“Yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent, surely his anger shall turn from me. Behold, I will plead with thee, because thou sayest, I have not sinned.” (Jer 2:35 AV)
Israel strikes me as a nation that hasn’t a clue what sin is or even that they are suffering because of it. Jeremiah, known as the weeping prophet, is sent to an unrepentant Israel as they face two generations of captivity. Jeremiah preaches to Judah and Benjamin prior to and in the midst of their carrying away into Babylon. At this point, they have gotten so far away from the LORD that they are offering their children as sacrifices to a false god. The blood of the skirts is a descriptive way of saying the blood of babies. Either the blood was newborns offered or the aborted babies of a pleasure-laden society. Relative morality was the illness of backslidden Israel. In someways, it still it. Not to pick on Israel, but humanity as a whole is the same. We develop our own sense of morality, justify it be some sick way of thinking, and then have the audacity to ask God to deliver us from trouble. What I see above is a nation that did not have a clue as to what sin was, nor realize the consequences when they came. Much like where our nation sits today.
It astounds me just how corrupt we can become and not seem to know just how corrupt we are. It is like adapting to horrible circumstances and then calling it normal. We live in an urban area. Morals are fleeting at best. We have a population that has no clue as to what acceptable behavior looks or doesn’t look like. For instance, if it is not locked down, it will get stolen. My dumpster has two bungee cords keeping the lid closed tightly. If we don’t do that, squirrels or rats will get inside. Every Tuesday, the service comes to empty the dumpster. They removed the bungee cords, but did not put them back on. So, they lay on the ground or on my porch. The other day, an individual came through the alley and took one of the cords. He needed it to strap things down on his little cart. About a week later, a lady drives into our alley and stops right under my living room window. She proceeds to dump dog waste right in the alley. Our dumpster isn’t more than ten feet from where she discarded the waste. Just a bit more effort and it would have gone where it belonged. Things like this happen every day. People behaving badly without a clue that their choices are wrong. They see nothing wrong with it.
We are all like this to one degree or another. We have a sense of right and wrong that is convenient. When we are called out on it, we are shocked. If the Bible didn’t have something to say about it, we wouldn’t believe it. It is crazy! Even when the Bible does teach us right and wrong, we still argue it away with our own set of values. We use arguments of convenience. “It was written for a different people and time”. “The translators didn’t have a correct way of describing this sin, so it really isn’t wrong”. “The Bible is outdated and doesn’t apply to me”. Etc., etc., etc. Only when we suffer inescapable consequences are we then moved to reconsider. May the LORD help us to be more tender and humble toward the sacred things of God.
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