Jeremiah

[0:01] Taking the Lord's help, I direct your attention this evening to the prophecy of Isaiah, reading from chapter 31 and verse 3. The prophecy of Isaiah, reading from chapter 31 and verse 3.

[0:17] The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love. Therefore, with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.

[0:33] The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love. Therefore, with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.

[0:48] Jeremiah could speak of what the Lord had done for him.

[1:02] He could speak here of divine appearances in his soul. Has your soul ever been led in such a way?

[1:18] Can you say, looking back over your past, that the Lord has appeared? Has he ever appeared to you?

[1:30] Has he ever spoken to you, come near? Let his mercy be had. We live in this sinful, evil world of darkness and death.

[1:45] Called time. We go, without time eventually, to eternity. If we never know him here.

[2:00] He never appears to us here. Never reveals himself to us here. Never speaks to us here. We shall never meet him face to face in eternity. We shall be cast into outer darkness with the devil and his angel.

[2:14] Jeremiah walked in a life of sorrow.

[2:28] He penned those solemn lamentations. The world was to him what it is to all of God's dear children.

[2:39] In a place of many wounds, much grief. His ministry appeared to be fruitless.

[3:00] The blessing that he desired, that his love would heed his warnings, never came.

[3:15] And yet, there's a glory about his ministry. He was faithful. In the truest sense of that were, he preached as the Lord directed him.

[3:29] And what he said came to pass. Solemnly came to pass. He died in Egypt, forgotten.

[3:44] We can only trace in this prophecy of Jeremiah that he had but two friends. Beiruch and Ibn Mela.

[3:58] He had some sacred blessing. The Lord spoke to him.

[4:14] He could speak of those things that he'd handled. Can you, oh, what a mercy if you can, deny.

[4:27] Look back and be unable to deny the Lord has appeared to you.

[4:40] It may be that you've never spoken about it. It's hidden in your heart. That's good. That is so good. I shudder in the churches often to hear religious talk which has a false echo about it.

[5:06] The things of God in their reality and the hearts of it. Living family are deep and lie deep. And only as the Lord opens the lips are those precious things spoken of.

[5:23] But they lie there hidden in the soul and yet having that eternal stamp and seal upon them that the Lord has appeared.

[5:39] He has spoken. He has applied His precious promises. He has drawn near. And we can say like Jeremiah says here, The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying.

[5:58] There are other things, you know, that He knew in His heart. One of them was this. The opening of this prophecy come those words, those lovely words, before I, ah, another word the Lord has spoken to Him, before I formed thee in the womb I knew thee.

[6:19] Oh, what a revelation in His dear heart of that eternal everlasting covenant. God's dear children are loved in eternity past. As Robert Murray McChain said in that lovely hymn, Chosen Not For Good In Me.

[6:38] Call it out from Rastiffly. He said, mercy as people draw near their journey's end to be able to look back over the pathway of old.

[6:52] many years back, but having this divine mark, whether it be forty or fifty years ago that the Lord appeared to you, it's as fresh today as it was then.

[7:11] It is a work of God. He has spoken. Never can that be erased in your heart. precious, treasured moments when the Lord spoke to you, when He called you by His grace, when He called you out of nature's darkness.

[7:36] Apostle Paul looked back to his call by grace many times before the gripper and fast he spoke out regarding what he had known and the Lord called him or he could speak of those things in his heart.

[7:55] Can you let him mercy when you can? And you know He appears to us in our trials, appears to us in our needs, appears to us when He hears an answer's prayer, whether it be in providence or in grace.

[8:18] Grace is obviously important, more important than providence, but providence is vital. The Lord answers prayer often in our youth in providence, but He leads us on further to answer our prayers in grace, in our hearts, in our soul, in applying His precious promises in our hearts.

[8:40] what a wonder it appears to us at times that He should ever come to us, ever take notice of us, ever in divine mercy speak to us, but oh then, how good if we have a hope that He has spoken to us.

[9:06] if we have a hope that He has come to us, and applied His word with care, that there have been those seasons under the preaching of the gospel which we shall never forget, when our hearts were softened by His spirit, and when the word was made food to our souls, and when we could trace out under the ministry the pathway that the Lord had led us, had a sweet hope that we were His children.

[9:44] How precious when the Lord has applied His promises in our hearts, one perhaps, two perhaps, but as we journey on in fresh paths, how they come by.

[10:01] they don't dim, they shine. We learn to use them as blessed instruments in our hands.

[10:17] I believe Jacob at Peniel, as he wrestled with the angel, was able to use his promise, Lord, they have said, I'll be with thee.

[10:28] have you used your promise? Have you come to Him and pleaded? That promise the Lord has spoken to you?

[10:39] Oh, yea. Here's a word the Lord spoke to Jeremiah. Jeremiah. I would look first at this word, yea.

[10:56] There's a divine hallmark about it. It is the word of God to Jeremiah. It is a divine seal.

[11:11] There is a stamp about it. it carries the hallmark, the divine hallmark of God upon it. There is a depth and reality in it.

[11:27] The Lord speaks with such blessed certainty regarding what he's going to say. He seals it in the heart of his dear servant.

[11:40] It is the voice of his God in his soul with almighty power. Do you ever know that? Or when the Lord speaks, there's something about it which is unique, peculiar, divine.

[12:02] When he writes in the hearts of his dear children, or how he writes indelibly, never to be erased.

[12:16] Yea, I have loved thee. You know, God's dear children, under the weight of their sins, their unbelief, their rebellion, their solemn unworthiness, hearts, they feel and know, and abound to feel and know when the Lord draws near to them, because the divine light shining in their hearts, they know themselves as dust and ashes in his side, worthless, barren, sinful, dark, filthy, foul, or, and the Lord speaks into their hearts, there is bound to be that reaction from their souls, why me?

[13:13] Why such love to me? Why was I made to hear his voice? Ever asked that question?

[13:23] I mean, not intellectually, but, in a moment, when you have felt his sweet presence, what produces this reaction?

[13:38] I have loved thee. Ah, you say in your heart, Lord, I don't deserve it. No, you never will. Sovereign grace, his love, is that scepter of mercy, extended to poor sinners.

[13:56] who don't deserve it. They deserve his wrath and anger. Why the dying thief, when he mocked him on the cross, as he did, he said with his brother, thief, those that savest others, save thyself.

[14:11] Came to know, when he asked, what could he feel, when he asked, he just mocked Jesus, what could he then feel, remember me?

[14:22] Ah, I tell you this, there was utter poverty in that play. utter, total poverty, he hadn't anything he could play, remember me, all he could, ah, but he asked.

[14:36] And oh, hear the love, the everlasting arms of love and mercy were extended to him, when the Lord spoke into his heart in sweet peace, and showed him that he had loved him.

[14:51] Now we come to this, I've loved thee. Ah, if ever Jeremiah was to reach glory, he needed the blood of Christ as much as any.

[15:02] Therefore we see here in the Lord's words, his suffering sorrows, here they are. They lie here in these words of Christ to his heart, they are lovely.

[15:17] Grace for love, we read, hath no man than this, and lay down his life for his friends. this is what the Lord speaks to his people, and you are my friends, you do whatsoever I command you, or the love of Christ.

[15:36] I would speak very reverently, but there is something in the love of Christ which rests here in this, that it is not just a love like we might feel to another, it is something so different.

[16:05] It's a love that is manifested in what it cost him in the pathway walk.

[16:16] we cannot measure until the Lord grant us a glimpse through the lattice. We cannot measure the suffering sorrows of Christ.

[16:34] We catch a glimpse now and then, but in their totality, from the womb to the tomb, here in this service, in his incarnation.

[16:48] In that truth he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. In the path where he walked, in the path of temptation, peculiarly we think of this suffering sorrow and the love that lay behind it, as centering around Gethsemane and the cross.

[17:20] But oh, there was more to it than there. Oh, when we look at the dreadful and awful behaviour of his servant Peter, Christ revealed in his heart the hope of glory, sat down to the Lord's table.

[17:42] Many protestations of what he would do, go with him even to death and yet denied him with oaths and curses. For the sorrows of the Lord, that's only one, so many more.

[17:59] Bitter cut that he walked here in this earth. When we come to Calvary, he was surrounded with sorrows.

[18:13] At his trials, he listened to Peter's blasphemous denials with oaths and curses. His disciples all forsook him and fled. The greatest of all his sorrows was on the cross as he bore the sins of his dear people and uttered that prayer, my God, my God, why has they forsaken me?

[18:40] I say, this is about touching the fringe of his suffering sorrow, but it lies here in this word, yeah, I have loved thee. And the Lord will reveal his love in precious moments in the pathway, often in our deepest sorrow, here below.

[19:06] He will give us a glimpse of what he suffered for us. Your dread crime, says the hymn writer, pierced his heart, sank his soul in fearful blood.

[19:24] His sin atoning blood now procures your peace with God. It is to unworthy, guilty, vile sinner that the Lord speaks this word.

[19:38] It was into the sorrows of Jeremiah's heart. They were, these words, a blessed counterbalance of all his griefs and sorrows. I am the man, he said, as a seen affliction by the right of his wrath.

[19:59] He speaks in the lamentations of his time in the dungeon. And all that that meant to him in his heart, very similar to Jonah going down into the belly of the whale.

[20:15] He filled me with bitterness, made me drunken with wormwood, broken my teeth with gravel, covered me in ashes, removed my soul far off from peace, I forgot prosperity, said my strength and my hope is perished in the Lord.

[20:32] And he says this, remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gore my soul hath still in remembrance and is humble in me. This I recall to my mind, therefore I have a hope, it is of the Lord's mercies that were not consumed.

[20:46] Because his compassions fell not, they knew every morning great is thy faithfulness, the Lord is my portion, saith my soul, therefore will I hope in him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for him.

[20:58] oh how he learnt in that bitter place, the waters that went over his soul, yet he came to realise the love of his God, him and his heart.

[21:17] Oh the Lord brings his dear people down into deep waters and solemn crosses and heavy afflictions bitter cups, that they might value and appreciate the very moment when he speaks to them in such precious truth with blessed power, yea, I have loved thee.

[21:41] It is as though he, and I wouldn't be sentimental, it is as though he would put his hand from the heart of his dear people in their bitterest sorrows, deepest words, with comfort and healing.

[22:01] Yes, Jeremiah, you are full of sorrow, full of grief, full of bitterness, but look at it like this, how light were his suffering, compared with the sufferings of his saviour, how light were his sorrows, compared with the sorrows of his saviour.

[22:24] You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin, and his dear people haven't, but oh how a precious sight they have in his word, spoken to them in their hearts, and we would say this, that when he speaks such words to Jeremiah in his heart, yea, I have loved thee, then there flowed into the dear man's heart the love of Christ.

[22:58] He felt those everlasting arms to be beneath. Have you known it? The love of Christ, says the hymn writer, is rich and free fixed, on his own eternally.

[23:11] my glory, says his word, but I not give to another. The Lord then will reveal his love in our soul.

[23:25] I have said this many, many times, if you and I ever are favoured by divine grace, reach the courts of heaven above, and to sing the anthem of the redeemed, then we must know something of it here, and the anthem is this, on him that loved us.

[23:54] Oh, that precious love of Christ, known and felt in the heart, is what top lady speaks of when he says, love of my God.

[24:09] For him again, with love intense, I burn, chosen of thee, time began, I choose thee in return. We cannot speak of these things unless we have walked in them, but I know this, that when in our unworthiness and our valleys and our temptation, love of the Lord draws near to us and touches our hearts with his love, with his atoning blood, grants us what the psalmist David spoke of in his 51st psalm, a broken heart.

[24:53] heart. Then, in brokenness and contrition of heart, our love will go forth to him because of a solemn, sacred realization, we deserve not the least of all his mercy.

[25:11] Oh, how the Lord would draw his dear people into his loving arms, that he might extend his love to them and manifest it by revelation in their hearts of what he suffered for them in his death, in his life, and that he might and does draw from them their love to him.

[25:43] Broken hearted sinner, on his knees at the mercy seat, under a sweet sense of the drawing near of his God in his soul, oh, there will be fellowship, truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.

[26:10] And the Apostle John goes on to say, if we have fellowship with him, sweet fellowship, then we have fellowship one with another, one with another. Here I believe is the only ground of fellowship in this earth.

[26:25] True fellowship is in Christ. Then we have fellowship one with another. We can speak of those things, as John says, that he's handled, and he's said the good word of life, what has been spoken to him, how Christ has been revealed in all his reality and power and preciousness in his heart.

[26:50] Comes here, the Lord draws near to Jeremiah, and forever, eternally, he writes upon his heart, in the sweet experience of it, yea, I have loved thee, with an everlasting love.

[27:08] That love extends from eternity to eternity, though it is only known in time. Oh, the fulfilment of it will be in glory.

[27:23] Enter into the full love of Christ, there, without a clay between. Here, we have moments, precious moments, says the dear writer, rich, sweet, the moments, rich in blessing, which, before the cross, I spend life and health and peace imparting from the sinner's dying friend.

[27:54] Oh, what a blessed ground of peace that is in this world, and sweet comfort. And God's people who have tasted it once will never be satisfied until they've tasted it again and again.

[28:09] never will they want it more than in a dying hour. But how blessed you to have it now. What an indescribable mercy for the Lord to speak into our hearts with divine power.

[28:24] And it is right there that he has loved us over here. He said to Jeremiah, I know the thoughts that I think towards you, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you an expected end.

[28:43] His life was a life of suffering sorrow, but he had some sweet revelation which counterbalanced it all. And he had Baruch and Ibe Melek who loved him and who his companions, blessed mercy, have one companion in the gospel.

[29:07] One to whom we can speak. Here we see the Lord gave, he made Melek to be the means in going into the king to deliver him that he was ever grateful.

[29:23] The man colored Ethiopian knew that he went down to get permission and he took those old cast clouts and put them under Jeremiah's arms and lifted him out of the pit.

[29:37] The waters he felt had gone over his head. We have the sides of this, two sides, he bet Melek's, and we have Jeremiah's lamentation.

[29:48] Water went over his head, he said, I'm cast out of thy side, just like Jonah. But here was a loving friend who loved him for the truth.

[29:59] son. And when the sack of the city came and he prophesied, told Zedekiah what would happen, then the Lord sent him to Heber Melek, with a blessed promise, Heber Melek.

[30:17] And the promise was this, thou shalt not fall by the sword. But thy life will I give reprievely, because thou hast put thy trust in me.

[30:29] The Lord hath appeared of old, unto me say, but he appeared to dear Ibed Melek. We hear nothing more of the dear godly man. He goes from the page of scripture, but we know he went to heaven.

[30:43] He would not fall by that divine sword of God's wrath, nor by the sword in that city. But his life, beautiful word, was given for a pray, a life of trial and affliction like Jeremiah, but it was given to him, never to be cast into eternal darkness.

[31:07] Why? Because he made me put his trust in the Lord as Jeremiah had. Sorrows, yes, clouded the journey. Danger, darkness, death, were all about them, but their God was with them.

[31:22] And thanks of Elisha at Dothan opened the young man's eyes. What did he see? Ah, cities around him.

[31:34] They that were with them are more than they that were against them. God was there. He was there. And we believe that this is what Jeremiah saw, yeah, I have loved thee, what, with an everlasting love, eternal, unchangeable.

[31:55] Oh, I have prayed for thee, said the Lord of Peter, thy face fell not. One look sent the arrows of condemnation into Peter's heart, and with it went a broken and a contrite heart.

[32:17] Oh, how he went out, what tears those were. He wept bitterly. But in his weeping he knew as Thomas did, the love of Christ coming over the mountains of his sin and his iniquity.

[32:35] He is Ephraim, my dear child, I he is. Sinner though he is, yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love.

[32:49] therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee. Now, a few words on this drawing. Has the Lord drawn your heart to himself?

[33:05] Drawn to your affection? how does that affect you? Does it send you to your knees? Can you not rest until the Lord give you a spirit of prayer to plead with him?

[33:20] Till he appear to you? A beautiful word this is, no man will come unto me except the Father which has sent me, draw him. What is the force that lies in that drawing?

[33:35] It's like the magnet, is it not? There's an unseen power in a magnet. It draws. Oh, it's the love of Christ that draws a sinner.

[33:48] Not the condemnation of his holy law, beautifully spoken of in that lovely little hymn, law and terror do but harden. All the while they work alone, but a sense of blood-bought pardon soon will melt a heart of stone.

[34:04] It'll draw you to Christ, sinner that you are. Oh, sacred drawing influence. It's hard for thee, said the Lord to the Apostle Paul to kick against the pricks.

[34:16] There was a drawing. There was a fighting in it, but the Lord was there. He was drawing him. Has he drawn you?

[34:28] Has he drawn me? Where did he draw you? Where did that influence, that power, that effectual call come in your life?

[34:39] How long ago was it? Can you mark the spot? Can you mark the place? The Lord calls. He called Samuel the third time. Samuel did not yet know the Lord, but there was a drawing.

[34:52] God was drawing near to him to call him. He drew Jacob to himself at Bethel. came to him.

[35:05] And he revealed himself to him. And he spoke to him. It changed the whole course of his life. And the mystery was this. He had a brother, a twin.

[35:20] They were in the same womb together, but one was drawn. The other had no drawing influence at all. He wandered in the world. A carnal man at the end of his day. Those two brothers, Cain and Abel.

[35:33] One was drawn, the other was not. Oh, it's the work of God's Spirit to draw a sinner to cry. When the Lord comes and shines with a light on his work of grace in the heart, then we begin to see that Scripture speaks of our case.

[35:56] grace. But it's the love of Christ revealed to us that draws us to himself. Poor unworthy sinners, and one of the beautiful sides of it is theirs, that we have the super aboundings of grace over the aboundings of sin.

[36:22] and that grace is that compound of love and mercy and it is to be experienced.

[36:35] Then the power that draws is the work of grace in the soul, the love of Christ in the heart, that draws a sinner to Christ. And where does it draw them from?

[36:46] It draws them from this world, separates them, blessed separation, drawn away from it. Not that poor fallen nature doesn't love it still, but sin shall not have dominion over you, not under the law, but under grace.

[37:08] The Lord draws us by his sweet power to himself, draws us out of this world that lies in wickedness and draws us to the living family of God.

[37:22] Has he drawn you? We read so blessedly in Scripture, they went to their own company of you, gone to the company of the living family of God. Is this where you find your companion? Is this where you were led in life's pathway as regards the one you would spend your life with?

[37:47] God's love and love and love and wife are drawn together in the bonds of the everlasting gospel and prayerfully watch their offspring in united prayer.

[38:07] love and love and love and love and love and kindness have I drawn thee, drawn out of nature's darkness, to his marvellous life, drawn away from a wicked world, drawn to himself, and it's God who has done it.

[38:35] Yea, I have loved thee with everlasting love and therefore with loving kind. Beautiful word, isn't it? Oh, the kindness of God to his unworthy people who come under the hymn and there would I have gone.

[39:05] But thou dost all things well. Not left, but drawn to himself.

[39:21] And then in that drawing to understand in experience, feelingly, the loving kindness of our God.

[39:35] And to understand it in the power of his words spoken into our hearts, in all his blessedness. Oh, these are sweet truths.

[39:49] things. And Jeremiah could speak of his own experience. The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee.

[40:09] Amen. Amen.