Judgment deferred.
The evil counsellors of Jerusalem did their worst to counteract the effect of the message which the Lord's prophets were commissioned to communicate. Thus it came to pass that the inhabitants of the city were encouraged to neglect the obvious duties of repentance and supplication; and, when the time of judgment came, were found unprepared. The means by which the devisers of mischief brought about this result are described in this passage. They induced the citizens to believe that, if the threatened judgment were ever to come, it would not be yet, not probably in their time; and encouraged the citizens to build houses, and to live as if no catastrophe were about to befall them. If the ruin of Jerusalem were appointed, at all events that ruin was "not near."
I. THE WAY IN WHICH SINNERS TREAT THE THREATS OF GOD'S AUTHORIZED MINISTERS.
1. It is often the bounden duty of faithful messengers of God to foretell the approach of chastisement and judgment. A painful duty it always is; and it is to be leaped that on this account many shrink from discharging it. Even the tender and gracious Jesus now and again denounced the sins of the self-righteous and hypocritical, and warned such that condemnation awaited them. No one can carry out the office of a minister of righteousness who does not remind the unbelieving and impenitent that "the wages of sin is death."
2. It is observable that such admonitions are often treated with neglect and contempt. It has been thus from the time of Noah, whose warnings were unheeded and ridiculed by his contemporaries. The admonitions of Christ himself in some instances only embittered the hostility of those whom he reproached. Every servant of God has had occasion to exclaim, "Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?"
II. THE ERROR WHICH SINNERS COMMIT IN SO TREATING GOD'S MESSAGE.
1. Many who hear the warnings and threats addressed to them give no credit to what they hear, and do not expect the predictions to be fulfilled. They have more confidence in their own judgment and in their own good fortune than in the Word of the Lord. They do not wish to believe, and they will not bellow.
2. Many who do not absolutely disbelieve and reject the message, nevertheless persuade themselves that its fulfilment will be indefinitely deferred, and indeed is altogether uncertain. Such seems to have been the case with the evil counsellors, whose guidance was accepted in Jerusalem. Their answer to every prediction of calamity was this: "It is not near!" It is with the same excuse that the Word of God is so constantly encountered in our own days; and there are those who may not make this excuse in words, who yet cherish it in their hearts and act upon it in their conduct. "Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the hearts of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil."
III. THE FOLLY AND WICKEDNESS OF SUCH TREATMENT OF GOD'S MESSAGE. What shall be said of the attitude of those whose one reply is this: "It is not near"?
1. They must be reminded that time, after all, is of comparatively little importance. The main question for us is this—Is God angry with the wicked? Is his wrath to be revealed against the ungodly? If it is so, then how can we attach great importance to the question—Will this be made manifest this year or next year; now or at some future time?
2. They must be reminded that the judgment foretold may be actually nearer than is supposed or believed. It was so in the case of Jerusalem in the time of Ezekiel. It has often been so. Men have been eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, when sudden destruction has come upon them.
3. They must be reminded that, near or far, the judgment of the Supreme Ruler is inevitable. "Who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth?"—T.