Charles Spurgeon Commentary Jeremiah 3

They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted?

God himself seems here to be at a loss. His people had gone away from him; they had acted unfaithfully toward him; they had joined themselves to other gods. The case was a very difficult one.

If the Lord takes these people back again, will it not look like putting a premium on sin? That is just the question that is constantly being raised.

If God freely forgives great sinners, will it not look as if he treated sin too leniently? Will not free salvation, by faith in Jesus, lead to sin? The world says that it will; and even Scripture seems to raise the question: If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted?

Yet Judah had been worse than the woman described here.

But thou hast played the harlot with many lovers;

Here was an awful depth of sin, a terrible enormity of wickedness.

Yet return again to me, saith the LORD.

What a splendor of divine love is here revealed! I do not wonder that the question should be put, "How can God act thus, and yet be just?" He can do it, and yet be just, as we have often shown you; but, still, it is a very great wonder of grace.

Lift up thine eyes unto the high places, and see where thou hast not been lien with. In the ways hast thou sat for them, as the Arabian in the wilderness; and thou hast polluted the land with thy whoredoms and with thy wickedness. Therefore the showers have been withholden, and there hath been no latter rain; and thou hadst a whore's forehead, thou refused to be ashamed.

This was very strong, rough language, but oh! how true it was!

The people had gone astray from God into all kinds of filthiness and pollution; and even when God had chastened them by withholding the showers till they were threatened with famine, they did not turn to him. They seemed to have a brow like adamant; they could not be made ashamed. There may be some people of that kind in this assembly; if so, let them notice what God says:

Will you not come back again? You are invited to return to the Lord, despite your wandering, your perverseness, your abominable iniquity. Will you not remember the better days when God was the Guide of your youth? You were not always what you are now. Will you not from this time cry to the Lord, "My Father, you are the Guide of my youth"?

Will he reserve his anger for ever? Will he keep it to the end?

No, that he will not; no one is so slow to anger as our God, and no one is so ready to be rid of it as he is. He is a God ready to pardon, waiting to forgive, delighting in mercy. Even though the sin may be so foul that, as I read it to you, I seem almost to blush in the reading, as you may in the hearing, yet, black as it is, God can put it all away in the greatness of his mercy.

Behold, thou hast spoken and done evil things as thou couldest.

You have gone as far in sin as you could go; only lack of power has prevented you from being even worse than you are. Yet this is the kind of people to whom God speaks in mercy, inviting them to return to him.

The LORD said also unto me in the days of Josiah the king, Hast thou seen that which backsliding Israel hath done? she is gone up upon every high mountain and under every green tree, and there hath played the harlot. And I said after she had done all these things. Turn thou unto me.

Depth of mercy that God should call such a polluted one to return to him. Yet I said, after she had done all these things, Turn thou unto me.