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             Jeremiah one of the great prophets of God in the Old Testament wrote “…my people have forgotten me days without number” (Jeremiah 2:32). The people that God had cared for and benevolently provided for during the centuries since the days of Abraham had become secular in their thinking and had forgotten God. The question was asked in order to demonstrate how utterly ridiculous it was for the Jews to have forgotten God. The question was “Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire” (Jeremiah 2:32). Just as a bride would not think of going to her wedding without her wedding dress so it should be that God’s people would never forget him.
            The people of God no longer recognized truth and were not interested in it. Jeremiah wrote to the people of God “Run you to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in the broad place thereof, if you can find a man, if there be any that executes judgment, that seeks the truth, I will pardon I” (Jeremiah 5:1). What a sad commentary on the people that were supposedly the salt of the earth. Jeremiah went on to write “Although they say, the Lord lives, they swear falsely” (Jeremiah 5:2).
            Judah and Israel had become so interested in the economic and political situation among the nations that they began to see themselves in that way rather than according to God’s plan for them. They were not to be just secular nations, but a nation of people that loved God and worshiped God and lived for him. Jeremiah wrote “Stand in the gate of the Lord’s house, and proclaim there this word and say, Hear the word of the Lord, all of Judah, that enter in at these gates to worship the Lord” (Jeremiah 7:2). The people of Judah were slowly becoming involved in idolatry, immorality, injustice, and so many other things that were against the will of God and in reality who they should have been. Jeremiah’s message was that they needed to repent and return to God.
            The Lord’s church is “a holy nation” (1 Peter 2:9) that is to stand in this world as a light of hope (Matthew 5:16). Just at it was with Judah there is the danger that Christians can become secular minded in their thinking. There is the danger to view the church through human laws rather than the human laws through God’s Word. It is easy to view what happened to Judah and think, but that will not happen to the church. Really? The same thing can happen if the church does not maintain its focus upon the Word of God rather than in culture and human laws. Jeremiah wrote “O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself, it is not in man that walks to direct his steps” (Jeremiah 10:23).
            The people of God in Judah had forgotten God and as Jeremiah wrote “days without number” or that is to say for a long time. It was not a recent occurrence, but for many years Judah had been living without focusing upon the Word of God. When the Lord’s church begins to focus upon current events, politics, and material things and not upon the Word of God then the church can become what Judah was. Let us stay focused upon the Word of God and let the power of the gospel be what saves and leads (Romans 1:16)