INDIFFERENCE TO DIVINE APPEALS
‘Ye have not inclined your ear.’
There can be no more convincing proof of the power of sin to harden the heart than the indifference with which multitudes have always received the declarations of Divine wisdom and the appeals of Divine love. It was so in the remote days of Jeremiah, and it is so now.
I. The disobedience of Israel appeared aggravated when compared with the loyal obedience of the Rechabites.—These persons, constituting a sort of sect, were quoted by the prophet as an illustration of filial reverence and loyalty. They scrupulously kept the ordinances they had received from their forefather. Yet Israel was regardless of the voice of God!
II. The disobedience of Israel was shown by their contempt of God’s messengers, the prophets.—There is something very condescendingly human and touching in the representation of the Eternal as rising early, in His solicitude for the salvation of His people, and sending messenger after messenger to instruct and admonish them. Let it be remembered by the hearers of the Gospel, that He Who spake in times past by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son!
III. By their defiance of God’s just and asserted authority.—He spoke to Israel, and He speaks to us, as one Who has a right to reverent attention and cheerful obedience.
IV. By their disregard of God’s gracious promises.—His language was not simply language of authority and command, it was language of gracious assurance and promise. The guilt is aggravated, and the condemnation is the sorer, in the case of those who resist the mercy and despise the promises of heaven.