As we walk through Jeremiah as a church on Wednesday nights, I have been struck by how similar the problems Jeremiah faced in his day are to the problems that we face in ours. Two verses in particular stand out in Jeremiah 6.
Jeremiah 6:19 “Listen, earth! I am about to bring disaster on these people, the fruit of their own plotting, for they have paid no attention to My word. They have rejected My instruction. 20 What use to Me is frankincense from Sheba or sweet cane from a distant land? Your burnt offerings are not acceptable; your sacrifices do not please Me.” (HCSB)
In these verses we see a close connection between the Word of God and the worship of God. In essence, the people’s sacrifices and offerings of worship were not pleasing to God because of their rejection of His Word. They would reap the fruit of their own actions because they had rejected God’s commands, even though they had continued to offer sacrifices to God. They were claiming to worship God while rejecting His Word, and God tells them that He would bring disaster on them for having done so.
Today, we can still fall into the trap of performing acts or rituals of worship while ignoring or downplaying the Word of God. We find this in messages that downplay, minimize, or redefine the commands of God or in sermons that question the importance of and reliability of the Bible or in churches where the sermon is essentially a few out of context Bible verses used to deliver a message of self-help and the power of positive thinking.
But surely we would never fall into this trap. At this point, we need to be reminded that this trap is often more subtle than we think. To take an easy example, Joel Osteen begins his messages by having his audience hold up their Bibles and recite a statement about the importance of the Bible, claiming that what they are about to hear is a message from God’s Word. Then what follows from Osteen in the above example is a half-hour word of faith message about the power of our words with a few Bible verses attached. But the entire content of the message runs counter to the message of the Bible. Osteen’s message is about us and our power, not about God and His power.
But again, surely this is just the Osteen’s of the world and not us. But the point is that just because we say we believe that Bible, and just because we use the Bible in our worship services, does not necessarily mean that we are honoring God’s Word and keeping His commands.
As Jeremiah went on to say about the destruction of the land:
Jeremiah 9:13 “The Lord said, ‘It is because they abandoned My instruction that I set in front of them and did not obey My voice or walk according to it. 14 Instead, they followed the stubbornness of their hearts and followed after the Baals as their fathers taught them.’” (HCSB)
So the question is, are we trying to worship God while ignoring His Word? Do we think that our religious acts of apparent devotion to God can counteract a disregard for His instructions and His commands? Any attempt to worship God while ignoring His Word and His commands will produce no better results today than it did in Jeremiah’s day. As Jesus himself said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15).
A Family of Faith 