Matthew Zamudio, Pastor, Windsor Park Baptist Church, Desoto Tx. March 12, 2017.

Where They Were
The Scripture was Despised
Jeremiah 6:10 (ESV)-To whom shall I speak and give warning, that they may hear? Behold, their ears are uncircumcised, they cannot listen; behold, the word of the Lord is to them an object of scorn; they take no pleasure in it.

Dishonesty was the Norm
Jeremiah 6:13 (ESV)-For from the least to the greatest of them, everyone is greedy for unjust gain; and from prophet to priest, everyone deals falsely.

Spiritual leaders had said everything is “OK”.
Jeremiah 6:14(ESV)-They have healed the wound of my people lightly, saying, ‘peace, peace’ when there is no peace.

Jeremiah 6:14(HCSB)-They have treated My people’s brokenness superficially, claiming: Peace, peace, when there is no peace.

“Talk to him about moderation in all things. If you can once get him to the point of thinking that ‘religion is all very well up to a point,’ you can feel quite happy about his soul. A moderated religion is as good for us as no religion at all.”
-Screwtape, The Screwtape Letters
There was no shame
Jeremiah 6:15 (ESV)- “Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No they were not at all ashamed; they did not know how to blush.

God’s Response
Jeremiah 6:15b (ESV)- Therefore they shall fall among those who fall; at the time that I punish them, they shall be overthrown.

3. The Choice
Text Breakdown: Thus says the LORD: Stand by the roads Hb:דֶרֶךְ
[Derek] way, road, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, Hb:עוֹלָם
[Olam] ancient, long ago, eternal, everlasting where the good way is, and walk in it and find rest for your souls.

Jeremiah 6:16 (ESV)-Thus says the Lord: “Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’

Jeremiah 6:16 (HCSB)-Stand by the roadways and look. Ask about the ancient paths: Which is the way to what is good? Then take it and find rest for yourselves. But they protested: we won’t!

Jeremiah 6:16 (NRSV)-Thus says the LORD: Stand at the crossroads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way lies; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls...

Path 1: ________________________________
Job 8:13 (ESV)-Such are the paths of all who forget God; the hope of the godless shall perish.

Path 2: ________________________________
Isaiah 30:20 (ESV)-And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, ‘This is the way, walk in it,’ when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.”

We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us! It behooves us then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.
-Abraham Lincoln March 30, 1863