Turn to Jeremiah 17. The sin of Judah is written down with an iron stylus. With a diamond point it is engraved upon the tablet of their heart and on the horns of their altars. As they remember their children, so they remember their altars and their asherim. By green trees on the high hills, on a mountain of mine in the countryside, or O mountain of mine, rather, in the countryside, I will give you over your wealth and all your treasures for booty, your high places for sin throughout your borders. And you will, even of yourself, let go of your inheritance that I gave you, And I will make you serve your enemies in the land which you do not know. For you have kindled a fire in my anger which will burn forever. Thus says the Lord, Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind, and makes flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from the Lord. For he will be like a bush in the desert, and will not see when prosperity comes, but will live in stony wastes in the wilderness, a land of salt without inhabitant. Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, and whose trust is the Lord. For he will be like a tree planted by the water that extends its roots by a stream, and will not fear when the heat comes. But its leaves will be green, and it will not be anxious in a year of drought, nor cease to yield fruit. The heart is more deceitful than all else, and desperately sick. Who can understand it? I, the Lord, search the heart. I test the mind, even to give to each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds. As a partridge that hatches eggs which it has not laid, so is he who makes a fortune, but unjustly. In the midst of his days it will forsake him. And in the end, he will be a fool. A glorious throne on high from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary. O Lord, the hope of Israel, all who forsake you will be put to shame. Those who turn away on earth will be written down because they have forsaken the fountain of living water. Even the Lord. Heal me. Lord, and I will be healed. Save me and I will be saved for you are my praise. Look, they keep saying to me, where is the word of the Lord? Let it come now. But as for me. I have not hurried away from being a shepherd after you, nor have I longed for the woeful day. You yourself know that the utterance of my lips was in your presence. Do not be a terror to me. You are my refuge in the day of disaster. Let those who persecute me be put to shame. But as for me, let me not be put to shame. Let them be dismayed, but let me not be dismayed. Bring on them a day of disaster, and crush them with a twofold destruction. Thus the Lord said to me, Go and stand in the public gate through which the kings of Judah come in and go out, as well as in all the gates of Jerusalem, and say to them, Listen to the word of the Lord, kings of Judah and all Judah and all inhabitants of Jerusalem who come in through these gates. Thus says the Lord, take heed for yourselves and do not carry any load on the Sabbath day or bring anything in through the gates of Jerusalem. You shall not bring a load out of your houses on the Sabbath day nor do any work but keep the Sabbath day holy as I commanded your forefathers. Yet they did not listen or incline their ears but stiffen their necks in order not to listen or take correction. But it will come about if you listen attentively to me. declares the Lord, to bring no load in through the gates of this city on the Sabbath day, but to keep the Sabbath day holy by doing no work on it. Then will come in through the gates of this city kings and princes sitting on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses. They and their princes, the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem and this city will be inhabited forever." They will come in from the cities of Judah, and from the environs of Jerusalem, and from the land of Benjamin, and from the lowland, and from the hill country, and from the Negev, or the south, bringing burnt offerings, sacrifices, grain offerings, and incense, and bringing sacrifices of thanksgiving to the house of the Lord. But if you do not listen to Me to keep the Sabbath day holy by not carrying and coming in through the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day. Then I will kindle a fire in its gates, and it will devour the palaces of Jerusalem and not be quenched." Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Almighty God, we give You thanks for Your Word. We pray, Lord, that You will, as we take a look at Your Word, not let our hearts deceive us, but that You will be true, and You will show Yourself true. And our hearts, when they are not following after You, show them to be false. And let us turn and follow You. Let us love and serve You. Let us bring You glory in all of our lives. that you might be pleased to bless us. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen. I imagine that you are a lot like everyone beside you and in front of you and behind you. I imagine this because, well, you are. You have been affected by the fall. Just as I have and even though you name the name of Christ you struggle You struggle with sin you you've likely struggled with the same sin for years and Sometimes you wonder How is it that I am going to overcome this I What if I said to you that by keeping the Lord's Day, you're preparing yourself to obey all God's other commandments? What if I said to you, by the neglect of it, you're ushering in impiety and irreligion? What would you think? Would you agree or disagree? You know I'm going to get you if you say anything, right? If you agree, you agree, of course, with Scripture and with the larger catechism. Westminster Larger Catechism 121 spells out that the Lord's Day is a blessing and it is an aid in keeping all of our duties. It says this, why is the word remember set in the beginning of the fourth commandment? The word remember is set in the beginning of the fourth commandment partly because of the great benefit of remembering it. We being thereby helped in our preparation to keep it, and in keeping it, better able to keep all the rest of the commandments, and to continue a thankful remembrance of the two great benefits of creation and redemption." And you can go on to read, "...the way in which the Lord's Day is a blessing to us in keeping in keeping the law, in following after holiness. And that's the very principle that we see in Jeremiah 17. Right? Jeremiah 17 sets before us the reality that the neglect of the Sabbath is evidence of a heart that neglects the Lord. Right? It's evidence of a heart that neglects the Lord, and that always leads to judgment. That's what you get in chapter 17. That the neglect of the Sabbath is evidence of a heart that neglects the Lord which always leads to judgment. Which then tells us we ought to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. We have two points which we're going to take up. We're going to see firstly the inner root of the sin of Judah. That's verses 1 through 18. The inner root of the sin of Judah, and then we'll see the outward fruit of the sin of Judah. That's verses 19 through 28. The inner root and the outward fruit. Inner root and the outward fruit. As you look at chapter 17, most people break the chapter in two. They deal with the first part because everybody really wants to get to verse 9, and that's the verse that we all know from Jeremiah 17. The heart is deceitful and wicked above all things. And that's what you tell your kids, and that's what you tell other people when you're getting them in a gotcha moment about how we behave before the Lord, right? That the heart is wicked and deceitful above all things, But you can't break it up that way. As a matter of fact, it's not dealing with two different things, but if you pay attention to what's happening here, you actually see that what's described in the first half as something that's an inner turmoil or an inner expression is in the second half an outward expression. The first half is Judah dealing with its sin internally, right? That's why it says, an iron stylus, a diamond point engraved upon the tablet of the heart. And the second half is dealing with their outward expression. And so then the sin of Judah, which is described internally in the first half, is again outwardly expressed in the second half. And so Jeremiah begins describing Judah as having sin engraved on their heart. Right? Sin engraved on their heart. Now, you understand that engraving is much deeper than something on the surface. Engraving is not writing on a pencil, writing on a paper with a pencil. I love you. That's on the surface. You can just take a little rubber eraser and it comes off. It's no longer there. No, this is engraving, he says. Not just with any engraving. It's with an iron stylus and with a diamond point. Right? And you thought we were the first to come up with diamond grinders and to realize that diamonds are a strong substance. No. No, no. Etching deep. It's like writing on the tree, carving in deep and going back years later and it's still there. Well, that's the way their sin is on their heart. Their sin is engraved deep. Their sin then is expressed primarily in profaning and desecrating the Sabbath. You'll see that by what the Lord says to them. That's the expression of their sin. Right? And it plays out in a couple of ways. It plays out in sins of omission, things that they neglect to do, Right? They don't keep the heart, like Proverbs tells us. For out of it flow the issues of life. They don't observe the Sabbath. And out of that then, they don't remember the Sabbath, rather. Out of that then, you get sins of commission, doing what is forbidden. And that's what you see from the outset, right? They're involved in the worship of idols. Their sin is engraved on their heart. What is it? They remember their children. They remember their altars and their asherim, their idolaters, by green trees on the high hills. That's where idols were worshipped. They were on every high hill. That's where they set up their idol worship. And so then, they have neglected the Sabbath. And that is actually the fruit not the root of their issues. That's what comes out. It's the fruit. It's what sends them to exile. That's the fruit, not the root of their issue. And so as you look at the Lord as He's dealing with them here, as Jeremiah is setting it out before them, He's going to set it out and He says, listen, because of your sin, You're willingly letting go of your inheritance. Right? Verse 4, "...and you will let go of your inheritance." That's the nature of idolatry. Right? The nature of idolatry is to turn away from the Lord and to trust in anything other than the Lord. And that's what Jeremiah sets out for them by way of contrast. He's going to do that in verses 5 and 6 and then in 7 and 8. Right? What's the inner sin of Judah that shows its fruit in their neglect of the Sabbath? Their trusting in man. Verse 5, Thus says the Lord, Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind, and makes flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from the Lord. That's the crisis as it comes to expression outwardly. It starts deep within. And so then there's the trust of man. And then verse 7 and 8 is going to give us the contrast. The trust of the Lord. But the outcomes of the two are compared here. Trusting in man, trusting in the Lord. And so He tells us what it means to trust in man, doesn't He? And makes flesh His strength. His heart turns away from the Lord. Right? And so that's what idolatry is. It's any trust that is not directed to the Lord. It's looking or trusting in anything else. It's trusting in man. It's idolatry because it's trusting something other than the Lord. And as he says then in verse 4, to trust anything other than the Lord is to seek a curse. That's why they're bringing it on themselves. They are actively seeking the curse rather than the blessing of God. That's what we do when we trust in anything or anyone other than the Lord. They are seeking then for themselves what Christ experienced for us. Right? Christ walks in perfect communion with God, and walks in fellowship with Him, but when the Lord makes Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, what happens? That perfect fellowship, that communion is now uttered in words like this, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from me? Right? Psalm 22. It's words on the cross. Well, for those who are close to the Lord, those who seek the Lord, who find their trust in Him, their curse has been borne by Christ. They are not cast off. But Judah, in following after idols, is actively seeking that curse, being cast off from the Lord. And so then, He's writing, remember, remember this, he's writing to the church. Judah is God's people. He's writing to the Old Testament saints, so that he's writing to those who belong to the Lord. The reality is for us, then that this holds true. The very moment that you begin to seek anything other than the Lord, you are inviting God's covenant threatenings upon you. You're inviting the Lord's curse. If it ends in apostasy, right, that's a very fine line between backsliding and apostasy. They start in the exact same place, we've already said, as we've looked in Jeremiah. You're inviting, well, what we read in 1 John. Going out from us because they're not of us But a hair's breadth between the two backsliding and apostasy And so then, to turn away from the Lord is to voluntarily seek out the desert, right? The man who trusts in mankind, the man who trusts in anything other than the Lord, verse 6, will be like a bush in the desert, and he will not see when prosperity comes, but will live in stony wastes in the wilderness, a land of salt without inhabitant. Now think of this, he's writing to Judah. The people who have been blessed with the land of milk and honey, the people who have been promised great growth, great blessing, great abundance for every need to be met, but the very moment their hearts place trust in anything other than the Lord, they're seeking, well, they're like a plant seeking to be moved from its water source. They're seeking out salty lands and barrenness. That's what it means to trust in man. They voluntarily go to a howling wasteland where you will not be nourished, where you will not be fed, where you will not grow. And then he contrasts it with seeking the Lord, doesn't he? Blessed is the man whose trust is in the Lord, for he will be like a tree planted by the water that extends its roots by a stream, and will not fear when the heat comes." That's quite the contrast. Not a shabby bush, it's a tree. A well-watered, well-planted tree that grows and flourishes. And so that's the picture here. That's the picture here. And so then, what's Judah's problem? Well, it's that she doesn't see that she's the one trusting in man. That's why verse 9 is there. That's why he says, "...the heart is deceitful and wicked above all things." Because Judah is going to say, no, no, no, no, not us. And he goes on to say, well, then you need the searching, searching of the Lord. So the Lord is the one who searches the hearts and they are like the plant then that forsook its water source. How do we know? Well, that's the second half of the chapter. That's the part wherein you get the outward fruit of Judah's sin. Verse 19, the Lord sends Jeremiah to the people's gate, or the public gate, where kings and all the people come through. And what message does He send him with? Well, He sends him to call attention to the fourth commandment. He tells them to hear, take heed to themselves, listen. Don't come in and out with loads on your shoulders. Right? He's speaking to them about their relationship with the Lord. This is a first table violation. They are those who are not walking with the Lord. So how do they show that they're not people who trust in the Lord? They don't remember His day. Right? That's one of the surest ways that we trust the Lord. The world is ever at work, ever restless, ever pursuing her own desires, ever going after everything but the Lord. But the Lord's people show their trust in Him by an holy resting all the day. In their works, words, recreations, Employments. And so they trust God with that day. Right? Those who are trusting in the Lord are those who rest unto worship. Those who are not trusting in the Lord never rest unto worship. They go about trying to move and to do and to do more and more in order to have more and more because they've been captivated by the sin of idolatry. Right? It's amazing how that happens. You don't rest in the Lord because you're resting in something else. It works out in this. And so then, they're trusting in themselves and other men. And it's demonstrated in that they do not trust the Lord, and follow His command. And so Jeremiah sets it before them, the command of your forefathers. Well, who then is to avoid work? Who is to rest unto worship? Well, you, your sons, your daughters, your male servants, your female servants, your ox, your cattle, the stranger that's within your gates. Right? It's an all-encompassing command. You hear that and immediately, immediately your heart wants to trust in anything other than the Lord, doesn't it? You begin to work on looking for exceptions a lot of times. Well, what about this? Right? That's where our heart runs. Well, what about that? Instead of, how can I seek to obey the Lord? Well, as much as possible. Out of love to Him. How can I obey Him more? Right? That's not usually our problem. Our problem is usually, how much can I get away with? Right? And so then we rest unto worship. We rest so that we can look to God. Right? This is nothing new. People have always grumbled about what they can't do rather than what they can do. on the Lord's day, rather than focusing on the things which are meant to bring us near to what ought to be our heart's desire, the Lord. Right? We ought to pursue works of mercy, works of necessity, works of piety. How often then instead are we like the children of Israel and Amos, right? Amos is writing to them, interesting how this happens, about this very same sin and listen to what they say. Amos writes to them, he says, Hear this, you who swallow up the needy and make the poor of the land fail, saying, When will the new moon be past that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath that we may trade wheat? So here's the question. How often on the Lord's Day does your heart reveal what you really want? What you really trust in? Look, I've got a lot to do. I've been busy at work. I just can't get it all done. I need to accomplish this now. Rather than wait. Rather than trust the Lord in that time and to pursue How often do our hearts deceive us? We have stuff to do, stuff to accomplish. Now answer this honestly. If you're dying for the Lord's day to be over so you can get on with life, who are you trusting? What are you trusting in? Right? Money is the God of our culture. So that's why there's a wholesale desecration of the Lord's Day in our day, right? It shouldn't be in the church. He's writing to the church. He's writing to the saints, the congregation in the wilderness. They're not in the wilderness here, but they're in the land. They're still the congregation. So why does the Lord send Jeremiah? Is it so that he can press us down and make us miserable? Right? That's what a lot of people think. The Lord's Day is all about the Lord making me miserable. Well, no. He's calling them to observe His day that He might bless them. Look at verses 24 and following. Alright? Verse 24. He says, but it will come about if you listen attentively to me, declares the Lord, to bring no load in through the gates of this city on the Sabbath, but to keep the Sabbath day holy and do no work on it. Then there will come in through the gates of this city kings and princes sitting on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their princes, the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and this city will be inhabited forever. They will come from the cities of Judah, and from the environs of Jerusalem, from the land of Benjamin, and the lowland, from the hill country, and from the Negev, or south, bringing burnt offerings, sacrifices, grain offerings, and incense, bringing sacrifices of thanksgiving to the house of the Lord." It's a festive blessing the Lord gives in His day, and He wants to bless His people. Right? Is one day in seven misery? No. No, it's the way that He pours out His blessing so that they actually accomplish, well, the thing that they desire to accomplish, and they've been trying by their own doing, not by trusting Him, but in themselves, He does it. And so it is in the church. The Lord blesses His church when His people honor His day. In other words, he says, do you want to reform your land, Judah? Do you want to see the blessing of God? Honor the Lord's Day, honor the Sabbath, right? The key is found in the return to the worship of God, not in the suppression of sin, right? What does he tell them is part of that blessing? Well, it begins in verse 26, that they're going to come, they're going to bring sacrifice, return to a right worship, and the rest, well, by God's grace, the Lord will take care of. honoring the Sabbath enables us, helps us, keeps us, that we might go forward and keep, well, the fifth through the tenth. And so then, honoring the Lord's Day as a testimony of trust of the Lord. It's to say whatever else I might find important in this life, whatever else I might think is necessary, I know that the Lord says this is blessing to me and I rest and trust in Him more than my own heart which will deceive me and tell me it's okay to pursue these necessary, put that in quote, things. Right? I trust Him more than men because there's a corresponding threatening, isn't there? He promises blessing if they listen, if they will hearken to Him, if they will observe and remember the Lord's Day. But verse 27 says, if you do not listen to Me to keep the Sabbath day holy, not carrying a load and coming in and out, then I will kindle a fire in its gates and devour the palaces of Jerusalem and it will not be quenched. Right? If they turn from the Lord, they trust in themselves, they trust in men. Exile. Right? The neglect of the Lord's day is to walk toward exile. Voluntarily. And the truth of the matter is, they struggle with it for the rest of their history. You'll see it in the latter prophets. You'll see it in those after a return from exile. They struggle, right? Nehemiah and others, they struggle. That's because, well, trusting the Lord is not natural to us. Actually, trusting in ourselves is what's natural. And we think we need every hour we have for ourself, but the reality is, well, we make the most of our time, the best use of our time when we honor the Lord as He's asked. So why are we to observe the Sabbath? Well, because to turn away from the Lord and to seek something other than His blessing or the blessing of His day is to seek a curse. To have others work for us is to say, well, let them receive the curses. Right? You want to see a church that's not blessed, even if they're large? Watch how they observe the Lord's Day. And so then the neglect of the Sabbath is actually the sin of the church today. Right, I sit in and watch presbytery exams where man after man after man after man takes an exception to our standards in the fourth commandment. to what we believe here, or what we profess to believe. We're outraged, aren't we, over sins that we see that are out there, the breakdown of the family, abortion, all of those things. And the fact of the matter is this, that even if the law turned, and those who make a law, they outlaw abortion, somehow set it up so that families cannot be broken. They make divorce harder for those who pursue it. They only give the biblical grounds for it. And that's the only thing allowed. The men who set that up, well, they can still die and go to hell. It doesn't mean that they're necessarily pursuing the Lord. What's the way that we show outwardly our pursuit? We honor the Lord's Day and walk after Him in that. If you honor the first table, the second table follows a little more easily. The law stands together. And so Jeremiah is writing to a people who inwardly have already turned and put their trust elsewhere. And so outwardly it's manifested in, well, in dishonoring the Lord's Day or the Sabbath. And so what do we do with this? Well, one, we remember it's to the church, right? He's not writing against those outside the church, though all men everywhere are commanded to worship God, and the way to worship Him is prescribed in the Scriptures, and that's on the Lord's day in the house of God with the people of God. That is the case, right? But it's not written to them. It's written to us. to make a stop to examine our own hearts. Do I trust in myself, in my own doing, in what I can set up and make right? Or do I trust the Lord and give Him my time? Because, well, number one, I want to be with Him in a special presence. Number two, I want His blessing upon me in my life. I want to draw near to Him and be closer to Him. And so we stop and we examine ourselves, we examine, well, we examine our body. And we see those who are lacking, those who are not honoring the Lord's Day, well, we call them. Thankfully, most of us have a high view of the Lord's Day here. We show up for worship. But, we are to be those who look around. who call on others to honor the Lord's day, that they might not walk away. Because that's the way it happens, right? It's easier to walk away once you're already away. People who are off to themselves, they begin to die like that coal scraped away from the fire. And so you encourage people who are away, those who haven't been, those who are struggling, even those with health problems and they can't make it regularly. Well, you go and you bring with you the blessing of the Lord, you know, that you received on the Lord's Day. You encourage their hearts. And so we ought to consider the serious nature of the Lord's Day. And we ask ourselves, have I deceived myself? Would I rather have my pleasure on this day, and really I want it to be over, or would I rather give myself all day into a holy resting? Resting unto worship. Resting unto what the Lord would have to bless me. Let's go to the Lord.