No hope, no hope! That was the peculiar burden of Jeremiah, that was the vision forced upon him, the message he was constrained to deliver, while the people and their leaders were nursing the assurance that all was going well, that a work was being prosecuted which would secure salvation.
I. Few things are more unpalatable and painful, than to feel it incumbent on you to say to any for whom you entertain sentiments of friendship and affection, what is calculated to damp and dishearten; to spoil the dreams of those who are dreaming pleasantly, deliciously; to destroy or disturb fond hopes: than to feel it incumbent upon you, instead of sympathising with the joy of such hopes as you fain would, were it possible to shake your head and contradict them. Comforting and comfortable as the dream may be, the sleeper, in his own best interests, must, if possible, be roused, since the dream is beguiling him perchance to courses that are wrong, and is misshaping and impairing him for what is at hand.
II. By how many has the cry of Jeremiah been breathed inwardly, with sorrow and bitterness, concerning themselves, as they have stood contemplating what they have and what they are, after seasons in their history seasons that had enfolded golden opportunity, or shone bright with promise. Who is there beyond the boundaries of youth at all, who has not had his seasons of promise, that have left him sighing forlornly over broken hopes? Infinite in this respect is the pathos of human life, crying dumbly evermore for the infinite pity of God. And yet may we not believe, do we not feel to our solace, that at the least, something has always been reaped? reaped for sowing, albeit with tears, in fields beyond; nay, that even in the more lowly and penitent sense of shortcoming, which seems perhaps almost all that has been gained, we shall be carrying away with us from hence, a gathered seed grain, to be for fruit perchance for the fruit we have hitherto missed, behind the veil.
S. A. Tipple, Sunday Mornings at Upper Norwood,p. 39.
References: Jeremiah 8:20. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xxvi., No. 1562; Ibid., Evening by Evening,p. 368; A. F. Barfield, Christian World Pulpit,vol. iv., p. 363; R. L. Browne, Sussex Sermons,p. 113; R. Storrs, Homiletic Magazine,vol. ix., p. 315.