of the prayer are present. An acknowledgment that Yahweh is in fact Lord and King (v22a). The realisation that sin is ultimately harmful and deceptive and rescue is found in only one place (v23). That the corruption we are riddled with is longstanding and costly (v24) and finally that shame is entirely appropriate because disobedience is both individual and corporate – it runs deep in the family (v25). It is a pure confession of sin and recognition of the need for a saviour.
The danger lies in believing that the prayer need only be prayed once. If sin has been our lifelong companion, why should repentance be a single event?
‘If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.’ (1 John 1:8-10) (NIVUK)
