A Presumptuous People

There is a passage in Jeremiah that haunts me. It haunts me because it disturbs me, as I feel it speaks to us today, friends. In Jeremiah chapter 7, the prophet Jeremiah is on a preaching tear, and he is tearing up all preconceived perceptions of the people of God.

God tells Jeremiah to go stand in the gate of the Lord's house and deliver a searching sermon to the backslidden Jews and Judah. First he warns them to amend their ways and to not walk after other gods to their hurt. Then Jeremiah begins to bring the hammer down on them with pounding accusations.

He denounces them with a list of God-provoking sins, as seen in verses 9 through 10. Will ye steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and walk after other gods whom ye know not, and come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, We are delivered to do all these abominations. The shocking reality of Jeremiah's sermon is that it accuses the people of God for their belief that, because God had delivered them, they were now the fair-haired favorites of God, and they could now sin all they want to and get away with it.

The Jews felt God was obligated to them and obligated to protect his temple, but they were presumptuous people whose flagrant sins flew in the face of a provoked God. God then speaks two things to them through his preacher Jeremiah. 1. God makes it clear that he will destroy the temple, just as he allowed the tabernacle at Shiloh to be destroyed.

Verse 14 says so. Therefore will I do unto this house, which is called by my name, wherein ye trust, and unto the place which I gave unto you and to your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh. Then God makes a dramatic declaration, which sent shudders down the back of Jeremiah.

God tells Jeremiah that this presumptuous people are beyond prayer. Verse 16 declares, Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to me, for I will not hear thee. I will stop there, friends.

All one has to do is to camp out in the book of Lamentations and see the sorrows of Jerusalem, as God fulfills his word by the destruction of Jerusalem, for sin has its consequences for sure. But what stands out in Jeremiah chapter 7 is the attitude of a presumptuous people, who feel that because they are God's favorites they can sin all they want to and get away with it. I want us to look at two things today, friends, and these two things are what haunts me about our passage today.

It's a disturbing passage of scripture to me because I see vast similarities in it and us today, for we are today, number one, a presumptuous nation. Like the Jews of old, we feel we are privileged people under God in America today. God has allowed us to defeat our enemies in times of war.

God has allowed us to prosper as a nation like never before. And like the Jews of old, we presume we are God's favorites so now we can get away with murder and adultery and idolatry. America as a nation can turn its back on God and think that God will still protect us because he always has.

America can kick God right out of our country by legislating him out of our judicial system and legislating him out of our educational system. And then we can enact our own laws that then go against the law of God, calling good evil and evil good. The nation of America is a very presumptuous people.

Number two, the church is a presumptuous church today. It exists in a contradictory vacuum of material prosperity and spiritual poverty. Because we are prosperous people, we have become a presumptuous church.

And we too believe that because we are the fair-haired favorites of God that he will not come and destroy our temples or our cities, that we too can sin all we want to and get away with it. But God told the wayward people of Judah that he would come and destroy their city and their temple for their multiplied sins. And God told Jeremiah that the people were now beyond prayer.

That haunts me, friends, because I fear it's true with us today. I believe we as a nation and we as a church have gotten so used to sinning against God that we presume he won't come and destroy us. And my biggest fear, friends, is that if we're not careful as a nation and if we're not careful and repent as a church, that we too will soon cross that line where we are beyond prayer.

What haunts me is the thought that we may have already passed that point of no return. Heaven help us all.