Double sinning: Leaving true God & following false gods Jeremiah 2:10-13
- Vicent Nemeyimana
- November 29, 2016
- Uncategorized
Double sinning: Leaving true God & followingfalse gods
Jeremiah 2:10-13
Today, I was reading through the book of Jeremiah chapter two and there are about 4 verses that made me think my head off. They are so intriguing, let us examine them:
“Go across the sea to the Islands of Cyprus and see. Send someone to the land of Kedar to look closely. See if there has been anything like this (verse 10). Has a nation ever exchanged its gods? (Of course, its gods are not really gods at all). But my people have exchanged their glorious God for idols worth nothing (verse 11). Skies, be shocked at the things that have happened and shake with great fear!” says the Lord (12). My people have done two evils: They have turned away from me, the spring of living water. And they have dug their own wells, which are broken wells that cannot hold water (13).Those are the verses.
In these verses, God through prophet Jeremiah first asked people to make some assignment; to take examples of cities like Cyprus and Kedar and ask closely and observantly if there had ever happened something like exchanging deities/gods. While these gods are actually not gods (I do not have words to explain what this means, but the Bible is trying to tell us that these gods are not even true gods. Yes, we are saying that not only gods cannot be our God, they are not even gods. So what are they? They are just useless, nothing, just trees, stones and animal pictures). Anyway, aside from that, God asked Judah to make a comparison and see if there had ever been exchange of gods, and to which there had never been such a thing. In other words, while gods were useless as we have already deciphered, their followers had so much reverence and respect for them that they could not exchange them for other gods.
But look at Israelites; they have exchanged their true glorious God for gods, gods that are not even true or real gods themselves. Literally, Judah (In this case, Israel or Judah means the same people) had exchanged her true glorious God for nothing, for meaningless gods. Apparently, I have no words to express the deeper meaning in this, but I will try. Let us move on to verse 13
The last verse 13 makes it a little plain: Judah had committed two evils, one was turning away from the true God, the source of living water, and the second one was embracing/digging herself wells, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.
Now, let us explain this. Literally, it is one sin to leave God, the true source of our happiness and another to embrace a weaker being, a cheap deity, a much lower state, a seemingly useless god that won’t provide us with even little happiness. That is the sin of man. We do not sin because we are moving away from what seemed bad, unsatisfying, uncomfortable, cheap, weak, and holding us back, we sin because we are moving away from greater good to worst, from God to not even true gods.
Have you got the picture? Let me help with analogy below.
A young man is married to this young, hardworking, beautiful and obedient woman. Generally, their relationship is heaven on earth and no single reason; I mean no single excuse for their quarrel or separation. But somehow because of desires, the strong sexual desires (the weak heart’s desires), this man goes out and meets a grown up woman (old, with wrinkles, not physically beautiful or so attractive, 10 years older than our young man, already married and with 3 kids) in one of the bars, and they both share romance. What do you think people will say when they find out?
They will say a lot but this won’t miss: What exactly made this man fall in sin with such a woman? To many, it would at least make sense if this other woman was young, beautiful and sexy, not married, or not have wrinkles and about 3 children, and so much more compared to this young man’s wife. In our general eyes, this young man moved from better woman position to the worst woman position. That is our God’s message today.
Once again, we will use C.S Lewis’ words; our sin is not our strongest desires, but our weak desires. We are not taken to be sinners because we have just forsaken God, but because we have actually forsaken our lives. Logically, we would not be sinners if in deserting God we would find a more powerful God than Him but this never exists. He is one true God and there is none above Him. Deserting or turning away from Him and putting our trust and time in other gods (money, businesses, friends, knowledge, power, fame, and all sorts of things) can be understood as escaping out of the saucepan into the fire. Yet this is not even comparable, our God is so good, loving, kind, saving, protective, defensive, and savior. Embracing God and his teachings is certainly not doing a favor to Him but to us.
God is still God without us and yet we are nothing without Him.
If you have not yet received Christ Jesus as your personal Savior to help you in this crazy life and build you up for even the next eternal life, today is your day dear brother and sister. Repeat this prayer after me, “Lord Jesus, I am so much happy to meet you today. I have suffered and struggled to live for myself alone, but I am tired and I have sinned a lot along this way. I kindly ask you to take me in today and make me your holy child. Yes, I want to be there for your service Lord from today onwards. Save me and make me find true living in you alone. Thanks Jesus. Amen”. If you have finished praying, we believe you are now saved and Jesus will never abandon you. Find a good church near you and be part of their congregation.
God bless you
The Complete You Ministry, www.nemvicx.blogspot.com
