Jeremiah 2

The prophet gets started.

Verse 1 kicks off the ministry with God's opening...Thus says the Lord!

Awwe and Ouch. In verses 2 and 3 God reflects on the early days of His relationship with Judah. Their young devotion, the betrothals, and following Him in the wilderness. Israel was briefly holy in the soil not sown; but by first harvest, they were sinful.

Starting in verse 5 He asks what they saw wrong in Him that they walked away. They forgot all that He did for them from Egypt to the Promise Land. And then He gave them the Promise Land and they defiled it--making His inheritance for them and abomination.

He brings up similar points about the priests, law scribes, leaders, and prophets. They all turned their backs on everything He had done and the corrupted the offices they had been given. All of these groups of people were morally responsible for the people. So their sins didn't just corrupt themselves and their offices, but also the people they were meant to lead and serve.

“Therefore I still contend with you,
declares the Lord,
    and with your children's children I will contend. Jeremiah 2:9, ESV, biblegateway.com

First of all, how terrifying. That you would have to contend with the Lord. And second, just like He promised in Exodus, When you do these things against the Lord, your choices will have an impact on future generations.

The Lord points out, next, that you could search from east to west and not find a nation that abandons its god, but Israel trades the living God, who has repeatedly proved Himself faithful, for another glory that does not show profit. To this, He commands the heavens to be appalled and shutter; to be desolate.

And then this very famous observation from the Lord:

for my people have committed two evils:
they have forsaken me,
    the fountain of living waters,
and hewed out cisterns for themselves,
    broken cisterns that can hold no water. Jeremiah 2:13

I think we could pause here and meditate on this verse for a month.

It seems utterly impossible that a people would walk away from a source of water, Living Water at that, and choose instead to make cisterns, which are actually broken and can't even hold water- let alone be a source for water.

Why would anyone choose so foolishly?

But.

Why do we?

I think we all wander off from the Lord, chasing shiny bobbles or wants and desires or addictions or we just tune out and forget.

C.S. Lewis has a quote asserting that it's not that we ask too much of God but that we ask too little. We ask for mud pies when He has offered us a feast. We make a broken cup and turn away from the flow of living water in the offing.

It doesn't make sense. And when you're close to the Lord, you cannot even image that it's possible to wander off; but then you turn around an realize that you wandered off- like a sheep looking for a weed to snack on. Or maybe it's just me who does this; but I think it's pretty universal. I'd ask you, dear reader, to take time to ask God to search your heart for the broken cisterns in your life. Turn away from them and find yourself renewed in the Living Water.

And Jeremiah got to bring the news to God's priestly nation, who was supposed to be leading all nations to the Lord.

Starting in verse 14, the prophet, speaking for the Lord, points out the terrible situation Israel has gotten itself in, servitude and surrounded by young lions roaring before the kill.

Have you not brought this upon yourself
    by forsaking the Lord your God,
    when he led you in the way? Jeremiah 2:17, ESV

Again, not judging Israel because I am paying the price for plenty of consequences myself. Bad food choices. Bad exercise, or lack thereof. Feeling much older than many other 50-somethings around me. It's really valuable to read these verses and find he application in your own life. It could be really easy to just disassociate with them and relegate them to some foreign storyland. But it is the Living Word. there's Living Water for you. If you seek Him, you will find Him.Verse 18 asks them where they will go now for water. Ask Egypt for help, trying to "drink from the Nile". Or asking Assyria for help, "drinking from the Euphrates". And with broken cisterns...nobody can help for long.

Verse 19 is very interesting. Explaining that there own apostasy will be there own punishment. When we forsake the Lord and own fear of Him wains, we end making choices that are their own punishment. There is one good way and when we aren't on it; bad things come.

He reminds them, starting in verse 20, that He set them free and yet, they play the harlot. He planted good seed but they mixed with foreign vines. Even if they try to claim they are clean, their actions show them like a young she-camel or wild donkey in heat. Not a flattering picture...

Israel is shamed, starting in verse 26, kings, princes, priests, and prophets all giving their worship to trees and stones instead of the Lord. But where are these gods when Israel is in need?

God asks them why they contend with Him. He's given them severe consequences and yet they won't accept chastisement.

He, again, notes that they are claiming their innocence and assuming His anger will turn away; without actually changing their hearts back to Him alone.

He warns them that if they seek help from Egypt, they will find only misery.

This word from the Lord continues in Chapter 3, so it's sort of an unsatisfying ending to Chapter 2. I'll never understand some of these man-made chapter and verse breaks. But here we are.