Stiff-necked People

I am reading the book of Jeremiah right now and I absolutely love it. God's command for purity and devotion is incredible. He simply wants His people to follow Him and to stop making their own gods and following after their own wicked hearts. In 5:3 we are told that Judah has refused to repent and in verse 21 they are called foolish and senseless people. They have eyes but they do not see and they have ears but they do not listen. They are spiritually blind and deaf. In chapter 6 we are told that the people scorn the word of God and take no pleasure in it at all.

Many times God compare his people to dung that will be thrown in an open field (9:22). I am pretty sure if God calls you pile of steaming poop, that's not a good thing. God is infuriated with His people. In 13:25-26 He says, "Because you have forgotten me and trusted in lies. I myself will lift up your skirts over your face, and your shame will be seen." Okay, just imagine what God is really saying there. He is revealing their "privates" for everyone to see. These people have no dignity, no integrity, nothing. God continually states that they have rejected Him. He has not rejected them but they have listened to lies and forgotten about the one true God. God is punishing them in order to purify them.

As I read chapter 18 today, something hit me. 18:18 says, "They said [they – are the peoples of Judah that have disobeyed God], "Come let us make plots against Jeremiah, for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor the counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, let us strike him with the tongue, and let us not pay attention to any of his words." Basically the people of Judah said, who does this guy think he is? They did not believe his message. They could not comprehend the fact that they had sinned, that they had fallen away from the law. They rejected those thoughts. After all, no one else was saying anything, just the lone prophet Jeremiah.
This is what hit me. Sometimes God calls just one person like you or me and we are called to stand alone. We are called to preach a message that many others (even Christians) will not believe or understand. They will think we are wrong that we have lost it. Their sin will cause them to become stubborn and will blind them and cause them to turn a deaf ear. But we cannot be discouraged at others responses because our job is not to change people but to simply preach the message that God places in our mouths. Be encouraged if you are standing alone, many times that is how God uses us.

In the same way, I pray that I never become arrogant, deaf, and blind that I will reject the voice of one. The key here is to be fully devoted to God and worship Him alone. Let us always listen to God that we will never leave his highway and take the side roads (18:15).