NOTES for Jer 13:1-27

The Lord compares the people whom He drew close to Himself to a belt fitted as tightly as possible around the body. But now the belt has rotted, and its only destination is the rubbish heap. The people too have rotted; the sins that saturated them have made them good for nothing. Alas, the people refuse to acknowledge that in their present state they are good for nothing and must share the fate of an old rag.

How can the rejection of the sinful people described here be reconciled with the Lord’s mercy, patience, and forgiveness, of which many other pages of the same Scripture speak? Is there a contradiction? If one wishes, of course, such different words can be regarded as contradicting one another, but it is better to call them complementary. To appreciate forgiveness, one must feel the vileness of sin in all its fullness and see what it brings in its wake. The Lord still spares us; He does not even show us fully the whole horror of the abyss into which we can sink, dragged down by the burden of our sins. And it is not the Lord who pushes us there: He constantly warns us of the dangers of crooked paths. In His stern warnings, His love for us is revealed far more powerfully than in sugary indulgence. Yet again and again we try to turn into some swamp.