DOUBLE TROUBLE

 

“For My people have committed two evils:

  They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters,

  And hewn themselves cisterns—broken cisterns that can hold no water.” 

  (Jeremiah 2:13)

There have been times during the course of my ministry that I have ministered to those with severe illness.  Sometimes a pattern develops that leads to their death.  One thing goes wrong—and there is a treatment for it—then another problem arises that also could be treated, except that the medication works against the first condition.  It is double trouble—and before long I am meeting with the patient’s family to plan a funeral. 

Jeremiah was seeing this double trouble afflict the kingdom of Judah.  If something didn’t happen quickly, the nation would die.  Nations are birthed, they decline, and they die.  Here is the solemn warning,

“Has a nation changed its gods,

  Which are not gods?

  But My people have changed their Glory

  For what does not profit.”  (Jer.2:11)

We have recently celebrated another birthday for America, but we look at the worsening condition of the nation and wonder how many more will we have?  God does not change, and if we abandon the Living God for idols we will soon discover that God has abandoned us.  Yet, this is what we are doing.  It is a frightening prospect.

“Be astonished, O heavens, at this,

  And be horribly afraid;

  Be very desolate,” says the LORD.  (Jer.2:12)

Here is the double trouble: we forsake the Lord and His precepts and follow the world and its philosophies.

“For My people have committed two evils:

  They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters,

And hewn themselves cisterns—broken cisterns that can hold no water.”    (Jer.2:13)

Physically, we cannot survive without water.  Spiritually, God is the fountain of living water—and to forsake Him is to commit suicide—whether it be the self-inflicted death of an individual, a family, a church, or a nation.  God’s precepts in His Word lead us to Him, and we can drink deeply of the life sustaining and soul satisfying truth.  Yet, how many of us leave our Bibles closed, and even in churches encounter little solid Bible teaching?  Still we thirst, and rather than return to the source of life, we may seek to dig our own wells.  Science, education, government, self-help gurus, cults, false religions, and the rest offer solutions.  It is all empty promises—just dry holes.

For such double trouble, there is a “double cure,” to “save from wrath and make me pure.” (Augustus Toplady, “Rock of Ages”)  There is water flowing from that Rock!  The Rock is Jesus (1 Cor.10:4).  We must reject the broken cisterns, repenting of the folly of trying to solve our own problems with the world’s vain philosophies—for that only leads to death—and return to the flowing fountain of life.  That is our only hope!