[0:00] Seeking the Lord's blessing, let us now turn back to the portion of scripture that we read together in the prophecy of Jeremiah chapter 33.
[0:14] And we can read from the beginning. Moreover, the word of the Lord came unto Jeremiah the second time, while he was shut up in the court of the prison, saying, Thus saith the Lord, the maker thereof, the Lord that formed but to establish it, the Lord is his name.
[0:36] Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not, and so on.
[0:46] Amen. After about 60 years, after the death of the prophet Isaiah, the Lord raised up a young man by the name of Jeremiah.
[1:09] He is often brought before us as the weeping prophet. And there is no doubt that he did proclaim his message of judgment with a heavy heart.
[1:29] In chapter 9 of his prophecy, I will read these words that he uttered, O that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people.
[1:50] He was from a priestly family. He was born in a small village just around two miles northeast of Jerusalem.
[2:07] And he lived at a time when Israel and Judah was tossed around by three great superpowers.
[2:18] There was Assyria to the north, there was Egypt to the south, and there was Babylon to the east.
[2:31] And he served and suffered through the administration of five kings of Judah.
[2:42] He was a contemporary of the prophets Nahum, Saphoniah, and Habakkuk in Jerusalem.
[2:56] And of course, Daniel and Ezekiel in Babylon. He is called to office as a young man, and he pleads his immaturity and lack of experience as rendering him unsuitable for the task that was set out before him by the Lord.
[3:23] However, the Lord promised to be with him. He was there during the reign of Josiah, King Josiah.
[3:39] And you will recall that in the 18th year of the reign of Josiah, that the book of the law was discovered in the temple.
[3:51] And the discovery of the book of the law brought great reforms into Judah. And Jeremiah was alive in those days when a great reformation took place in Judah.
[4:11] And that was probably the happiest years for the prophet. For we know that when King Josiah died in battle, that he was followed by his sons and grandson, all of whom had no regard whatsoever to the things of God.
[4:31] And actually they acted with much hostility to any suggestion that they should repent of their wickedness and that they should seek the Lord.
[4:46] And of course, that was the core message of the prophet Jeremiah, that they should repent of their wickedness and that they should seek the Lord.
[5:01] It was also a prophecy of warning because Jeremiah made quite clear to them, as did Isaiah before him, that if they did not repent and seek the Lord, that the Lord was going to bring judgment upon them and that they would be brought into captivity.
[5:23] This already had happened to the northern kingdom, to Israel. The Assyrians had already taken them into captivity. And the prophet is warning that the same thing is going to happen to the southern kingdom, to Judah, unless they would repent and seek the Lord.
[5:47] But his message was not regarded. The people gave no heed to his message. So a terrible sense of isolation and loneliness must have gripped Jeremiah through those dark years, as no one wanted to hear his message from God.
[6:12] His own family, his friends, his neighbours, the people and the rulers, they all rejected his preaching. And some even turned against him and sought his death.
[6:28] However, Jeremiah was in Jerusalem right up to the moment when the Babylonians came and destroyed Judah and the city of Jerusalem.
[6:38] As you know, there were three invasions against Judah. In the first invasion that came from Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, Daniel was taken.
[6:53] And in the second invasion, Ezekiel was taken. And the Lord ordered the prophet Jeremiah to make a yoke and to put it on his neck and to tell the king of Judah to harness himself to the yoke of the Babylonian king and not to listen to the lying and the false prophets.
[7:23] We have that in chapter 27 of this prophecy. But of course, the king and the people gave no heed to the warning of Jeremiah so that in the end, the city of Jerusalem is besieged by the Babylonians and nothing was soon to be left.
[7:47] It was more or less desolate and destroyed. And Jeremiah himself now goes into exile.
[7:59] He goes into Egypt, as far as we know, where he died. But it is interesting that here we find that God is speaking to Jeremiah.
[8:19] And he's speaking to him as a God who made and who formed and who established the earth. The Lord reveals himself to Jeremiah as Yahweh, which is the special name for God.
[8:39] And that name reminds us of the covenant God. There are two primary names in Hebrew for God.
[8:51] There's Elchim, which means the powerful creator. And there's Jehovah or Yahweh, as the Jewish people pronounce it.
[9:02] And Yahweh is his personal covenant name. The name that he uses when he introduces himself to his friends, to those who know him, to those who are in covenant with him.
[9:20] So Elchim is the name by which all people knew of God. But Yahweh is his covenant name by which he revealed himself more intimately to his covenant people who know him.
[9:33] And here he, in that manner, reveals himself to Jeremiah. As we have there in verse 2.
[9:46] Thus says the Lord, or Yahweh, the maker thereof, the Lord that formed it to establish it. The Lord is his name. You'll notice how the word Lord is in capital to bring before us that.
[10:01] It is this covenant name of God, that it is Yahweh, that it is Jehovah, this name by which he makes himself known to those who are in covenant with him.
[10:19] And God here invites Jeremiah to call on him. And that if he did so, God promised to make known to him the unknowable things.
[10:34] First of all, God promised to reveal those things to Jeremiah if he called upon him. In other words, it was through prayer.
[10:56] And it shows us how important prayer is. And how much we lose because of the slackness of our prayer life.
[11:07] The prayer life of our Lord himself is a great example to us. A prayer life of the Lord Jesus, which was a part of his humiliation, wherein he became dependent upon the Father and the Spirit.
[11:28] And how he so often gave himself over to prayer. In Psalm 2, we sang this morning, where we find these words, Ask of me and for heritage, the heathen I'll make thine, and for possession I to thee will give us utmost line.
[11:50] Prayer is a necessary duty of the meditatorial office of Christ. How thankful one of his disciples who denied him, Peter, how thankful he must have been of these words, which Jesus said to him when he said, But I have prayed for thee that your faith fail not.
[12:15] The writer to the Hebrews writes and he says, That Jesus is able to save to the uttermost, because he ever lives to make intercession.
[12:30] And secondly, we are reminded that the knowledge of divine things are inaccessible, incomprehensible, out of reach for us.
[12:43] Unless God reveals them to us. Unless God reveals them to us.
[12:54] Call unto me, pray unto me, and I will answer thee and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not.
[13:05] And the greatest thing of all that the Lord has revealed to ourselves is that he has revealed his own mind to us in the plan of redemption.
[13:22] God loves to share the secret plan of redemption. We read in another of Paul's epistles, Having made known to us the mystery of his will, according to the good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth, even in him.
[13:53] It pleased God to reveal to us his mind in the plan of redemption.
[14:06] He has done so through the prophets, through the word. He has done so especially in the person of his son, Jesus Christ, who came to work out that plan of redemption that was in the mind of God.
[14:24] And to us this has been revealed, the mystery of God's will, that which he had purposed in himself, that in the fullness of time he might gather together in one all things in Christ.
[14:39] The greatest revelation of all was the victory of God over sin through the death and the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[14:51] Yet for many, sadly, this still remains experimentally hidden because to know it experimentally is to call upon him.
[15:06] We must call upon him for he has promised for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. However, here, God reveals to Jeremiah at least three great and unsearchable things that Jeremiah did not know and that he needed to know.
[15:28] The first was that God would destroy all his enemies. Now we must put ourselves in the shoes of Jeremiah.
[15:39] He knew how Judah was threatened by the superpower of Babylon.
[15:51] And he knew how the people were reacting to God's word and God's warning. And he knew that soon these people would come and would take over Judah.
[16:10] But here the Lord tells him that he would destroy all his enemies.
[16:20] He would destroy all his enemies. There were to be chaos and confusion that would lead to the fall of Jerusalem.
[16:36] Jerusalem, that great and beautiful city, was going to be destroyed because the people of Jerusalem had forsaken the Lord, the fountain of living waters.
[16:51] They had hewn out for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that could hold no water. But although they were going to be destroyed, yet the Lord here brings before Jeremiah that his end, that the enemies would eventually be destroyed and that the people would come back and be restored.
[17:21] That their captivity would be overturned. Even the strongest city cannot withstand the judgment of God.
[17:40] Jeremiah reminded that the wrath of God against sin is great and unsuchable. Paul says how unsuchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out.
[17:57] God reminds us that he will not tolerate sin. Just as he told Jeremiah that he would hide his face from the city because of all its wickedness.
[18:09] That he would hide his face from that beautiful city because of all its wickedness. So he will hide his face from all those who persist in doing wickedness down to the very end of the age.
[18:24] Because every sin must be judged and there are only two things that you can do with your sin. And one is to lay hold on to them until the day of judgment when you will suffer punishment for them yourself.
[18:38] And that is what the inhabitants of Jerusalem did. They refused to change their ways. They refused refused to repent.
[18:50] And so God judged them. God brought them into captivity. And Jeremiah is reminded of these things.
[19:04] However, it is revealed also to Jeremiah that there is pardon for sin.
[19:18] It is here in verse 8 and he says, and I will cleanse them from all their iniquity whereby they have sinned against me. And I will pardon all their iniquities whereby they have sinned and whereby they have transgressed against me.
[19:37] If it was revealed to him that sin must be judged, it was also revealed to him that the enemy will be eventually destroyed, it is also revealed to him that with Lord there is pardon.
[19:56] God will cleanse his people from all their sin. And here Jeremiah uses three different words to define what sin is.
[20:09] He says iniquity and that refers to something that is twisted or bent. And here where we have the words Alderson, well in the Hebrew it's a word that means missing the mark, missing the mark.
[20:27] Then there is the word transgression which is rebellion. So sin is all these things. It is a twisting and bending of the person that God created upright.
[20:40] It is a missing of the mark of God's standard and it is active rebellion against God. And Jeremiah throughout the book brings before the people of Jerusalem the sins that they have committed against the Lord and for which they refuse to repent.
[21:04] There is a forsaking of God. There is a worshipping of idols, the ignoring of the prophets. There is the oppression of the poor, the breaking of the Sabbath day and many more.
[21:23] And here then in these words brought before us where he says and I will cleanse them from all their iniquity whereby they have sinned against me. And I will pardon all their iniquities whereby they have sinned and whereby they have transgressed against me.
[21:39] And it shall be to me a name of joy, a praise and an honour before all the nations of the earth. We shall hear all the good that I do unto them and they shall fear and tremble for all the goodness, for all the prosperity that I procure unto and so on.
[21:56] What this shows us is how insurgable, how great is the grace of God that offers pardon and forgiveness. Here was a nation and a city that was bent towards iniquity and transgression and sin who ignored God, who worshipped idols and yet here is the Lord and he is promising them that he will pardon all their iniquity, all their sin.
[22:37] How great and unsurgable is the grace of God that offers pardon and forgiveness to me and you today. For we have all sinned, we have all done iniquity, we have all sinned, we have all transgressed against the Lord and yet today he is offering us pardon and forgiveness.
[23:03] How great was God's grace to devise a plan that would give forgiveness for such gross sins. And for the individual he sees the greatness of God's grace that devised a plan that would give forgiveness forgiveness for such as he was.
[23:23] And so we find in the New Testament the Apostle Paul who was so overwhelmed with the fact that grace came into the life of a person who was the chief of sinners.
[23:40] We may feel to be but there was only one person who was the chief of sinners and the Bible never lies and the Bible calls him the chief of sinners.
[23:56] The Apostle Paul and yet he found grace, he found pardon, he found forgiveness and if the chief of sinners found grace, found pardon, found forgiveness, then surely, surely that is something that encourages us to call sinners to repentance and to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
[24:31] If the chief of sinners found such, why not you? Why not you? The one who says, come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord, though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.
[24:55] The prophet Micah cries out, who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage, he retaineth not his anger for ever because he delighteth in mercy, he will turn again, he will have compassion upon us, he will subdue our iniquities and thou will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
[25:21] Thou will perform the truth to Jacob and the mercy to Abraham which thou was sworn into our fathers from the days of old. And of course as we come towards the end of this chapter, who do you find at the end of the chapter?
[25:41] There is one person that you find at the end of the chapter and that person is Christ. Christ is brought before us.
[25:53] What does it say? David shall never want a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel, neither shall the priest the Levites want a man before me to offer burnt offerings and to kindle meat offerings and to do sacrifice continually.
[26:10] Why? Because he says the days come that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the house of Israel and to the house of Judah.
[26:22] In those days and at that time will I cause a branch of righteousness to grow up unto David and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land.
[26:33] Those days shall Judah be saved and Jerusalem shall dwell safely and this is a name wherewith she shall be called the Lord our righteousness promising the time and the days of Jesus Christ and at the centre of God's unsearchable plan for the pardon and forgiveness of sin is this person Jesus Christ and especially the cross of Jesus Christ when Jesus was crucified in Golgotha when the blood dripped from his body in that blood that is through his death there is a cleansing from all sin Jesus Christ became the sin offering he who knew no sin became sin for us the hymn writer says there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from
[27:37] Emmanuel's veins and sinners plenched beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains the blood of Jesus Christ cleansed us from all sin in him we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sin and what is required of me and you to come to the cross and to identify ourselves with Jesus by faith by trusting and committing ourselves to him for all those who will do that Jesus has accepted the punishment that their sins deserve so that they won't have to bear that punishment themselves he has become the substitute for his people and God cannot demand punishment twice remember that
[28:39] God will judge sin his justice will be honoured one way or another in yourself or in the one that he has provided his son as the substitute and so here then is the prophet and the third great and unsurgeable thing that God revealed to Jeremiah was a peace that endures a peace that endures God God promised to restore and to renew and to rebuild Jerusalem he he has promised to give his people peace as well as pardon and more than a century after this prophet died
[29:45] Nehemiah surveyed the ruins of Jerusalem and the book that bears his name shows how the city was rebuilt gate by gate stone by stone for God had brought his people back from captivity and built them up as before just as he had promised but there was to be a greater restoration than just simply the coming back from captivity and that awaited the days of Jesus Christ as the end of the chapter brings before us Zechariah speaks of Zerubbabel a man by the name of Zerubbabel and he says this is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel saying not by might nor by power but by my spirit saith the
[30:52] Lord of hosts who art thou O great mountain before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain and he shall bring forth the head stone thereof with shout and crying grace grace unto it there was of course speaking of the rebuilding of Jerusalem rebuilding of the temple the man who was appointed Zerubbabel that he would bring the head stone and that he would be shouting grace grace unto it well that is so true regarding not only the captivity and the restoration out of captivity and the rebuilding of Jerusalem but by a greater and a much greater way is it true regarding the sinner whose sins have been cleansed who has been restored again into fellowship and communion with
[31:57] God he is the person or she is the person who can truly cry out grace grace unto it because it is all of grace the great plan of God's redemption by grace deserves the highest the highest praise of all may may the Lord bless unto us our thoughts let us pray