They have healed the wound of my people lightly, saying, “Peace, peace,” when there is no peace.
– Jeremiah 8:11
Wow. What an indictment, specifically of the leaders, the prophets, the teachers, among God’s people who, when God is telling them judgment is coming, the prophets, the teachers among them, gloss over that, deal with that lightly. They don’t address sin and its seriousness, the consequences of sin, the judgment that comes from sin. They say “Peace, peace,” like things are fine when things are not fine.
Jeremiah 8:11 reminds us not to treat sin lightly.
We read this in Jeremiah, but now think about it in light of us as God’s people today, and how tempting it is for us to treat sin lightly, to think about sin as if it’s not that big a deal, or to treat judgment lightly as if an infinite eternal judgment is not coming soon, any day, for any one of us who is not trusting in Jesus.
And there is a word here for those who teach God’s Word. Obviously we want to teach about God’s grace and God’s love and God’s mercy, and at the same time, any of us who teach God’s Word in any way, need to be serious about sin and judgment that’s coming, and for that to be clear in how we communicate God’s Word. And yes, this applies to pastors, but all of us as disciple-makers, teaching other people to obey Christ, teaching children, teaching people in our homes, in our communities, and the people around us that we are talking about God’s Word with.
Let’s not treat sin lightly. Let’s treat sin seriously, and talk about judgment, seriously, that is coming, to talk about hell, an everlasting judgment on sin. And there’s a word here for all of us who hear others teaching the Word, that we would not just crave what sounds good to us, that we would not just crave people who will say “Peace, peace,” when there is no peace.
Jeremiah 8:11 teaches us to see sin for what it is.
We all need to hear warnings from God’s Word when it comes to sin in our lives, and sin in others’ lives around us, to feel the weight and the significance of the coming judgment. So God, we pray, please help us not to treat sin and its effects and its consequences lightly in any way. God, we pray that over our lives today. We pray that we would see sin for what it is and hate it and run from it, run from every temptation to sin in our lives today, that we would realize how serious it is.
And God, we pray you could help us to realize how serious your justice is, your coming judgment is, in a way that causes us to hate sin and fear you rightly, and that causes us to spread the gospel to warn people of the effects of sin and to call people, invite people to trust in you before it is too late, to turn to your mercy so that they might be saved from your coming judgment.
God, we pray for urgency in sharing the gospel in each of our lives, and we pray that you would help each of us to pass on your word faithfully. Yes, all the promises and the grace and the mercy, and the promises of judgment, and the reality of an eternal hell, an eternal judgment do sin. God, help us not to live as if there’s peace, peace, when there is no peace, or to speak as if there’s peace, peace, when there is no peace.
Prayer for the Banjar People
Lord, help us to spread this gospel of your grace and your mercy, of your salvation from our sin, to the people around us and to people around the world who have never even heard this.
God, we pray specifically today for the Banjar people of Indonesia, for this Muslim people group of four and a half million men and women and children. God, we pray that the gospel, the good news of your grace, and your salvation from coming judgment would spread to the Banjar people of Indonesia, please, oh God, for their salvation. We pray that you would cause workers to spread the gospel to them, you would bless brothers and sisters who are in that people group, the small number of them, and others who are near them, to see disciples made and churches planted, and people saved from sin and coming eternal judgment among the Banjar people of Indonesia. We pray all this according to your Word in Jeremiah 8:11. In Jesus’ name, in the name of the one who alone can save us from our sin. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
