Marking Iniquity

General James Green, Aug. 22, 2011

TODAY’S TEXT IS FOUND IN Jeremiah 2:22 — “For though thou wash thee with nitre, and take thee much soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before Me, saith the Lord God.” One minister from the Midwest sent me the following comment about our text:

     “It is possible for spiritual filth and defilement to so contaminate a social that nothing can be done about it!” He went on to say, “Israel was in such a condition!” This minister referred back to 2:17 where it says, “…thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, when He led thee by the way.” One translation says, “Have you not brought this upon yourself by forsaking the LORD God, when He led you in the way?”

I Believe

I personally believe that the Church is in this very condition today!! God led Israel out of Egypt’s bondage, breaking the yoke of severe servitude from off their necks, and as Jeremiah 2:20 says, “…and thou saidst, I will not transgress.” But in the same sentence the LORD reminds them that “…upon every high hill and under every green tree thou wanderest, playing the harlot.” Verse 21 gets even more graphic, “yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into a degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me?”

Today’s Church: A Strange Vine

Because of what whorish Israel did, God's judgment would come upon them. You see, God will bring judgments eventually. Don’t you feel that today’s Church has provoked God?

     Verse 19 tells us, “Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee…”

     Today’s Church is so backslid that she really thinks that God approves her adultery and idolatry!! Today’s leadership is so “strange” that they know nothing of the true ways of the Living God.

     The Prophet Jeremiah’s analysis of Israel’s rebellion was adultery and idolatry plus apostasy.

Judgments Due!!!

YES! Today's Church deserves God's judgments because, as Jeremiah said of Israel, “For my people have committed two evils; they have FORSAKEN me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water” (2:13). Has not today’s Church done this very thing? Oh, yes, she has!!—creating a man-centered Church, not a Christ-centered Church…creating an evil, degenerate plant that produces evil and corrupt fruit.

Iniquity marked!

Yes, dear readers, today’s Church is marked by God. Jeremiah 17:1 said of Israel, “The sin of Judah is written with a pen of diamond: it is graven upon the table of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars.”

     Jeremiah was obviously using a figure of speech we call “hyperbole”, that is, exaggeration for effect.

     “Marked iniquities” no doubt speaks of a situation that is unalterable (read what David said in Ps. 130:3).

     When Sodom and Gomorrah’s (known for their vile sex sins) sin came up before God, He said, “I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry against it that has come to me…” (Gen. 18:21). And, my dear professing Christian Church, have you not allowed, yea, even invited, vile practicing sodomites (male homosexuals and female lesbians and others) into your midst? Have you not disobeyed God's Holy Word in doing this? YES, YES, YES!!

Sins Monumental

Sodom and Gomorrah have nothing over on today’s Church; in fact, every sin named in the Bible can be found in today’s Church…monumental in the first degree. And this sin-stained Church thinks they will just waltz right into the glories of heaven. How utterly deceived!!!

Have We Come To This?

“As for you (Jeremiah), do not pray for this people, or lift up cry or prayer for them (Israel), and do not intercede with Me, for I do not hear you” (Jer. 7:16).

     The Church in this hour and generation thinks she can go on committing her gross sins and all will be well with her. FOOLISHNESS!! (Amos 7:2, 5 states the same thing also).

Rebellion Leads to Punishment

This is true of every generation. Irenaeus once sought to understand and comprehend this principle, for in his writing we find this:

     “It is impossible to live without the principle of life, but the means of life one found in fellowship with God…He has shown His longsuffering during the apostasy of man, and man has been trained thereby, as the prophet says: ‘Thy apostasy shall reform thee’ (Jer. 2:19). For God arranged everything from the first with a view to the perfection of man, in order to edify him and reveal His own dispensations…Thus man may eventually reach maturity, and, being ripened by such privileges, may see and comprehend God.” (Against the Heresies IV. 20. 5; IV. 37. 7).

     Moffatt’s translation puts it pretty clear:

     “See for yourself how sore it is for you to abandon me, to have no reverence for me, says the LORD.”

Noah’s Day!

Lest we forget, we need only to read about the awful condition of mankind in the days of Noah—God destroyed the whole world, remember? (All but 8 souls perished in the universal Flood.) Their iniquity was certainly marked by the all-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful God (read also Proverbs 29:1).

Rebellion Against God's Word

This is the SIN of today’s generation in the whole world. Even Christians(?) take pleasure in rebelling against God's Holy Word. Rebellion has pulled the whole body of Christ, with some exceptions, into a grand megalomania / narcissism way of life, euphemism has all but consumed the Church. This spiritual quagmire has so polluted the Church that I doubt that God will rescue it.

Preaching Against Sin?

YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING! Not in today’s churches, no way!! Why this might warp people’s minds and make them uncomfortable. True—but if we do not preach against sin, this demonic malignancy will cause the Church to perish entirely.

To HELL With Comfort!

Here in the West we major in comforts. We love Brother and Sister Love to tell us how much God loves us and that He wants us to have the Biggest—the Best—and the MOST of the world NOW!! We don’t need to suffer for His Name sake, nor carry an old heavy cross, nor die daily, nor follow in His footsteps—NO! NO! NO!

Sick Synthesis

Flesh and Spirit, this is what churchianity is all about. Yet this spiritual thralldom has all but made the Christian Church worthless as far as serving the right God (sadly, the Church is serving the god of this world!).

     The modern Church has indeed become a “wild vine.” Such intransigence is, at bottom, against nature, as the behavior of the Church is against God. Isaiah (5:1-7) puts forth the same truth, that Israel had become estranged from God's righteousness.

     You see, such a vine is abnormal in a well-tended vineyard.

Wild Ass Ministries!

Jeremiah boldly states (2:24) that Israel had become like “A wild ass used to the wilderness, that snuffeth up the wind at her pleasure;…in her month they shall find her.” This is talking, of course, about an ass in heat; the prophet introduces, with merciless irony, his (really God's) indictments. Judah had become like a “Wild Ass” or “a heifer running wild” as Moffatt writes—in her heat of sexual desire, utterly beyond the control of her owner, but easily approachable by the males who seek her.

     So it is with today’s Church! This land is covered with “Wild Ass” ministries—all in HEAT, ready to fornicate with any and all in the world…running full speed after the gods and goddesses of this evil world.

     Judah’s idolatrous / adulterous passion makes her run after her lovers, the false gods (V 25) Moffatt sums it up this way; “It is no use to talk; I am in love with foreign gods.” IN LOVE! Yes, dear readers, the whole Church (with small exceptions) is IN LOVE with the world.

     The pathos—it is hopeless!! The Church has fallen so far into LUSTFUL passions with the world that only the judgments of God will save her—if this is even possible?!!

The Solution to the Pollution is Revolution!

 ...nothing short of revolt against the Church could save the few sincere. Amen.

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[Study material has been adapted from its original sources.]