Jeremiah 16

Introduction

The year is 1347 and you’re living in middle-ages Paris, one of the largest cities in Europe. In a normal day, you would walk outside to the smell of fresh baked goods and the sound of a bustling city. This is not a normal day though, and this is not a normal year. This year Paris has been struck with the Bubonic Plague and along with other major cities like London and Florence, nothing is the same. You’re one of the few people left in the city, and if you had the courage to walk outside right now you would see the streets filled with the dead. You might see one priest brave enough to visit a family in long black mask resembling a raven so that he can perform their last rites. Half of the population of Paris is dead, and most of the others have fled to the countryside in an attempt to escape the disease. In fact, most of the large cities in Europe, Africa and Asia have all lost roughly half of their population, and somewhere from 30-60% of the population of Europe is just gone. It will take the world 200 years to recoup the loss in population that this plague has brought. Because of this disease, death has never been more of a reality to the people of the world. Surely we always knew death was inevitable, but it was never quite so real to the individual until the black death swept the world.

Covenant Breaking Brings Death (verses 1-13, 18)

Supporting Passage: James 1:5-8

State: The people of God love their sin more than they love God. They do not desire the Lord or any of his ways, they desire their sin and all of its ways.

Covenant breaking is huge here, bring it back to the covenant that they have entered with God. They are not judged based on some ambiguous standard, but based upon the covenant. Jesus is perfectly covenant faithful and is our righteousness. We receive grace through what he has done on our behalf. Referencing

Problem CROSS Reward

Illustrate: You can’t support a child’s drug addiction. You must let them go and hope that they return.

Apply: We have a dangerous desire growing in us, and that desire will eventually lead to sin and then inevitably death. The Lord will eventually give us over to that.

Jesus Fulfills the Covenant on Our Behalf (Verses 14-17)

Supporting Passage: Zephaniah 3:17

State: The Lord will not altogether abandon his people, but he will bring them back to Himself. They will know that their sin only brings death, and they will know that their Lord brings them life.

Illustrate:

Apply: God has given us Christ, who has blotted out our sins. He has saved us from the path that leads to death, and has brought us back home to God as children. He has restored in our hearts a love for God that we had lost to our sinful desires.

The Call: Run from your sinful idols, return to the one true God. (Verses 19-21)

Supporting Passages: Romans 1:24-32, CFC: Acts 3:19-21 (our redemption secured) Acts 3:26 (Our love for God restored)

State: One day, when the people of Judah are laboring underneath a harsh oppressor, they will realize that their sin is what got them there. They will finally understand the gods that they propped up have betrayed them, and they will know that the Lord is the One Living and True God. They will cry out to Him, and the Lord will hear His people. He will bring them back to Himself, and He will restore all that has been lost.

Illustrate: Back to addiction: Yet, they are still your child. Some will die, but some by God’s grace will come back home again to find a Father with tears in his eyes and not a care in the world now that his child is home safe.

Apply: Your sin can only bring you death. The Lord is gracious, powerful and loving. When we recognize that all our sin can do is bring us to death’s door, when we are laboring underneath the weight of sin, it is in that day that we will recognize exactly where our sinful desires bring us. It is in that day that we will realize the Lord is good, and that He is the source of our life. In that day, cry out to the Lord, and he will graciously bring you back to himself. He send us Jesus, who brings us to the Everlasting Kingdom of God.