Jeremiah 2:13
13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.
GOD’S COMPLAINT
‘They have forsaken Me.’
An evil thing and bitter it is to forsake God.
I. It is so unreasonable.—There is an element of thoughtlessness in all sin. If I had pondered the matter carefully and deliberately, I never would have yielded to it. If I had set before me the hardness of the way of transgressors, would I ever have entered on the bitter path? I have been blind, and negligent, and heedless in the extreme.
II. And it is so guilty.—My conduct may have been thoughtless, but it is inexcusable too. I should have considered. I should have been wise. Lawlessness, rebellion against God’s Word, the slighting of His call and commandment, the wounding of His very soul: that is what I am chargeable with. Is it not criminal indeed?
III. And it is so dangerous.—When I forsake my Guide and my Father, I am caught in the thorny thickets, or I stumble over the precipice, or I fall into the enemy’s hand, or I sink down wearied before it is noonday. Behind me is the path I have left, a witness against me. And in front of me is the Judgment Seat.
IV. And it is so hopeless.—I have forfeited the power to rescue and restore myself. I am bewildered, helpless, undone. I am neither able nor yet willing to come back to God. Nothing avails to change me—nothing within myself, I mean—in my fatal course. I but lose myself more and more.
And yet, and yet, there is forgiveness with Thee.
Illustration
‘Why should the chosen people hind themselves up with the fortunes of any heathen nation? Was not God their King? Would not He succour them in calamity? Why should they drink the waters of Sihor, the black Nile, or those of the great river, Euphrates? It was as though a hamlet of villagers were to refuse a fountain of crystal water rising at their doors, and betake themselves to hewing cisterns, with infinite labour, in the hills, which at the best could only hold brackish water. But God had failed them in nothing, in nothing had He shown Himself worthy of such behaviour. Ah, how true this is of us, who have sought help and satisfaction in money, pleasure, human love, neglecting the offers of the Son of God!’