Jeremiah 35:1-19 The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD in the days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah, saying,… I. WHEREIN IT RESEMBLES CHRISTIAN OBEDIENCE. 1. It was total. They did not consult their preferences or their "affinities." They did not proceed upon any law of "natural selection." They did not show punctilious fidelity with reference to one commandment, and great laxity concerning another. This is one essential characteristic of Christian obedience. It is total. If we can make choice of such commands as we feel like obeying and disregard the rest, what are we but masters instead of subjects, dictating terms instead of receiving orders? 2. It was constant. It kept an unbroken path. It bore the stress of storms and tests. And herein it was marked by another essential characteristic of Christian obedience — a beautiful constancy. Enlistment in the Lord's army is for life, and there is no discharge in that war. II. WHEREIN THIS RECHABITE OBEDIENCE WAS UNLIKE CHRISTIAN OBEDIENCE. 1. The Rechabites obeyed Jonadab: Christians obey God. This is a substantive difference. And we must not confound things that radically differ. The source of a command has a great deal to do with the value of obedience to it. The lower relation must give way to the higher when the two conflict. 2. Jonadab's commands, so far as we know, were for temporal and material ends, in the interests of a rugged manhood and a sturdy independence. God's commands are for spiritual ends, for good of soul, and they stand vitally connected with those higher interests that relate not only to the life that now is, but to that which is to come. Rechabite obedience, therefore, conserves temporal good; Christian obedience conserves eternal good. 3. Rechabite obedience was not necessary to salvation; Christian obedience is indispensable. III. WHEREIN IT SHAMES CHRISTIAN DISOBEDIENCE. 1. These Rechabites are obedient to their father Jonadab, a mere man who had been dead nearly three hundred years, while Judah is in open and flagrant disobedience to the Most High God. 2. Jonadab commanded but once, and he had instant and constant heed, generation upon generation, for centuries. "But I," saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel — "I have spoken unto you, rising early and speaking. I have also sent unto you," &c. 3. Obedience to Jonadab was at a cost, and it brought at the best only power to endure and the spirit of independence. It left the Rechabites poor and homeless. Obedience to God was also at a cost, but it gave His people assured possessions, peace of conscience, protection from their enemies, and all the exceeding riches of an eternal inheritance in God's kingdom of grace and glory. Yet the Rechabites obeyed Jonadab with a beautiful constancy, while Judah hearkened not to the voice of the Lord.Practical suggestions — 1. The very essence of Christian fidelity is obedience. 2. A true obedience has two infallible signs. It will have no reservations, and it will never cry "Halt!" 3. See the shame and guilt of disobedience under the Gospel. 4. In respect to one particular in this Rechabite obedience, namely, abstinence from wine — three things are clear. (1) Abstinence from wine is not here made obligatory. (2) Abstinence from wine is not wrong. (3) Abstinence from wine for the sake of the stumblers is lifted by the New Testament to the sublime height of a duty, and made imperative (Romans 14:21).Wine-drinking is a sin "for that man who drinks with offence" (Romans 14:20). Wine-drinking is a sin for that man who by it "puts a stumbling-block or an occasion to fall in a brother s way (Romans 14:15). When wine-drinking wounds a weak conscience" it is "as in against Christ" (1 Corinthians 8:12). (H. Johnson, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: The word which came unto Jeremiah from the LORD in the days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah, saying, |
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