I have always been shy about speaking to people about Jesus.  I taught Sunday school and children’s church awhile in my youth so I was always really good at communicating with children, but not so much with adults.  Children tend to listen even when we don’t think they do.  I remember my son on the pew next to me, whom I thought was asleep.  The preacher made a joke about women that all the men enjoyed.  That was in a different time when everyone could laugh at themselves.  Then as it became silent, my son’s voice rang out ‘I know that’s right’.

Adults, like myself, try to listen but our minds are moving on to the next thing we have to do.  I even have to reign thoughts in during devotion.  This morning I just placed my bible in my lap and asked the Lord what did He want to talk about.  I was at the story in Jeremiah 26.

I was reminded of America as I read the words Jeremiah spoke from the Lord.  The Lord told him to ‘stand in the court of the Lord’s house and speak to all the cities of Judah, which come to worship in the Lord’s house, all the words that I command thee to speak unto them;  diminish not a word: If so be they will hearken, and turn every man from his evil way, that I may repent me of the evil, which I purpose to do unto them because of the evil of their doings.’

He was told to say ‘thus saith the Lord’.  The people were told to walk in God’s law which He has set before them.  Jesus tells us in Matthew 5 that He did not come to destroy the law or the prophets but to fulfill. He says that till heaven and earth pass, not one jot or tittle shall pass from the law till all is fulfilled.

The people in Judah would not accept the words Jeremiah spoke from the Lord.  We have the bible to compare what the prophets say with the word of the Lord.  In the house of the Lord, the people said that Jeremiah should die.  Others claimed to speak otherwise/a different message from the Lord, but to their demise.

I pray we are not so offended to repent, but will humble ourselves as little children and listen to what the Lord has to say in this hour.  America has allowed so much evil to be called good.  So many innocent lives have been destroyed.  God continues to offer another chance, but know this, it is sin that will one day be destroyed.

Seventy years captivity as the people of Judah saw is a very long time.  I know that’s right.