Lying words.
These were "lying words," as being used by false men for a false purpose. Literally true, for it was "the temple of the Lord" that stood in the midst of the land, and in the gate of which this message was delivered,—they were false in spirit, for the deceitful prophets thought thus to make the sanctity of the material structure a cover for the iniquities of the people—a charm to ward off their threatened punishment. The cry was indicative of a hollow and rotten condition of things throughout the entire system of social life. "The prophets prophesied falsely, and the priests bore rule by their means, and the people loved to have it so" (Jeremiah 5:31). We may take these words in three different lights, as reflecting—
I. THE SPIRITUAL PRIDE THAT LEADS MEN TO THINK THEMSELVES THE SPECIAL OBJECTS OF THE DIVINE FAVOR. This was the characteristic vice of the Jewish people. The distinctions God conferred on them—that they were separate among the nations as "Abraham's seed' and the chosen covenant people, that they had the temple of the Lord among them—were made occasions for national vain-glory, instead of incentives to holy character and noble deed. The same principle is illustrated whenever superior enlightenment, knowledge of truth, spiritual gifts, personal sanctity, ecclesiastical advantage, etc; lead in any way to self-exaltation. Nothing more unseemly than this. If in any such sense "the temple of the Lord' is with us, it may be expected that the shadow of it will produce in us a solemn sense of responsibility. Special privilege brings with it corresponding obligations. Whatever tokens of his favor God bestows on us, their due effect is to lead us to walk with the greater self-forgetfulness and reverential fear before him.
II. THE HYPOCRISY THAT MAKES THE "FORM OF GODLINESS" A SUBSTITUTE FOR ITS "POWER." What availed it that the temple of the Lord stood among them, if the spirit of devotion had departed? The sacred shrine in which they boasted was but a mockery of their internal falseness. The essence of Pharisaism lies in this resting in the outward and apparent, to the neglect of the inward, the spiritual, the real. None so far from God as they who imagine that a mere round of external observances will please him apart from the sincere homage of the soul. "This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoreth me with their lips," etc. (Matthew 15:8).
III. THE SELF-DECEPTION THAT PUTS ON THE GARB OF A RELIGIOUS PROFESSION AS A CLOKE FOR SIN AND A SHIELD FROM ITS PENALTY. The people did wickedly, and then went and stood before the Lord in the house called by his Name, and said, "We are delivered" (Jeremiah 7:10)—a striking illustration of the folly of those who dream that, so long as they pay public homage to the sovereignty of God's claims, they may violate his laws with impunity. It is a delusive dream that must have, sooner or later, a dread awakening. The mere material temple, glorious as it may be, is no sanctuary for a guilty conscience and a corrupt life. Simply to "lay hold on the horns of the altar" will not save us from the Divine retributions, the Nemesis that tracks the footsteps of the transgressor. Merely to cry, "Lord, Lord!" will never avert from men the sentence, "Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity ' (Luke 13:25-27).—W.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG