Jeremiah 2

Ver. 2, 3. I remember the kindness which I shewed to your nation when it was but forming, and when in the Arabian wilderness, by solemn covenant, I espoused you first of all the nations of the world to be my holy and peculiar people, and the affectionate regard which your fathers professed for me. And then I severely punished the Egyptians and others, who attempted to do them wrong

Jeremiah 2:13-18

They have rejected me in my oracles, ordinances, and fulness, who am the freely bestowed, everlasting, and unbounded, source of all grace, consolations, and blessings, and have, with inexpressible fatigue, procured to themselves idols, which can give them not the smallest relief. No wonder that they are basely enslaved, and cruelly spoiled. The Assyrians, like outrageous lions, have wasted the country of the ten tribes, and murdered and carried captive the inhabitants. And the Egyptians have treacherously disap- 2 pointed you, or shall murder Josiah, depose Jehoahaz, and impose a tribute. And will you, nevertheless, still send messengers to Egypt or Assyria, to form new alliances, or to borrow new idols?

Jeremiah 2:20-28

When I formerly delivered you from the Egyptians, and other oppressors, ye engaged to keep my commandments, yet ye commit idolatry every where. I originally formed you a nation of pious patriarchs, and established among you my pure oracles, ordinances, and worship; how then are ye become superstitious, idolatrous, and every way corrupt, in both church and state? Nor can all your excuses, evasions, or pretences to reformation, conceal the manifest tokens of your wickedness from me. How can ye deny it, when the valley of Hinnom, where ye have burnt your children to Moloch, and other valleys, where ye have worshipped your idols, manifest it? Ye have, even with madness and fury, run after idols, empty as wind, one after another; and, till fearful distress restrain you, ye appear quite irreclaimable. I have warned you to repent of your lewd, idolatrous, and foolish courses, and of hunting after alliances with heathens, which will bring you to captivity and misery; but ye desperately cleave to your strange gods. Yet all of you at last shall be ashamed of your idols, when ye find that, notwithstanding their multitudes, they can do nothing to save you from disgrace or punishment

Jeremiah 2:29-37

No excuse can be offered for your conduct; and all of you are guilty. Warnings and judgments have not in the least reclaimed you; nay, ye have cruelly murdered the prophets who admonished you. Did not I plentifully provide for and comfort you, while ye continued obedient; why then do ye reject me, as if now, self-sufficient, ye have no need of me? Why thus so long forget me, who have been your chief glory and ornament? Why take such tedious journeys in pursuance of idolatrous courses, and become patterns and teachers to the very heathens in wickedness? Why, in every corner of your land publicly sacrifice your children to idols, and murder the innocent, and yet hope to pass unpunished? Why thus change your idols and heathen allies? The Egyptians shall no more help you than the Assyrians did; but ye shall be led forth into a mournful and miserable captivity; and the curse of God shall render all your projected methods of relief unprofitable and ruinous to you

REFLECTIONS UPON CHAP. II.—It is honourable for nations, families, and persons, to be early beloved by God, and addicted to his service: and safe to be followers of him through every difficulty. But very absurd is it for those who have shared his distinguished favours, to apostatize from him to idols, and render him hatred for love: for church officers to be ringleaders in guilt, and for men at once to belie their profession, affront their God, and cheat themselves out of happiness. Alas, in what slavery, poverty, and disappointment, and endless wandering after idols, do unbelief and forsaking of God issue! With denial of guilt, eagerness, obstinacy, and impudence, do men, abandoned by God, proceed from evil to worse. And it is common for sinners to supplicate relief from God when their idols cannot help them. But dreadful is their case, who under his word, rod, or favours, grow insolent and imperious in wickedness; and when, forgetting God, notwithstanding checks unnumbered, they abound in impiety