The Peril of False Security

MEMORY SELECTION: “For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of My people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.” —Jeremiah 8:11

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: Jeremiah 26:1-6, 10-15

THE setting of our lesson is the evil rule of King Jehoiakim. Jeremiah, under the Lord’s guidance, foretold the coming destruction of the city of Jerusalem and the Temple. The effect of his prophecy should have led the people to self-examination, prayer, fasting, and a full return to God. But according to Jeremiah’s account the people and their leaders were deaf to the message. It was a time of great moral delinquency, with a prevalence of dishonesty, slander, murder, false swearing, and open licentiousness.

The priests led the people in an angry attack upon the prophet. He was arrested and charged with speaking evil of his city in declaring its forth-coming destruction. It is interesting to note that it was the priests and the false prophets who on this occasion called for the death of the true prophet. In defending himself against the false priests and prophets, Jeremiah said, “The Lord sent me to prophesy against this house and against this city all the words that ye have heard. Therefore now amend your ways and your doings, and obey the voice of the Lord your God; and the Lord will repent him of the evil that he hath pronounced against you. As for me, behold, I am in your hand: do with me as seemeth good and meet unto you.”—Jer. 26:12-14

Even though Jeremiah’s life was threatened, without any hesitation and with courage he proclaimed the message that the Lord had given him. This is the kind of love, determination, faith, and loyalty required by the Lord of all those who would serve him, both then and now. The Apostle Paul, in Hebrews 11:37-40, summarizes some of the very difficult situations under which the faithful ones of old were steadfast, faithful, and obedient: “They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; (of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth. And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.”

The text states that all these faithful servants of the Lord in the past received a good report through faith because they demonstrated their faith under very difficult and trying circumstances. They were required in some instances literally to forfeit their lives in the Lord’s service. But because they proved their love and faithfulness, the Lord has promised them a “better” resurrection. They looked for a city that hath foundations, whose Builder and Maker is God.

The Apostle Paul, in the subsequent chapter, Hebrews 12:1,2, holds forth these faithful men of old as examples to the footstep followers of Jesus during the Gospel Age, Jesus himself, the firstfruit of the new age, being our chief example. The Apostle Peter stated: “For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to Him that judgeth righteously: who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.”—I Pet. 2:21-24

When Jesus sent his twelve disciples forth into Israel to preach the message that the kingdom of heaven was at hand, he prepared them for the opposition they would receive. His warnings were, in part, that they would be delivered up to the councils, that they would be scourged in the synagogues, and that they would be brought before governors and kings for his sake. This was the same kind of opposition that was experienced by the faithful servants of old and was subsequently experienced by Jesus and was now to be experienced by his disciples and the footstep followers of Jesus down through the Gospel Age—all of this for the purpose of trying, testing, and developing those who aspire to be associated with Jesus in the beneficent work of the kingdom.

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