Jeremiah 2:20
"For long ago you broke your yoke and tore off your chains, saying, 'I will not serve!' Indeed, on every high hill and under every green tree you lay down as a prostitute.
Sermons
Jehovah's Indictment Against IsraelS. Conway Jeremiah 2:20-37














Note -

I. ITS MANY COUNTS.

1. Their sin of outrageous character. It is spoken of as in ver. 20, because it so commonly involved the grossest fleshly sins, and because it involved shameful denial of God. Cf. ver. 27, "Saying to a stock, Thou art my father," etc. And it was chargeable with numerous and shameful murders (ver. 30). Killing the prophets of God; ver. 34, "In thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents," etc.

2. Of long standing. Ver. 20, "Of old time thou hast broken thy yoke" (see exegesis for true translation), "and saidst, I will not serve."

3. In no wise chargeable to God. Ver. 21, "Yet I had planted thee a noble vine," etc.

4. Was ingrained into their very nature (ver. 22). All manner of endeavor had been made to cleanse away the defilement, but its stain remained in them still.

5. Was fiercely and determinately pursued after (vers. 23, 24, 33; see exegesis). They "worked all uncleanness with greediness."

6. And this in spite of all that might have taught them better.

(1) Warnings (ver. 25, where they are entreated to have done with such wickedness).

(2) Miserable results of their idolatry in the past (vers. 26-28).

(3) Divine chastisements (ver. 30).

(4) God's great mercy in the past (ver. 31). God had not been to them as a wilderness.

(5) The honor and glory God was ready to place upon them (ver. 32), like as a husband would adorn his bride with jewels.

7. And their sin is aggravated by

(1) their shameless assertion of innocence (vers. 23, 35);

(2) their persistence in sin (ver 36), "gadding about to change their way," going from one idolatry to another, one heathen alliance to another.

II. THE MISERABLE DEFENSE OFFERED. It consisted simply in denial (vers. 23, 35). It augmented their guilt and condemnation (ver. 37).

III. THE INSTRUCTION FROM ALL THIS FOR OUR OWN DAY AND FOR OUR OWN LIVES.

1. It shows us the terrible nature of sin.

(1) The lengths it will go.

(2) The gracious Barriers it will break through.

(3) The condemnation it will surely meet.

2. It bids us not trust to any early advantages. Israel was planted "a noble vine, wholly a right seed,"

3. The folly and guilt of denying our sin (cf. 1 John 1:8, "If we say that we have no sin,:' etc.).

4. The needs be there is for us all of the pardoning and preserving grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. - C.

Thine own wickedness shall correct thee.
I. IN THE DEALINGS OF GOD WITH GOOD MEN.

1. Neglect secret devotion, and God will refuse His blessing on other means of grace.

2. Indulge secret sin, and God will bring that sin into open light and condemnation.

3. Idolise created good, and God will take from us an idol, or make it a plague to us.

4. Act with faithlessness to others, and God will permit us to suffer from the treachery of others.

5. Undutifulness to parents punished by the defiance of our own children.

6. Indifference as to home piety returned upon us in the irreligion of those in the home.

II. IN THE DEALINGS OF GOD WITH WICKED MEN.

1. Those who resent religious persuasions, and strive to stifle conviction, are deprived of godly parents and friends, and left to a fatal peace.

2. Those who repel the Gospel because of its humiliating truths, are allowed "to believe a lie," etc.

3. In death and judgment, the punishment of the sinner will reflect his sin.

(Andrew Fuller.)

I. PRECAUTIONARY OBSERVATIONS.

1. Sin, in its own nature, is inexpressibly bad. Not only the negation of all that is good, but the absolute plenitude of all that is evil. It is wrong raising itself against the order, purity, and happiness of the universe. The originating, exclusive, and prolific source of all human woe.

2. If in any circumstances sin appear in a beginning, and good and happiness in the end, the latter will not be, in any sense, the proper conduct of the former. Good comes of evil through causes exterior to evil, independent of evil, hostile to evil, and which turn evil to good account against evil. Imagine a man sleeping in a wood. A serpent strikes its fangs into one of his limbs. The man is stung into consciousness, and starts up from his slumber just in time to escape the pounce of a hungry tiger, whose eyes are glaring in the thicket. The serpent had no intention of saving him. It attacked him for itself; but the sudden anguish of the bleeding wound was the occasion of rescue from the two-fold destruction. So, often, man "dead in trespasses and sins" is maddened into activity by the remorse of wickedness, and ultimately rushes away from the adjacent coils of Satan and the gaping jaws of hell.

3. To turn evil to good account is one of the sovereign prerogatives of God. It is only through Divine interference and interworking that sin fails, at any time, to effect "evil, only evil, and that continually." This is one of the express laws of the Divine conduct in the Bible. Joseph and his brethren. David and Shimei. Preaching Christ out of envy, etc.

II. WHAT ATTITUDE GOD ACTUALLY ASSUMES AND MAINTAINS TOWARDS SIN.

1. God has surrounded sin by limits and restrictions. The moral sentiments of men — the moral restraints of society — the moral utterances of revealed religion — the moral corrections of the invincible laws of the material economy — have conspired to bind sin hand and foot, in its most monstrous and demoniacal forms.

2. Sin is permitted, but anticipated; defiled, but used; unscathed, but bridled and harnessed, till the reluctant monster shall be firmly yoked to the car of the mighty victor and swell the final triumph.(1) God uses sin to punish sin. When God employed the passion and ambition of hostile monarchs to chastise the apostate Israelites, or when God directed warring kings, raging with the lust of empire, to relieve His afflicted and repentant people — in either case the Jews recognised the operation of an inter-working and over-ruling providence, and recorded the principles which we are explaining.(2) God uses sin to defeat sin. Very often when two persons, two coteries, two nations, it may be, are struggling to obtain a false object, and both the parties or communities are equally profligate in the means which they employ to secure success, the plans of the unprincipled tricksters clash; all are overwhelmed with defeat and disgrace together, and the field is left free for right quietly to triumph. In the history of every kingdom and hierarchy, political and priestly despotism may be seen committing suicide by outdoing its ordinary amount of enormity.(3) God uses sin to reprove sin. God does not turn sins into whips exclusively, by the pains and disappointments of iniquity, merely to scourge the sinner. The element of moral reproof is uniformly associated with the anguish of punishment. We ask not here how sin can at all become the means of moral instruction; we only state the fact. Without seeking the remote or proximate cause of such a phenomenon, it is sufficient for our present purpose to say that one act, or a few acts of sin, and the immediate consequences are often, to a man apparently established in irreligion, the occasion of godly sorrow for the sins of his whole life.(4) God uses sin to promote goodness. The odiousness of sin, when visible in the conduct of the ungodly, is ever felt by Christians to be promotive of piety. It undoubtedly increases their gratitude when they are reminded, by contrast, of the obvious and revolting abominations from which they have been rescued. The daffy sinfulness, too, of which the best are conscious, which they frankly acknowledge, however unaffectedly deplore, becomes a source of sincere and growing humiliation. The transgressions, also, of the past are never remembered without grief; and the spirit is chastened into meekness at the recollection of even bygone and forgiven iniquities. And, beyond this, what salutary spiritual consequences are derived from a conscious proneness to sin in the future! To what self-renunciation does it conduct! what acts of self-consignment to God does it prompt! and how much possible sin does it annihilate!(5) God uses sin to display the matchless glory of His Divine perfections.

(H. Batchelor.)

It is an evil thing and bitter.
Theological Sketchbook.
I. INQUIRE WHEREIN SIN CONSISTS, ACCORDING TO THE DESCRIPTION OF THE PROPHET.

1. Every sinner has forsaken God.(1) He does not desire Him as his portion, but other things in preference.(2) He is not mindful of His favour, but esteems the friendship of a fellow creature more than His.

2. As God is not loved, so neither is He feared, at least, not in such a way as to depart from evil.

3. From these two sources proceed all the evils that are in the world.(1) Forsaking God has been the cause of every abomination: hence all the wars, oppression, and injustice, between nations and individuals.(2) From the same source also arises a rejection of Christ and the Gospel; a contempt of religion and of religious people.(3) Hence, also, that hardness and indifference to the Gospel in many who attend upon it.(4) Hence the most solemn warnings and tender expostulations are without effect, and all the mercy of the Saviour is neglected.

II. CONSIDER THE EVIL AND BITTER NATURE OF SIN.

1. We may "know and see how evil and bitter a thing sin is," by the precepts of God's holy law, which forbid it; and we must measure it by this rule to see what evil there is in it.

2. We may "know and see" by the awful threatenings of God's Word, by which it stands condemned (Deuteronomy 28:15).

3. We may know and see by the bitter sorrows of true penitents (Psalm 38:1-6; Psalm 51:1-4; Zechariah 12:10).

4. Know by the bitter fruits it has already produced.

5. By the still more bitter fruits it would have produced if God had not restrained it.

6. By the bitter pains of eternal death.

7. Know it also by the bitter sufferings of the Son of God.

III. ENFORCE THE EXHORTATION: "Know therefore and see that it is an evil and bitter thing."

1. Unless we know and see this, we can neither know nor see the salvation of God.

2. Without a knowledge of the evil of sin, we shall neither repent of it nor depart from it to any good purpose.

3. If we know and see it not truly in this world, we shall be made to know and see it to our cost in the world to come.

4. If we are brought to know and see it aright, we shall come to Christ; and herein will be the proof of our knowledge being in some measure what it ought to be (John 6:45).

(Theological Sketchbook.)

I. INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS.

1. Men in general think lightly of sin. They consider it rather as a failure or infirmity of nature, than as positive transgression, guilt, or vileness. Nay, "fools make a mock of sin."

2. The great reason why men think so lightly of sin is, that they think lightly of God. Our judgment of anything is always in proportion to our esteem or disesteem of its opposite. God and sin are two contraries; and we will unavoidably form our estimate of sin, according to that which we form of essential holiness.

3. There is an infinite evil in sin. This may appear impossible, because man, its subject, is a finite being. But although viewed in man, or in any creature, as its subject, it can be only finite; with respect to God, the object against whom it is directed, it is infinitely evil: for it is an affront to His infinite perfections.

4. All sin has an infinite evil in it. The guilt of one sin exposes to eternal wrath. The least sin implies in it ingratitude, unbelief, rebellion, and atheism.

II. THE EVIL OF SIN.

1. Because contrary to the nature of God, who is the supreme standard of truth and righteousness. Men may talk as they will of moral rectitude and the fitness of things. But these are terms without meaning, unless we understand them as relating to the perfections of the Divine nature; for there can be no notion of rectitude, fitness, or propriety, abstracted from the nature of God.

2. Because contrary to His holy law. This notion of sin is usually illustrated by the situation of a person under a bodily disease, who not only labours under the want of a proper temperament of humours, but hath a positive disorder among them. So sin, which is a moral disease, not only implies a want of proper conformity to the law, but a real opposition to it.

3. It is an attempt against the moral government of God in the world. This is the necessary result of its being a transgression of the law.

4. It is abominable to God. Nothing else in the universe is the object of Divine hatred, or nothing else but on account of sin.

5. That sin is an evil thing is evident from that malignity which is in its nature. Does the justice of God proclaim the guilt of sin? Do we learn its filth from its contrariety to Divine holiness? Its malignity also appears by its opposition to the alluring perfection of love.

6. Because it makes man the slave of Satan. By the law of his creation, he is the subject of God. To Him he owes his service, and to Him only.Inferences —

1. That those who have never seen sin to be evil and bitter have no fear of God.

2. The danger of entertaining trivial thoughts of sin.

3. The dreadful ingratitude that is in sin.

4. The impossibility of delivering ourselves from sin. The necessity of washing in the blood of Christ.

III. THE BITTERNESS OF SIN.

1. Sin is so bitter in its consequences that it has deprived us of all good. It has robbed us of the Divine image and favour.

2. Sin has subjected us to all penal evil. The curse of the law; afflictions; death

3. Sin has introduced disorder into the whole creation of God.

IV. BY WHAT PROOFS SINNERS MAY KNOW AND SEE THAT SIN IS EVIL AND BITTER.

1. By the commands and threatenings of the law. It threatens death in all its extent: temporal, spiritual, and eternal.

2. By terrors of conscience.

3. From the complaints of God's people, on account of sin. They everywhere, when rightly exercised, represent it as their heaviest burden; and however great their afflictions, they consider sin as greater than any ether.

4. By the punishments inflicted on sinners in this life. Flood: Sodom and Gomorrah.

5. Many see and know the evil and bitterness of sin by their own eternal misery. Hell.

6. In the sufferings of the Son of God.

(J. Jamieson M. A.)

Christian Observer.
Many and great are the benefits arising from a proper view of the evil of sin. It teaches us our true relation to God, and the value of Christ's salvation. It shows us the necessity of repentance, and serves to form in us that spirit of humility, which so well state, a fallen creature. To promote this necessary branch of Christian knowledge, therefore, I propose to set before you some of the evils contained in sin.

1. Sin is an act of rebellion against God, our supreme governor. We all feel it to be right that a master should govern his servant, a parent his child, a king his subjects: — and, in these cases, if obedience be refused, we immediately censure it as wrong. Now, all the relations of father, master, and king, do not confer a thousandth part of the right to rule, and to be obeyed, which centres in God. If authority is attached to property, the world is His, and the fulness of it; — if to high station, He is King of kings, and Lord of lords; — if to natural right, whose claim can be so little liable to dispute as that of the Creator of all things, by whom all things subsist? The language of sin is, "Who is the Lord that I should obey Him?" Now, when we consider the infinite glory, power, and goodness of God, whose authority is thus trampled upon; the meanness of man — dust of the earth quickened into life by God; the slightness of the motive by which in many cases he is induced to disobey God; and the desperate boldness or unthinking carelessness with which he dares to transgress, often showing neither reluctance, nor apprehension, nor sorrow, surely we shall see in this one view of the subject how "evil and bitter a thing it is that we have forsaken the Lord God, and that His fear is not in us." But to all this it may be objected, that guilt lies chiefly in the intention; and that it is not the intention of the sinner to offend God, much less to rebel against Him: his end is only to please himself. This may be true; but is it not rebellion against God not to intend to obey Him? No criminal directly proposes to insult the laws of his country. He intends only to please himself; to serve some selfish end of his own. But when the act which he commits is forbidden by the law, we consider him as justly liable to suffer the penalty of disobedience. But it is pleaded, "We have no distinct idea, when we sin, of acting against the will of God, but are drawn, by thoughtlessness, to do that which in our more serious moments we condemn." Is thoughtlessness itself, in respect to God and our duty, no crime? This is to excuse the guilt of the single act, by acknowledging a general principle of evil. Men, for the most part, know that what they are about to do is forbidden by God. Their conscience reproves them; their guilt is placed full in their view, and yet they proceed in their course.

2. The evil of sin will further appear from this consideration, that by every act of sin we do in effect arraign the wisdom and goodness of God. Every one who sins decides against the wisdom and goodness of God. He declares by actions, which always speak more strongly than words, that God would have more promoted the happiness of man had He allowed him to indulge his lusts; that His yoke, therefore, is hard. Now, is it not an unpardonable presumption in us thus to set up our judgment against that of God?

3. The evil of sin appears also from its tendency to defeat the designs of God. It introduces disorder into His dominions. It spreads desolation through His works. It destroys the happiness, harmony, and glory of the world, and fills it with misery and discord. All sin has this tendency. For, be it remembered, we are not to measure the evil of sin by its effects, but by its tendency. If God, by His power, prevents the effects which it would otherwise produce, this does not take away from its proper malignity.

4. The evil of sin will further appear when we consider the ingratitude contained in it. Is there, then, no guilt in sin which injures and insults our best Friend; no evil in that disposition which allows us to be even negligent in our conduct towards Him to whom we owe such obligations?

5. Sin manifests also an abject and grovelling spirit. It proposes to gratify the corrupt appetites of the flesh, and considers only the present moment: for this, reason is dethroned, while the flesh is allowed to rule: for this, honour, conscience, and the fear of God, are trampled under foot: for this, eternity is sacrificed to time. It belongs only to fallen beings; it is the badge of their shame, and the rod of their punishment.

6. Lastly, the evil of sin appears in the injury it does to others. It is the excellence of holiness that it spreads happiness around; but it is the effect of sin, like a pestilence, to spread ruin and desolation. All I have said of sin in general applies, of course, to every act of sin; and yet how very different an appearance does sin usually bear to us from what has been described! Is God, then, an angry tyrant, who marks in secret the weaknesses and follies of His creatures, in order, at length, to pour out His vengeance on them? Far from us be such an idea of our gracious and merciful God. He is slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth Him of the evil.

(Christian Observer.)

1. The nature of sin. Forsaking the Lord as our God.

2. The cause of sin. Because His fear is not in us.

3. The malignity of sin. An evil and bitter thing.

4. The fatal consequences of sin. Without God.

5. Use and application. Repent of thy sin.

( Matthew Henry, D. D.)

People
Gad, Jacob, Jeremiah, Kedar, Kittim, Kittites
Places
Assyria, Cyprus, Egypt, Euphrates River, Jerusalem, Kedar, Memphis, Nile River, Tahpanhes
Topics
Ago, Bands, Behaviour, Bonds, Bow, Bowed, Bowest, Branching, Broke, Broken, Burst, Cords, Drawn, Green, Hands, Harlot, Hast, Height, Hill, Indeed, Lain, Lay, Leafy, Loose, Parted, Past, Playing, Prostitute, Recline, Sayest, Servant, Serve, Spreading, Thyself, Tore, Transgress, Tree, Wanderest, Wandering, Yea, Yoke
Outline
1. God having shown his former kindness,
5. expostulates with the people on their causeless and unexampled revolt
14. They are the causes of their own calamities
18. The sins and idolatries of Judah
35. Her confidence is rejected.

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Jeremiah 2:20

     4696   yoke
     6243   adultery, spiritual
     7442   shrine
     8345   servanthood, and worship
     8703   antinomianism

Jeremiah 2:19-20

     8741   failure

Jeremiah 2:19-25

     8705   apostasy, in OT

Library
Stiff-Necked Idolaters and Pliable Christians
'Hath a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods? but My people have changed their glory for that which doth not profit.'--JER. ii. 11. The obstinacy of the adherents of idolatry is in striking contrast with Israel's continual tendency to forsake Jehovah. It reads a scarcely less forcible lesson to many nominal and even to some real Christians. I. That contrast carries with it a disclosure of the respective origins of the two kinds of Religion. The strangeness of the contrasted conduct is
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Forsaking Jehovah
'Know therefore, and see, that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that My fear is not in thee, saith the Lord God of hosts.'--JER. ii. 19. Of course the original reference is to national apostasy, which was aggravated by the national covenant, and avenged by national disasters, which are interpreted and urged by the prophet as God's merciful pleading with men. But the text is true in reference to individuals. I. The universal indictment. This is not so
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Balak's Inquiries Relative to the Service of God, and Balaam's Answer, Briefly Considered.
"Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the high God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with, thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my first born for my transgression; the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?--He hath shewed thee, 0 man, what is good: And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" As mankind are
Andrew Lee et al—Sermons on Various Important Subjects

"He is the Rock, his Work is Perfect, for all his Ways are Judgment, a God of Truth, and Without Iniquity, Just and Right is He.
Deut. xxxii. 4, 5.--"He is the Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are judgment, a God of truth, and without iniquity, just and right is he. They have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children," &c. There are none can behold their own vileness as it is, but in the sight of God's glorious holiness. Sin is darkness, and neither sees itself, nor any thing else, therefore must his light shine to discover this darkness. If we abide within ourselves, and men like ourselves,
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

That it is not Lawful for the Well Affected Subjects to Concur in Such an Engagement in War, and Associate with the Malignant Party.
That It Is Not Lawful For The Well Affected Subjects To Concur In Such An Engagement In War, And Associate With The Malignant Party. Some convinced of the unlawfulness of the public resolutions and proceedings, in reference to the employing of the malignant party, yet do not find such clearness and satisfaction in their own consciences as to forbid the subjects to concur in this war, and associate with the army so constituted. Therefore it is needful to speak something to this point, That it is
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

A Book for Boys and Girls Or, Temporal Things Spritualized.
by John Bunyan, Licensed and entered according to order. London: Printed for, and sold by, R. Tookey, at his Printing House in St. Christopher's Court, in Threadneedle Street, behind the Royal Exchange, 1701. Advertisement by the Editor. Some degree of mystery hangs over these Divine Emblems for children, and many years' diligent researches have not enabled me completely to solve it. That they were written by Bunyan, there cannot be the slightest doubt. 'Manner and matter, too, are all his own.'[1]
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3

'The God of the Amen'
'He who blesseth himself in the earth shall bless himself in the God of truth; and he that sweareth in the earth shall swear by the God of truth.'--ISAIAH lxv. 16. The full beauty and significance of these remarkable words are only reached when we attend to the literal rendering of a part of them which is obscured in our version. As they stand in the original they have, in both cases, instead of the vague expression, 'The God of truth,' the singularly picturesque one, 'The God of the Amen.' I. Note
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Harbinger
The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD , make straight in the desert a high-way for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain. And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it. T he general style of the prophecies is poetical. The inimitable simplicity which characterizes every
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1

"All Our Righteousnesses are as Filthy Rags, and we all do Fade as a Leaf, and Our Iniquities, Like the Wind, have Taken us Away. "
Isaiah lxiv. 6, 7.--"All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags, and we all do fade as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away." Not only are the direct breaches of the command uncleanness, and men originally and actually unclean, but even our holy actions, our commanded duties. Take a man's civility, religion, and all his universal inherent righteousness,--all are filthy rags. And here the church confesseth nothing but what God accuseth her of, Isa. lxvi. 8, and chap. i. ver.
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

How Christ is the Way in General, "I am the Way. "
We come now to speak more particularly to the words; and, first, Of his being a way. Our design being to point at the way of use-making of Christ in all our necessities, straits, and difficulties which are in our way to heaven; and particularly to point out the way how believers should make use of Christ in all their particular exigencies; and so live by faith in him, walk in him, grow up in him, advance and march forward toward glory in him. It will not be amiss to speak of this fulness of Christ
John Brown (of Wamphray)—Christ The Way, The Truth, and The Life

All Mankind Guilty; Or, Every Man Knows More than He Practises.
ROMANS i. 24.--"When they knew God, they glorified him not as God." The idea of God is the most important and comprehensive of all the ideas of which the human mind is possessed. It is the foundation of religion; of all right doctrine, and all right conduct. A correct intuition of it leads to correct religious theories and practice; while any erroneous or defective view of the Supreme Being will pervade the whole province of religion, and exert a most pernicious influence upon the entire character
William G.T. Shedd—Sermons to the Natural Man

A Short and Easy Method of Prayer
CHAPTER I The Universal Call to Prayer What a dreadful delusion hath prevailed over the greater part of mankind, in supposing that they are not called to a state of prayer! whereas all are capable of prayer, and are called thereto, as all are called to and are capable of salvation. Prayer is the application of the heart to God, and the internal exercise of love. S. Paul hath enjoined us to "pray without ceasing" (1 Thess. v 17), and our Lord saith, "I say unto you all, watch and pray" (Mark xiii.
Madame Guyon—A Short and Easy Method of Prayer

All are Commanded to Pray --Prayer the Great Means of Salvation
CHAPTER I. ALL ARE COMMANDED TO PRAY--PRAYER THE GREAT MEANS OF SALVATION, AND POSSIBLE AT ALL TIMES BY THE MOST SIMPLE. Prayer is nothing else but the application of the heart to God, and the interior exercise of love. St Paul commands us to "pray without ceasing" (1 Thess. v. 17). Our Lord says: "Take ye heed, watch and pray." "And what I say unto you, I say unto all" (Mark xiii. 33, 37). All, then, are capable of prayer, and it is the duty of all to engage in it. But I do not think that all are
Jeanne Marie Bouvières—A Short Method Of Prayer And Spiritual Torrents

What are Consequences of Backsliding in Heart.
The text says, that "the backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways." 1. He shall be filled with his own works. But these are dead works, they are not works of faith and love, which are acceptable to God, but are the filthy rags of his own righteousness. If they are performed as religious services, they are but loathsome hypocrisy, and an abomination to God; there is no heart in them. To such a person God says: "Who hath required this at your hand?" (Isaiah 1:12). "Ye are they which justify
Charles G. Finney—The Backslider in Heart

Backsliding.
"I will heal their backsliding; I will love them freely: for Mine anger is turned away."--Hosea xiv. 4. There are two kinds of backsliders. Some have never been converted: they have gone through the form of joining a Christian community and claim to be backsliders; but they never have, if I may use the expression, "slid forward." They may talk of backsliding; but they have never really been born again. They need to be treated differently from real back-sliders--those who have been born of the incorruptible
Dwight L. Moody—The Way to God and How to Find It

The Medes and the Second Chaldaean Empire
THE FALL OF NINEVEH AND THE RISE OF THE CHALDAEAN AND MEDIAN EMPIRES--THE XXVIth EGYPTIAN DYNASTY: CYAXARES, ALYATTES, AND NEBUCHADREZZAR. The legendary history of the kings of Media and the first contact of the Medes with the Assyrians: the alleged Iranian migrations of the Avesta--Media-proper, its fauna and flora; Phraortes and the beginning of the Median empire--Persia proper and the Persians; conquest of Persia by the Medes--The last monuments of Assur-bani-pal: the library of Kouyunjik--Phraortes
G. Maspero—History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, V 8

That the Unskilful Venture not to Approach an Office of Authority.
No one presumes to teach an art till he has first, with intent meditation, learnt it. What rashness is it, then, for the unskilful to assume pastoral authority, since the government of souls is the art of arts! For who can be ignorant that the sores of the thoughts of men are more occult than the sores of the bowels? And yet how often do men who have no knowledge whatever of spiritual precepts fearlessly profess themselves physicians of the heart, though those who are ignorant of the effect of
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great

"So Then they that are in the Flesh Cannot Please God. "
Rom. viii. 8.--"So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God." It is a kind of happiness to men, to please them upon whom they depend, and upon whose favour their well-being hangs. It is the servant's happiness to please his master, the courtier's to please his prince; and so generally, whosoever they be that are joined in mutual relations, and depend one upon another; that which makes all pleasant, is this, to please one another. Now, certainly, all the dependencies of creatures one upon
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

The Section Chap. I. -iii.
The question which here above all engages our attention, and requires to be answered, is this: Whether that which is reported in these chapters did, or did not, actually and outwardly take place. The history of the inquiries connected with this question is found most fully in Marckius's "Diatribe de uxore fornicationum," Leyden, 1696, reprinted in the Commentary on the Minor Prophets by the same author. The various views may be divided into three classes. 1. It is maintained by very many interpreters,
Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg—Christology of the Old Testament

Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners Or, a Brief Relation of the Exceeding Mercy of God in Christ, to his Poor Servant, John Bunyan
In this my relation of the merciful working of God upon my soul, it will not be amiss, if in the first place, I do in a few words give you a hint of my pedigree, and manner of bringing up; that thereby the goodness and bounty of God towards me, may be the more advanced and magnified before the sons of men. 2. For my descent then, it was, as is well known by many, of a low and inconsiderable generation; my father's house being of that rank that is meanest, and most despised of all the families in
John Bunyan—Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners

"He is the Rock, his Work is Perfect. For all his Ways are Judgment. A God of Truth, and Without Iniquity, Just and Right is He.
Deut. xxxii. 4, 5.--"He is the rock, his work is perfect. For all his ways are judgment. A God of truth, and without iniquity, just and right is he. They have corrupted themselves, their spot is not the spot of his children. They are a perverse and crooked generation." "All his ways are judgment," both the ways of his commandments and the ways of his providence, both his word which he hath given as a lantern to men's paths, and his works among men. And this were the blessedness of men, to be found
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

1 to Pray Does not Imply that Without Prayer God Would not Give us Anything...
1. To pray does not imply that without prayer God would not give us anything or that He would be unaware of our needs, but it has this great advantage, that in the attitude of prayer the soul is best fitted to receive the Giver of blessing as well as those blessings He desires to bestow. Thus it was that the fullness of the Spirit was not poured out upon the Apostles on the first day, but after ten days of special preparation. If a blessing were conferred upon one without a special readiness for
Sadhu Sundar Singh—At The Master's Feet

John Bunyan on the Terms of Communion and Fellowship of Christians at the Table of the Lord;
COMPRISING I. HIS CONFESSION OF FAITH, AND REASON OF HIS PRACTICE; II. DIFFERENCES ABOUT WATER BAPTISM NO BAR TO COMMUNION; AND III. PEACEABLE PRINCIPLES AND TRUE[1] ADVERTISEMENT BY THE EDITOR. Reader, these are extraordinary productions that will well repay an attentive perusal. It is the confession of faith of a Christian who had suffered nearly twelve years' imprisonment, under persecution for conscience sake. Shut up with his Bible, you have here the result of a prayerful study of those holy
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3

The River of Egypt, Rhinocorura. The Lake of Sirbon.
Pliny writes, "From Pelusium are the intrenchments of Chabrias: mount Casius: the temple of Jupiter Casius: the tomb of Pompey the Great: Ostracine: Arabia is bounded sixty-five miles from Pelusium: soon after begins Idumea and Palestine from the rising up of the Sirbon lake." Either my eyes deceive me, while I read these things,--or mount Casius lies nearer Pelusium, than the lake of Sirbon. The maps have ill placed the Sirbon between mount Casius and Pelusium. Sirbon implies burning; the name of
John Lightfoot—From the Talmud and Hebraica

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