Strange church-goers.
I. LOOK AT THEM AS JEREMIAH SAW THEM. Thieves (Jeremiah 7:6, Jeremiah 7:9), most cruel oppressors, murderers, adulterers, etc. Yet they were all going into the temple to worship the Lord. Strange church-goers indeed.
II. ASK IF THERE BE ANY SUCH NOW? What if some angel of God, unseen by us, were to mark on the foreheads of all who enter our churches now their true characters in the sight of God: would there be no fraudulent, no oppressors of the poor, none whose hearts, though not their hands, are chargeable with having shed innocent blood? Let us each one ask, "What name would be put upon me?"
III. INQUIRE WHAT POSSIBLE MOTIVES CAN ACTUATE THEM.
1. With some, no doubt, it is a cloak to cover up their real character.
2. Or a tribute paid to the demands of fashion, custom, society. What would be thought of them if they did not go to church?
3. Or a method of quieting conscience. They come away and think they have wiped off the score that was against them. They say (Jeremiah 7:10), "We are delivered [see Exposition] to do," etc.
4. Or to set an example to those they are pleased to call "the lower orders;" like the philosophers of old, who, whilst they held all religions to be equally false, yet regarded them all as indispensably useful.
5. Or as a means for so many regarded such things—of propitiating the Divine favor and securing a title to heaven by-and-by. But there is no end to the motives which lead such men to do that which, to more honest-hearted people, appears a mockery, an absurdity, and yet worse.
IV. LISTEN TO THE LORD'S WORD TO SUCH. He tells them:
1. They were getting no good whatsoever from such worship (Jeremiah 7:3).
2. They were completely declaring themselves (Jeremiah 7:4).
3. They were neglecting that amendment of their ways which would save them (Jeremiah 7:5).
4. They were grossly insulting nod (Jeremiah 7:10, Jeremiah 7:11).
5. They were blind to notorious facts: e.g. Shiloh (Jeremiah 7:12); Ephraim (Jeremiah 7:15).
6. Thorough reformation was alone the way of life for them (Jeremiah 7:3, Jeremiah 7:7). "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting."—C.