Jeremiah 3:6-4:4 “Repentance, Not Pretense”

1:07Whether getting through security or stealing top-secret information, the masks are very important. And the mask reveals in the movie themselves, where the spies dramatically peel off the mask and show their true identity, are some of the most memorable scenes in the movies. Now, depending on who you're trying to fool, A mask may be a great thing. Wearing a mask in front of your enemies may save your life. But wearing a mask in front of God may cost you eternal life.

1:47So far in Jeremiah, we've seen God's people had been committing idolatry for centuries, worshiping other gods and turning to other nations for protection. Israel, the northern kingdom, did this until, as we see in verse 8 here, God sent them away with a decree of divorce. For a time, it looked like the southern kingdom, Judah, had learned a lesson from watching Israel's decline and fall. And under King Hezekiah, a great king, the nation enjoyed a brief period of religious reform and prosperity. But right after his reign, the most wicked king in Judah's history, Manasseh, took over for half a century, and the country slid right back into gross sin, just when it looked like people were finally returning back to the Lord.

2:43And so we see in the scriptures that when Josiah became king, there was another brief revival. But the problem in King Josiah's reign is that people were pretending to do differently on the outside while their hearts remained unchanged. On the outside, they worship the God of Israel, going to the temple and saying the right words and making the right sacrifices, but on the inside, in their hearts, they had not learned any lessons from Israel's punishment, and they continued to worship false gods in their hearts.

3:19Verse 10 brings this to light. Take a look there. It says, Yet for all this, all that happened to Israel, all of God's punishment to them, yet for all this, her treacherous sister Judah did not return to me with her whole heart, but in pretense, declares the Lord. Pretense. This word means something like deception or falsehood. It refers to hypocrisy, to pretending to be someone you're not. Pretense is wearing a mask. And by wearing a mask, you might fool your enemies, but you can't fool God because he knows our hearts. And God knew that no matter what it looked like on the outside, Judah did not return to me with her whole heart, but in pretense, declares the Lord.

4:19In other words, they did not truly repent of their sins. And so, friends, God calls everyone, you and me and the people in Jeremiah's day, everyone. Everyone who hears the word of the Lord through Jeremiah to learn from Israel's sin and punishment. God uses this one word, shuv, in Hebrew, 15 times in this passage. That word means something like to turn or to return or to repent. 15 times that word is used in this passage. We are being called to turn or to return, to repent, and to go back to the Lord. And those who repent must turn or return to God, not in pretense, but in true repentance, which is going to be defined and illustrated in the passage today.

5:14What we're going to learn this morning is that God receives and heals every person who truly repents. So let's pick up now on verse 11 of chapter 3. And the Lord said to me, Faithless Israel has shown herself more righteous than treacherous Judah. Go and proclaim these words toward the north and say, Return, faithless Israel, declares the Lord. I will not look on you in anger, for I am merciful, declares the Lord. I will not be angry forever. Only acknowledge your guilt, that you rebelled against the Lord your God, and Scattered your favors among foreigners under every green tree, and that you have not obeyed my voice, declares the Lord. Return, O faithless children, declares the Lord, for I am your master. I will take you, one from a city and two from a family, and I will bring you to Zion.

6:24Right off the bat, God provokes the people of Judah with the statement, Faithless Israel has shown herself more righteous than treacherous Judah. Now, those words could have gotten Jeremiah killed in Jerusalem. The people of the southern kingdom knew that they weren't perfect. That's not the issue here. But to say that they were worse than Israel, to say that they were worse than the people of the northern kingdom, whose idolatry and open disregard for the law of God was well known, that would have offended every single person in Jerusalem who heard Jeremiah's words.

7:08And yet, that is exactly what God says. Because you see, at this point, some Israelites, some people who were carried away captive by Assyria into exile, some of those Israelites were ready to listen. They were sorry for what they had done. They were ready to repent, ready to acknowledge their guilt, ready to return. To God, but not most people in Judah. Most people in Judah were still pretending, they were still wearing a mask. So, God commands Jeremiah to proclaim toward the north that is the land to which Israel had been carried away captive, and to call them to return. God says something remarkable through Jeremiah to those people. He says, He will not look on them in anger, he will not be angry forever because he is merciful.

8:06Have you ever thought about that? God says, For I am merciful. In the law, God says that He is merciful and gracious, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. The Bible says, God is love. The Bible never says, God is anger. Now, don't misunderstand me. God gets angry. Make no mistake about it. God is very angry at sin, at rebellion, at disobedience of every kind. You can read nearly any part of the Bible and come to that correct conclusion very quickly.

8:55But you see, anger isn't part of God's character. It's not who he is. It is a response to our sin. The reason that God won't be angry forever is because that's not who he is. He is merciful. So the question is: how do people receive that mercy? Take a look again at verse 13 and look at what God says. Only acknowledge your guilt that you rebelled against the Lord your God. How do you receive God's mercy?

9:42Only acknowledge your guilt that you rebelled against the Lord your God. Could it be more simple than that? But, friends, we all know that the simplest things in life aren't always easy. Think about times where you have sinned against your husband or your wife, your roommate, your coworker. You know that you're in the wrong. What do you need to do to be reconciled? Only acknowledge your guilt. That's the only thing you have to do. The only thing you have to do in that situation is go to your wife, go to your husband, go to your roommate. To your co-worker and say, I'm sorry. I was wrong. Please forgive me.

10:39That is all you have to do. It could not be more simple. But in those moments, our pride makes those simplest words the hardest thing to say. Our pride raises up, and we don't want to humble ourselves. We don't want to acknowledge that we need forgiveness because of our words or actions. So we know exactly what this is like. All Israel had to do was to acknowledge their guilt, their rebellion, and their disobedience, and then return to the Lord. Because, look at verse 14, because I am your master.

11:20Now, there's a play on words here that's lost in our English translations, but this word master is Baalti. It means master or husband. And it comes from the root word Baal, which looks and sounds just like the word Baal, which is the false God that many of the Israelites have been serving for hundreds and hundreds of years. And so, what God is doing is he's extending an invitation to leave Baal, this false God, this false master that they've been serving, and return to him, their Baalty, their true master, their. True husband. That's the invitation that's being extended. God says that he is going to save one from a city and two from a family and bring them to Zion, the city of God.

12:15One from a city, two from a family, bring them to Zion. I want you to notice that not all of Israel is going to be saved. Just one from a city and two from a family. Not all of Israel is going to be saved because not all of Israel is going to repent. Not all of Israel is going to turn. But the ones that do will prove that they are true Israelites. Look on the screen at how Paul talks about this in Romans chapter 9.

12:51For not all who descended from Israel belong to Israel. Look what John says in 1 John chapter 2. They went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us. See, friends, the scriptures are very clear. We are not saved by birth or by marriage. Or by baptism, or by becoming members of a church. We are not saved by any of those things. God has always saved his people by grace alone, through faith alone.

13:47And those who belong to God show it by turning to him in faith and by walking in repentance. Those who do not do those things, turning to God and walking by faith, if you don't do those things, you don't belong to God, no matter what you say. So I want you to look at God's promise for those who do return to him. Look at verse 15. And I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding. And when you have multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, declares the Lord, they shall no more say, the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord. It shall not come to mind, or be remembered, or missed. It shall not be made again. At that time, Jerusalem shall be called the throne of the Lord, and all nations shall gather to it, to the presence of the Lord in Jerusalem, and they shall no more stubbornly follow their own evil heart.

15:00In those days, the house of Judah shall join the house of Israel, and together they shall come from the land of the north to the land that I gave your fathers for a heritage. When Israel returns, God promises that He's going to give them good shepherds, good rulers, good leaders, good priests, good prophets, who are going to teach them the truth and model for them the truth, which is unlike anything they have currently. Israel is then going to multiply and be fruitful in the land. And here's the most shocking thing in this section: in that day, nobody is going to ask about the Ark of the Covenant. If you're familiar with the Old Testament, you know the Ark of the Covenant, or if you've seen Indiana Jones, the Ark of the Covenant is that little wooden box that the priests carried that sits in the most holy place. Inside are the two tablets with the Ten Commandments, a jar of manna, and Aaron's staff that had budded.

16:13The Ark of the Covenant sat in the most holy place, and the people of Israel referred to it as the throne of the Lord, because that is where God met with the people of Israel. And what God says is that nobody is going to ask about it anymore when the people come back. To Zion, to the city of God. It's not going to be remembered. It's not going to be missed. Those things are unthinkable. How could that be the case?

16:41Well, it's because God is going to be there in Jerusalem, sitting on the throne, and his people are going to come and worship him and not stubbornly follow their own evil hearts. Church, this is a picture of what God is going to do for his people in the new heavens and the new earth. It's almost the exact language that we find in Revelation chapter 21. Take a look at the screen. John says, Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

17:49What a beautiful reality. All of God's people gathered together to worship him in his presence without any evil. Because Jesus defeated sin and death, and through his Holy Spirit has made us into new creations who worship him not in pretense, not with a mask, but in spirit and in truth. Praise God. So, to this point, we've seen that all people who repent, who acknowledge their guilt and rebellion and disobedience, and who return to the Lord are going to be received by God. He's going to give them good shepherds to lead them, and they're going to enjoy worshiping Him in the new Jerusalem, in His presence, and no longer follow the evil of their stubborn hearts. But the question is: what does this repentance look like in action?

18:49What does it sound like? What does it look like to repent? And what God gives us in the next section is this back-and-forth conversation between Himself and the people of Israel that gives us a true picture of what repentance looks like. So, let's pick up here in verse 19. This is God speaking. I said, How I would set you among my sons and give you a pleasant land, a heritage most beautiful of all nations. And I thought you would call me my Father. Father, and would not turn from following me. Surely, as a treacherous wife leaves her husband, so have you been treacherous to me, O house of Israel, declares the Lord.

19:46Now, up to this point, if you've been with us to this point in the series, you know that God has been using the imagery of marriage to talk about his relationship with his people, Israel. And we see that he employs that language again here as he mourns Israel's treacherous behavior. Now, that word treacherous means they were unfaithful, they were living deceitfully, they were wearing a mask and pretending the entire time to worship him and him alone, when in fact, the whole time they had turned their backs on him and they were worshiping other gods. They were committing spiritual adultery.

20:25But, friends, in spite of their disobedience, God displays an unfailing love toward them. The unfailing love of a faithful husband toward an unfaithful and wayward wife. But you notice here in verse 19 that the imagery changes. And God begins to speak of his love toward his people as the love of a faithful father toward a wayward child. And this passage might remind you of the parable of the prodigal son. If you've never read that parable, there is this wealthy dad who has a couple of sons. And what's implied in the parable and what the father states explicitly to the older son at the end of the parable is that everything that he owns, all of his stuff, he would have shared any of it and all of it with both of his boys. It was theirs for the asking.

21:28Nevertheless, the younger of the two brothers demands his share of the inheritance before the father died, which was a real slap in the face, and then he moved away, ran off to a faraway land so he could live however he pleased, no doubt breaking his father's heart. So, how is Israel going to respond to the father's broken-hearted lament here in Jeremiah that we just saw in verses 19 and 20? Look at verse 21. A voice on the bare heights is heard, the weeping and pleading of Israel's sons, because they have perverted their way. They have forgotten the Lord their God.

22:21Jeremiah envisions a lone voice on a bare hill. Somewhere in the far north, weeping over the sin of forgetting God and deserting Him for a life of idolatry that failed. As with Israel, life for the younger brother seemed pretty good for a time after he took his share of the inheritance and left his father's house. Flush with his dad's cash, he had plenty of money to spend on anything he wanted because money buys stuff and pleasures and experiences and friends.

23:08But eventually, in the parable, a famine hits and his money runs out. The younger brother is forced to feed pigs, and he gets so hungry that there comes a day that he dreams about eating the pods that the pigs ate. I just want you to imagine him all alone in a foreign country, trying to hide his tears and his fear and his shame. And meanwhile, his dad is back home, straining and watching the horizon, just hoping that his son would come back today.

24:00Look at verse 22. God says, Return, O faithless sons. I will heal your faithlessness. I want you to let that promise sink in deeply. God does not say, Return, O faithless sons, I will forgive your faithlessness. He says, Return, faithless sons, I will heal your faithlessness. You see, God's forgiveness is wonderful. We need it because we have sinned against Him already in our lives 10 million times. We need God's forgiveness. But, friends, we need more than forgiveness. We need healing. And we need healing because what drives our sinful thoughts and our sinful words and our sinful actions is sinful hearts.

25:12The heart, as Jeremiah is going to say later on in chapter 17, is desperately sick. We need more than forgiveness. We need healing for our sick hearts. Because sin is not. Caused by bad examples. Sin is caused by sinful hearts, sick, sinful hearts that are in need of healing. So God is calling out to Israel and to all people to return to Him, offering not just forgiveness, but the healing that is necessary if real reconciliation is going to take place.

25:59At his lowest point, the younger brother finally comes to his senses and he realizes that the hired hands that worked for his dad had a better life than he did. And he believed that his father would have mercy on him and hire him. He would just have to make it clear that he was genuinely sorry for what he had done. Look again at verse 22. The people of Israel say, Behold, we come to you, for you are the Lord our God.

26:44Truly, the hills are a delusion, the orgies on the mountains. Truly, and the Lord our God is the salvation of Israel. But from our youth, the shameful thing has. Devoured all for which our fathers labored, their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters. Let us lie down in our shame and let our dishonor cover us. For we have sinned against the Lord our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even to this day, and we have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God.

27:32The Israelites return to the Lord repentant. They confess that the hills where they worship those foreign gods are all a delusion and that salvation is only found in him. They confess, if you look there again, verse 24, the shameful thing has devoured everything. The prophets often referred to the false God Baal as Habosheth, the shame. And the shame did devour everything. Because that is what false gods do. Baal and Ashtrath and Molech, they demanded abundant animal sacrifice, their flocks and their herds.

28:30Many of them demanded child sacrifice, their sons and their daughters, in exchange for empty promises of prosperity and protection. And now Israel, conquered and exiled into Assyria, is drowning in shame as they realize that they have sacrificed everything: their land, their animals, even their kids, to false gods who did not help them because they are not real. They're a delusion. I want you to think about everything that people sacrifice today to get ahead in their career, to gain recognition or to win awards, to earn more money, to buy more stuff or have more experiences.

29:39And then they sit there as older men and women who have no relationship with God and a failed marriage and kids they barely even know. And all they can do is weep and say, from our youth, the shame. Shameful thing has devoured all because that is exactly what false gods do. Whether it's Baal or Ashtreth or Molech or money or sex or power, all false gods devour everything and leave you nothing of eternal value to show for it.

30:27The Israelites confess that they have sinned and they've not obeyed the voice of the Lord. And the younger brother was prepared to go to his father and say, Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Let's pick up in chapter 4, verse 1. If you return, O Israel, declares the Lord, to me you should return. If you remove your detestable things from my presence and do not waver, and if you swear, as the Lord lives in truth, in justice, and in righteousness, then nations shall bless themselves in him, and in him shall they glory.

31:17So, friends, here God outlines what true repentance actually looks like. Feeling sorry for your sin, acknowledging your sin and your guilt and your disobedience. To start there, but it cannot stop there. True repentance is demonstrated when we remove the idols from our hearts and lives, the detestable things from my presence, as God says here, and we don't waver. That is not to say that we never sin again. That's not possible. But we never waver in our commitment to rid our lives of idols and to serve the Lord, our true husband, our true master, with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. That is true repentance.

32:14True repentance is demonstrated when our lives are characterized by a commitment to truth, justice, and righteousness, as we seek to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. We cannot claim to love God, John says, if we do not love our neighbors. True repentance is not merely feeling sorry that you sinned. It's not feeling sorry that you got caught. It's not feeling sorry that you now have to deal with the consequences of your sin. No, true repentance is a gift from God that starts in the heart and results in a radically changed life.

33:00So, if we are turning or returning to God, our repentance will be evident in the way that we're living our lives, rooting out the idols and loving our neighbor with action and not with talk. When the younger brother got back home, his dad, who had been waiting for him and scanning the horizon every single day, ran out to meet him. And the younger brother wasn't just going to offer some words. He wasn't just going to say, I'm sorry, thinking that he'd just get his old room back.

33:39No, he was prepared to walk in repentance. He was ready to become a servant in his father's own house. But his dad kissed him and told the servants to bring the best robe and a ring for his finger and shoes for his feet. And he killed the fattened calf because he said, This son of mine that was lost is now found. He's come home. One can only imagine what a son in his position must be feeling.

34:22What kind of love is this? What kind of mercy and grace? The parable is designed. To show the love of the Father, the love that we see here in the book of Jeremiah, a love that calls out to every lost son and daughter, promising not just to forgive but to heal our unfaithfulness. Friends, that is the beautiful news of the gospel. Like the younger brother, we have made demands of God and then turned our backs on him. And we have gone off to live the life that we thought was best.

35:03Even if we wanted to return to God, there is no reason that he should receive us back. But because of his great love, he sent his only begotten son, Jesus, to live his life as a perfectly obedient son who never committed sin, never disobeyed his father, and honored him every day of his life. He took the punishment that we deserve for our sin, dying in our place, so that through faith in him, God could receive us back.

35:43That message is so beautiful that the late Tim Keller said, even if you don't think it's true, you should want it to be true. Because it's a message that captures the hope of every human heart. And that hope is to be reconciled to the God who made us and loves us. So it's no wonder that such a beautiful message draws people from every tribe and tongue and nation. Look again at verse 2, the end of verse 2 there. It says that when God's people return in true repentance and are received by him, then nations shall bless themselves in him, and in him shall they glory. Friends, one thing that is absolutely clear in the entire Bible is that God's people are meant to be a city on a hill, a light shining in the darkness that draws all people to come and worship and serve the one true God. That is what God said when he chose Abram, a man who was a pagan who did not know God. He said he would make him into a great nation and that all nations would be blessed through him.

37:03That is what Jesus says to us in the Great Commission to go and make disciples of all nations so that every person can know the blessing that comes from knowing and serving the one true God as Lord. Our salvation was never only about us. It was never only about our church. It was certainly never only about the American church. Which did not exist for 1,500 years after Jesus was risen. Our salvation has always been about drawing people from every tribe, tongue, and nation to worship the one true God.

37:45Let's finish up with these last two verses, three and four. For thus says the Lord to the men of Judah and Jerusalem: Break up your fallow ground and sow not among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to the Lord. Remove the foreskin of your hearts, O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, lest my wrath go forth like fire and burn with none to quench it, because of the evil of your deeds. You see, when Jeremiah speaks these words, it is not too late for the people of Judah. It's not too late to repent and return before God brings disaster. They needed to begin with breaking up the fallow ground, that is, their hard hearts, that the seed of God's word was not able to penetrate because of the hardness. And even if God's word was penetrating the hardness of their heart, the thorns of the world were choking it out.

38:49So they need to break up that ground. And then, switching analogies, they needed to circumcise their hearts and not their bodies. Because, again, as we've Earlier, the problem is not what they're doing on the outside. The problem is what's going on inside of them. The problem is their hearts. Look what Paul writes in Romans 2: For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. But a Jew is one inwardly. And circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man, but from God.

39:35That message is what the Jews in Paul's day needed to hear. And that message is what the Jews in Jeremiah's day needed to hear as well. They needed to stop believing that because they were descendants of Abraham, because they were circumcised, because they had the law, because they had the temple and the Ark of the Covenant, that they would just enjoy the favor and blessing of God forever. No, that's not right. If they did not take God's message to heart and repent and return to Him in truth, not in pretense, His anger was going to burn with no one to quench it. That is the message that so many needed to hear.

40:21And perhaps it's the very message that you need to hear this morning as well. In Jeremiah's day, people were very religious. Atheism and secularism were definitely not the problem. Their problem was hearts that were deceived into thinking that God could not be trusted to protect and provide for them. So they turned to false idols instead. But what did those false idols do? They devoured everything: their land, their animals, their children. Because that is what false idols do.

41:04But not Jesus. Look at what he says in John chapter 10. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

41:43False gods demand sacrifices. But Jesus sacrificed himself for us. He died in our place, absorbing the wrath of God that we deserve for our evil deeds. And he Rose again on the third day to keep the promise that he made to us, the promise of eternal, abundant life. And so, friends, if every idol that you have ever served has only made empty promises and taken everything that you have and left you in your shame, come to Jesus this morning.

42:30Only acknowledge your guilt that you have rebelled against the Lord. Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord. Believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, and you will be saved. Come to him today, not in pretense, but in true repentance, and God promises to receive you and to heal you. Let's pray, Father, this is a lesson that it seems that we need to learn over and over again in our lives. That false gods only make empty promises.

43:36They take everything we have and they leave us in our shame. I pray this morning that by the power of your Spirit, we would turn to Jesus Christ, whether for the first time or for the millionth time, knowing and believing that He is the only one who can truly protect and provide for us. Father, all of us need healing from you. We need you to heal our faithlessness. We cannot heal ourselves. And so today we come again to the great physician, knowing and believing that you alone do receive us and you will heal us.

44:33In Christ's name we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening to the sermon audio from New Life Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. For more information or to support our ministry, visit us online at newlifecs.net.