Sermon Jeremiah 8 Private Property

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard

Sermon Jeremiah 8 Private Property

First Presbyterian Church of Ocean City

September 18, 2016

            This is my fifth sermon drawn from the Book of Jeremiah.  Jeremiah was predestined by God to serve as his Prophet to the Nations.  Jeremiah warned the nations not to put their hope in false gods and materialism, because only the true God can save us.  Jeremiah told the nations that God holds them like a potter holds a lump of clay in his hands and can start over whenever he wants.  Last week Jeremiah told the nations that God could restart creation, but decided not to.  Instead he will continue to work with his people to become obedient.  Today we will see what we could lose as a result of continued disobedience, and it is something we don’t want to lose.  We will get to this, but first let’s pray.

            “Grant unto us, O Lord, to be occupied in the mysteries of thy heavenly wisdom, with true progress in piety, to thy glory and our own edification.  Amen.”   (John Calvin)

            Let’s start by hearing God’s analysis of what was happening in Jeremiah’s day.

Jeremiah 8:1b “‘When people fall down, do they not get up?

    When someone turns away, do they not return?

5 Why then have these people turned away?

    Why does Jerusalem always turn away?

They cling to deceit;

    they refuse to return.

6 I have listened attentively,

    but they do not say what is right.

None of them repent of their wickedness,

    saying, “What have I done?”

Each pursues their own course

    like a horse charging into battle.

            God is surely exasperated at his people.  They have turned away from him.  There is no obedience of his law, no study of his word, no worship of his majesty.  For generations the people of Judah have ignored their God.  They have worshiped things, false gods and materialism for so long that they no longer even remember their God.  God had the Book of the Law discovered in a storage room of the temple.  And he sent his prophet, Jeremiah, to tell people to read it and obey it.  But Judah wants nothing to do with the prophet and is going their own way.  And God is beside himself.

7 Even the stork in the sky

    knows her appointed seasons,

and the dove, the swift and the thrush

    observe the time of their migration.

But my people do not know

    the requirements of the Lord.

            Could you image the ocean one day deciding that it is just too difficult send waves all the way into Ocean City and stops a mile out?  God set the boundaries of the sea.  The sea can’t decide for itself where to stop.  Or consider the Sun.  What if one morning the Sun decided to sleep in and not rise in the east as God has ordained.  Would the Sun consider such a thing?  Of course not.  Everything in creation knows its limits and accepts them except us.  Only humans ignore our creator and try to go our own way.  We don’t read our instruction manual, the Bible.  We don’t do what it says.  And we are the only things in all of creation that ignore the limits placed on us by our creator.

            Of course our response is to point to our own wisdom.  We can decide for ourselves what to do.  We have Bibles, even if we don’t use them.  We have preachers, even if they don’t know what they’re talking about.  But here is God’s reply.

10“‘How can you say, “We are wise,

    for we have the law of the Lord,”

when actually the lying pen of the scribes

    has handled it falsely?

9 The wise will be put to shame;

    they will be dismayed and trapped.

Since they have rejected the word of the Lord,

    what kind of wisdom do they have?

            So in Jeremiah’s day the people of God have walked away from him.  The don’t study the Bible.  They don’t go to worship.  They don’t pay any attention to God at all.  And so God is about to do something about it.

10 Therefore I will give their wives to other men

    and their fields to new owners.     

            This is the worst possible news to the people of Judah.  Let me explain.  When God allowed his people to enter the promised land God established an economic system based on private property.  The land was divided and given to families who would own them in perpetuity.  The land could not be lost through debt, because all mortgages were cancelled every seven years.  The land could not be sold, because all land reverted to original owners every fifty years.  And so land always belongs to a family, generation to generation forever.

            This was very different from the economic systems of the other nations.  In other nations land was owned by the king.  A tyrant would own all property and you would sharecrop it for a portion of the produce.  But it didn’t belong to you.  Judah, on the other hand enjoyed private property rights because of its reliance on the Law of Moses in the Bible.  But when they turned away from the Bible and ignored the Law of Moses, they ran the risk of losing their private property rights.  And that was about to happen.  The King of Babylon was coming to take possession of the land.  Some of the farmers will be left as sharecroppers.  Others will be taken to Babylon.  But all the land will belong to the king.

            The idea of private property is common to all nations with a biblical heritage, because national laws are based, in part, on the Law of Moses.  But if we continue to walk away from God and ignore his law, we might find our own private property laws in jeopardy, as some tyrant takes what we have.  Here is how God describes it.

13“‘I will take away their harvest,

declares the Lord.

    There will be no grapes on the vine.

There will be no figs on the tree,

    and their leaves will wither.

What I have given them

    will be taken from them.’”

            Our private property is a blessing from God.  If we fail to obey him, if we refuse to worship him, if we do not study his word, then we could lose the property we have.  The people finally realized this when this happened.  Listen to the panic in their voices.

15 Why are we sitting here?

    Gather together!

Let us flee to the fortified cities

    and perish there!

For the Lord our God has doomed us to perish

    and given us poisoned water to drink,

    because we have sinned against him.

15 We hoped for peace

    but no good has come,

for a time of healing

    but there is only terror.

16 The snorting of the enemy’s horses

    is heard from Dan;

at the neighing of their stallions

    the whole land trembles.

They have come to devour

    the land and everything in it,

    the city and all who live there.       

            The Babylonians have arrived.  Their advance cavalry is already in the farms of the northern provinces.  People are fleeing their farms for safety inside city walls.  They are losing their personal property.  As the Babylon army advances Jeremiah turns to God in prayer.

18 You who are my Comforter[b] in sorrow,

    my heart is faint within me.

19 Listen to the cry of my people

    from a land far away:

“Is the Lord not in Zion?

    Is her King no longer there?”

            Where are you God?  Come and save us.  To which God replied.

“Why have they aroused my anger with their images,

    with their worthless foreign idols?”

            But Jeremiah wants God to know of the suffering of the people.

20 “The harvest is past,

    the summer has ended,

    and we are not saved.”

21 Since my people are crushed, I am crushed;

    I mourn, and horror grips me.

22 Is there no balm in Gilead?

    Is there no physician there?

Why then is there no healing

    for the wound of my people?

            The people are suffering.  The war is increasing in intensity.  And God’s responds to Jeremiah’s prayer.

9:7b“See, I will refine and test them,

    for what else can I do

    because of the sin of my people?

8 Their tongue is a deadly arrow;

    it speaks deceitfully.

With their mouths they all speak cordially to their neighbors,

    but in their hearts they set traps for them.

9 Should I not punish them for this?”

    declares the Lord.

“Should I not avenge myself

    on such a nation as this?”

            The answer, of course is Yes.  God will punish them.  This is what will happen.

“I will make Jerusalem a heap of ruins,

    a haunt of jackals;

and I will lay waste the towns of Judah

    so no one can live there.”

            The Babylonians will come and destroy Jerusalem.  They will carry the people off to exile.  The people have lost their land.  It had been given by God to families for perpetuity.  But now it was taken away.  This can happen to anyone who turns away from God.

            But God did not reverse creation.  He ended the private property ownership for a time.  But his people still have a chance.  If they repent, turn to him, and obey him this sentence will be reversed and the people will return to their ancestral farms.  This is the message God will send his Prophet to the Nations to proclaim.  And we will hear this good news next week.  But this week I call for repentance.  Turn from evil and turn to God before it is too late.  Let’s pray.

            Lord God we thank you for all the blessings we have received including our God given right to own property.  We know that this blessing remain only as long as we are obedient.  So help us Lord to know your word and obey your law.  We pray this in Jesus’ name.  Amen.