_It may be._ IT MAY BE I. This word shows us the heart of God. Displeased because of sin, but longing to show mercy to the sinner. All His counsels and warnings, promises and threatenings, are for good (Deuteronomy 5:29; Deuteronomy 32:44; Isaiah 1:18; Jeremiah 8:7; Ezekiel 12:3; Ezekiel 18:31; Hos... [ Continue Reading ]
_I am shut up._ JEREMIAH IN PRISON 1. Jeremiah’s age was one of great political troubles. 2. It was also an age of signal religious privileges. 3. It was an age of great moral corruption. I. His imprisonment suggests the sad moral character of his age. The prisons of an age are often criteria b... [ Continue Reading ]
_The fasting-day._ SYMBOLISM OF A FAST I. It exhibits the duty of a wise self-restraint or self-denial, in receiving the good gifts of heaven. What could more exactly typify this than the temporary withdrawing from innocent pleasure, and even from the proper nourishment of the frame? It is temporar... [ Continue Reading ]
_He cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the fire that was on the hearth until an the ton was consumed in the fire that was on the hearth _ THE BURNT ROLL I. The incidents connected with the text. II. A few observations upon them. 1. The piety of the parent is no assured guarantee for the r... [ Continue Reading ]
_Yet they were not afraid._ THE HARDENING POWER OF SIN Is it conceivable that men who believed Jeremiah to be a prophet of God should despise his words? Is it credible that, after preaching for twenty years, those who listened to him should think him a prophet, and yet throw his sermons in the fire... [ Continue Reading ]
_But the Lord hid him._ HIDDEN, BUT RADIANT “The Lord hid him.” What that precisely means it is impossible to say: Was there a John of Gaunt for this Wycliff, an Elector of Saxony for this Luther? Did Ahikam, who had before interposed on his behalf, or his sons--Gemariah, who lent Jeremiah his room... [ Continue Reading ]
_Take thee again another roll, and write in it all the former words._ THE WORD OF GOD CANNOT BE BURNT I. The Word of God is imperishable. The truth is not pen and ink, parchment and words, but a force of an unchangeable character. It borrows material forms for garments, and uses outward methods for... [ Continue Reading ]