Devotions: Holy Compassion

Thus says the Lord concerning all My wicked neighbors who strike at the inheritance with which I have endowed My people Israel, “Behold I am about to uproot them from their land and will uproot the house of Judah from among them. And it will come about that after I have uprooted them, I will again have compassion on them; and I will bring them back, each one to his inheritance and each one to his land. Then if they will really learn the ways of My people, to swear by My name, ‘As the Lord lives,’ even as they taught My people to swear by Baal, they will be built up in the midst of My people.”

Jeremiah 12:14-16 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Like Isaiah, Jeremiah mourned over the moral decline of his people, but unlike Isaiah, he wrote these prophesies as they were happening. He lived through the capture and exile of Jerusalem. He cried out to God to correct the wrongs being committed by and against his people. God answered by saying that He would punish Israel for her sin, but He would also punish the nations who did her wrong, who helped lead her astray with their false gods. He is the One True God and He will tolerate no rival in our lives. If we turn to Him He will restore us, if we do not we will be turned over to the destruction of our sin. Our God is altogether holy. He cannot be otherwise, and requires the same of us. We are called to be a holy people, set apart for Him alone. We can learn to be a child of God, or turn and follow the ways of the world, but we cannot have both. What sin are you clinging to? What bad habit are you nurturing? What character flaw are you ignoring? He will have compassion on us if we repent. He will restore and heal if we turn to Him. Don’t be afraid to return to Him.

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