Sunday, October 02, 2005

Jeremiah 23:10-15 - CONDEMNATION OF FALSE PROPHETS AND FALSE PRIESTS

23:10 For the land is full of adulterers; for because of swearing the land mourneth; the pleasant places of the wilderness are dried up, and their course is evil, and their force is not right.

23:11 For both prophet and priest are profane; yea, in my house have I found their wickedness, saith the LORD.

23:12 Wherefore their way shall be unto them as slippery ways in the darkness: they shall be driven on, and fall therein: for I will bring evil upon them, even the year of their visitation, saith the LORD.

23:13 And I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria; they prophesied in Baal, and caused my people Israel to err.

23:14 I have seen also in the prophets of Jerusalem an horrible thing: they commit adultery, and walk in lies: they strengthen also the hands of evildoers, that none doth return from his wickedness; they are all of them unto me as Sodom, and the inhabitants thereof as Gomorrah.

23:15 Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts concerning the prophets; Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall: for from the prophets of Jerusalem is profaneness gone forth into all the land.

God’s enemies gather together around the horrible evil of false gospels. They preach it everywhere throughout the whole world as well as directly inside churches (in my house). It has “gone forth into all the land“. The pleasant places of the world (the whole world) are perverted distorted ruined into corruption (evil) by those who disrespect (profane) God, who commit adultery loving false gods rather than Christ.

The phrase “in my house” refers directly in his churches both in the Northern Kingdom of Israel (typified by its main city Samaria) and the Southern Kingdom of Judah (typified by its main city Jerusalem).

These false prophets are correctly and appropriately referred to as “prophets of Jerusalem“; they have absolutely no connection with Christ; they are intimately and permanently associated with the perverted religion of man invented on this world; they are not Gospel preachers. They live and preach in darkness; they do not have Christ; they do not have the light of the Gospel. There is no partial value in these false prophets; they are totally corrupt. God’s elect are specifically instructed to not listen to them, to not hearken to them. Their behaviour, their walk is corrupt - all can see it. They are as corrupted as were Sodom and Gomorrah (see Genesis 18).

Endless eternal suffering is proclaimed for them because of their profaneness (their disrespect for God’s character). God ordained that their preaching, their path, their way will cause them to fall, to slip, into darkness (completely removed for God) forever. Christ commits to “feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall“. Wormwood (also called Absinthe) is a plant that yields a bitter extract used to flavor absinthe and formerly as a medicine for intestinal worms. The point here is that Christ will punish them severely for their offenses.

By Ray Bennetts