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The Book of Jeremiah – Jer 17:1-13 The Heart is Deceitful Above all Things…

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Jer 17:1-13 The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, and Desperately Wicked

[Study Aired September 5, 2021]

Jer 17:1  The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond: it is graven upon the table of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars;
Jer 17:2  Whilst their children remember their altars and their groves by the green trees upon the high hills.
Jer 17:3  O my mountain in the field, I will give thy substance and all thy treasures to the spoil, and thy high places for sin, throughout all thy borders.
Jer 17:4  And thou, even thyself, shalt discontinue from thine heritage that I gave thee; and I will cause thee to serve thine enemies in the land which thou knowest not: for ye have kindled a fire in mine anger, which shall burn for ever.
Jer 17:5  Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD.
Jer 17:6  For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land and not inhabited.
Jer 17:7  Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is.
Jer 17:8  For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.
Jer 17:9  The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
Jer 17:10  I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.
Jer 17:11  As the partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool.
Jer 17:12  A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary.
Jer 17:13  O LORD, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken the LORD, the fountain of living waters.

In this study we will seek to know the mind of the Lord concerning the meaning of the word ‘heart’. We are told, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it?”

Exactly what is ‘the heart’? This word ‘heart’ appears four times in the 13 verses of our study today, including our first verse:

Jer 17:1  The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond: it is graven upon the table of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars;

We are symbolized by ‘Judah’. In Ezekiel, Judah is symbolized by the younger of two harlot sisters who are married to the Lord. These two harlot sisters have been whores from their youth. They have “one mother” which tells us that these two harlots are within each of us and that they are ‘two’ because they witness to each other that they are the two stages of our harlotry against the Lord. However, we must notice that the latter stage or our whorish apostasy is worse than the earlier stage:

Mat 12:43  When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none.
Mat 12:44  Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished.
Mat 12:45  Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation.

Eze 23:1  The word of the LORD came again unto me, saying,
Eze 23:2  Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother:
Eze 23:3  And they committed whoredoms in Egypt; they committed whoredoms in their youth: there were their breasts pressed, and there they bruised the teats of their virginity.

Who was the mother of these two harlots? The question answers itself. She is “the mother of harlots and of the abomination of the world”:

Rev 17:1  And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:
Rev 17:2  With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
Rev 17:3  So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
Rev 17:4  And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:
Rev 17:5  And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.

All the religions of mankind have replaced Christ with “the imaginations of their own heart”, and that is who ‘Babylon the great’ is. She is a harlot who has forsaken Christ to find favor with the kings of this world.

Ezekiel tells us that this harlot comes to us in two stages – an older sister and a later younger sister who is worse and even more self-righteous harlot than her older sister.

Eze 23:4  And the names of them were Aholah the elder, and Aholibah her sister: and they were mine, and they bare sons and daughters. Thus were their names; Samaria is Aholah, and Jerusalem Aholibah.

Samaria is the capital of the northern kingdom which assumed the name ‘Israel’, and Jerusalem is the capital of the southern kingdom of Judah. Both are from one nation – Israel.

Eze 23:5  And Aholah played the harlot when she was mine; and she doted on her lovers, on the Assyrians her neighbours,
Eze 23:6  Which were clothed with blue, captains and rulers, all of them desirable young men, horsemen riding upon horses.
Eze 23:7  Thus she committed her whoredoms with them, all them that were the chosen men of Assyria, and with all on whom she doted: with all their idols she defiled herself.
Eze 23:8  Neither left she her whoredoms brought from Egypt: for in her youth they lay with her, and they bruised the breasts of her virginity, and poured their whoredom upon her.
Eze 23:9  Wherefore I have delivered her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the Assyrians, upon whom she doted.
Eze 23:10  These discovered her nakedness: they took her sons and her daughters, and slew her with the sword: and she became famous among women; for they had executed judgment upon her.
Eze 23:11  And when her sister Aholibah saw this, she was more corrupt in her inordinate love than she, and in her whoredoms more than her sister in her whoredoms.
Eze 23:12  She doted upon the Assyrians her neighbours, captains and rulers clothed most gorgeously, horsemen riding upon horses, all of them desirable young men.
Eze 23:13  Then I saw that she was defiled, that they took both one way,
Eze 23:14  And that she increased her whoredoms: for when she saw men pourtrayed upon the wall, the images of the Chaldeans pourtrayed with vermilion,
Eze 23:15  Girded with girdles upon their loins, exceeding in dyed attire upon their heads, all of them princes to look to, after the manner of the Babylonians of Chaldea, the land of their nativity:
Eze 23:16  And as soon as she saw them with her eyes, she doted upon them, and sent messengers unto them into Chaldea.
Eze 23:17  And the Babylonians came to her into the bed of love, and they defiled her with their whoredom, and she was polluted with them, and her mind was alienated from them.
Eze 23:18  So she discovered her whoredoms, and discovered her nakedness: then my mind was alienated from her, like as my mind was alienated from her sister.
Eze 23:19  Yet she multiplied her whoredoms, in calling to remembrance the days of her youth, wherein she had played the harlot in the land of Egypt.

These two sisters are not from different families. They are one family… “the daughters of one mother”. A stubborn mother she is, too, because she has a heart that is hardened by the Lord against the Lord:

Isa 63:17  O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

These two sisters symbolize our time in that family of harlots. We all come to Christ through this harlot system. Aholah symbolizes the early stages of that “experience of evil” (Ecc 1:13), and Aholibah symbolizes our later part of that experience of evil. But they are both “the daughters of one mother”:

Rev 18:4  And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.

Neither ‘Aholah’ nor ‘Aholibah’ think of themselves as harlots. They have both convinced themselves that they can have the Lord’s name even as they commit spiritual adultery against Him. This is what we tell ourselves while playing the harlot against our husband, Christ:

Pro 30:20  Such is the way of an adulterous woman; she eateth, and wipeth her mouth, and saith, I have done no wickedness.

That is what we think of ourselves while we are in this despicable position of being given a ‘hardened heart’ (Isa 63:17). When the Lord hardens our heart, we are powerless to resist the temptations of the flesh, and the false doctrines which justify that weakness.

Notice how hopeless we are in that God-ordained condition:

Rom 9:15  For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
Rom 9:16  So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
Rom 9:17  For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.
Rom 9:18  Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.

Exactly what is it that the Lord “hardens” to the extent that our will is not even a factor in what He is doing?

Exo 4:21  And the LORD said unto Moses, When thou goest to return into Egypt, see that thou do all those wonders before Pharaoh, which I have put in thine hand: but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go.

What exactly is a “hardened heart?” It is a heart devoid of understanding the Truth. It is a heart which cannot know or understand who Christ and His Father are.

Notice what the Lord does to harden our hearts:

Job 17:4  For thou hast hid their heart from understanding: therefore shalt thou not exalt them.

Pro 18:2  A fool hath no delight in understanding, but that his heart may discover itself.

Eph 4:18  Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:

When the Lord hides our heart from understanding, takes away our delight in understanding, and darkens our understanding, He has given us a “hardened heart”, and we are merely a “son of perdition” in His hand (2Th 2:3), made to be taken and destroyed (2Pe 2:12). That is the pre-ordained fate of our old man.

2Th 2:3  Let no man deceive you by any means: for  that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;

2Th 2:7  For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way.
2Th 2:8  And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming:

Contrast a deceitful, hardened heart with a whole heart for the Lord:

Job 38:36  Who hath put wisdom in the inward parts? or who hath given understanding to the heart?

Psa 49:3 My mouth shall speak of wisdom; and the meditation of my heart shall be of understanding.

Pro 14:33  Wisdom resteth in the heart of him that hath understanding: but that which is in the midst of fools is made known.

Pro 15:14  The heart of him that hath understanding seeketh knowledge: but the mouth of fools feedeth on foolishness.

The seven churches of Asia are the complete apostate, harlot church. As a whole entity they did not have a heart that sought wisdom, understanding or knowledge of the Lord. This is what the spirit says to the seven churches:

Rev 3:17  Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked:
Rev 3:18  I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see.

The truth that these seven churches are the two-stage harlot wife of Christ within us lies in these words, which are repeated immediately following each admonition to each of the seven churches:

Rev 3:22  He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.

In other words, let Aholibah within us hear what the spirit has admonished Aholah, her older sister.

There were many evil kings of Aholah, the northern kingdom. The first was Jereboam the son of Nebat. There was Ahab and his evil conniving wife, Jezebel, Jehu, etc. Each king rebelled against the Lord as the nation became progressively more rebellious.

This is what we are told of Ahab’s father:

1Ki 16:25  But Omri wrought evil in the eyes of the LORD, and did worse than all that were before him.

Yet we are told that the nation of Judah committed greater adulteries than Israel. This tells us that as we go from church to church, we are not getting closer to Christ. Instead, we are simply becoming more and more self-righteous, and becoming more entrenched in that most insidious sin of self-righteousness (Eze 33:13). It must happen in just that way to bring down the pride of the beast and the pride of the harlot that is within each of us.

Eze 33:13  When I shall say to the righteous, that he shall surely live; if he trust to his own righteousness, and commit iniquity, all his righteousnesses shall not be remembered; but for his iniquity [trusting in his own righteousness] that he hath committed, he shall die for it.

Judah (Aholibah) represents us when we have strayed so far from our Lord that we are forced to acknowledge our transgressions and our self-righteousness. When we are so far from the Lord that we are at our wits’ end, then we are forced to acknowledge our transgressions and our iniquity.

Jer 3:13  Only acknowledge thine iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against the LORD thy God, and hast scattered thy ways to the strangers under every green tree, and ye have not obeyed my voice, saith the LORD.

Nothing is more devastating to the kingdom of our old man than to have to acknowledge his self-righteousness, which stinks in the nostrils of the Lord.

Isa 64:6  But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our [self-]righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities [self-righteousness], like the wind [false doctrines], have taken us away.

Our sin is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond. It is gravened upon the table of our hardened heart and upon the horns of our altars. In other words, we are just that stubborn and rebellious and self-righteous.

This is exactly what Job had asked to be done to him:

Job 19:23  Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!
Job 19:24  That they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever!

When Job made this plea for his words to be memorialized, he was in the same place we are when we are symbolized in scripture by Aholibah, as the most egregious harlot. Because of our stubborn, rebellious, self-righteous nature, we all must be brought to our “wits’ end” before the Lord can give us eyes to see ourselves for the self-righteous whore we all are by nature.

Here is what Job said just prior to making that request:

Job 19:6  Know now that God hath overthrown me, and hath compassed me with his net.
Job 19:7  Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.
Job 19:8  He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths.
Job 19:9  He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head.
Job 19:10  He hath destroyed me on every side, and I am gone: and mine hope hath he removed like a tree.
Job 19:11  He hath also kindled his wrath against me, and he counteth me unto him as one of his enemies.
Job 19:12  His troops come together, and raise up their way against me, and encamp round about my tabernacle.
Job 19:13  He hath put my brethren far from me, and mine acquaintance are verily estranged from me.
Job 19:14  My kinsfolk have failed, and my familiar friends have forgotten me.
Job 19:15  They that dwell in mine house, and my maids, count me for a stranger: I am an alien in their sight.
Job 19:16  I called my servant, and he gave me no answer; I intreated him with my mouth.
Job 19:17  My breath is strange to my wife, though I intreated for the children’s sake of mine own body.
Job 19:18  Yea, young children despised me; I arose, and they spake against me.
Job 19:19  All my inward friends abhorred me: and they whom I loved are turned against me.
Job 19:20  My bone cleaveth to my skin and to my flesh, and I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.
Job 19:21  Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of God hath touched me.
Job 19:22  Why do ye persecute me as God, and are not satisfied with my flesh?
Job 19:23  Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!
Job 19:24  That they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever!
Job 19:25  For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth:

Job’s friends, his wife and his children symbolize Job himself. The Lord is bringing us to see ourselves, our old man, as He sees our old man. In His time, “through much tribulation” we finally come to see that we are “vile”. It is only our hardened heart and our pride which will not relinquish the throne of our hearts and minds.

Our children and we are one family. We simply cannot, of ourselves, give up all we have worked for to establish the kingdom of our old man. However, the Lord knows just what is needed to destroy our old man and his pride and his kingdom:

Jer 17:2  Whilst their children remember their altars and their groves by the green trees upon the high hills.

“Groves [and] green trees” refers to the keeping of the “traditions of men” (Col 2:8). It refers to the “observ[ing of] days, months, times, and years”, so as to fit in with the Christ-hating societies of this world.

Gal 4:9  But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
Gal 4:10  Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years.
Gal 4:11  I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain.

The “groves” which are mentioned so often in the Old Testament were places of worship at which pagans gathered seasonally to keep their pagan holidays and festivals which the Lord gave to them:

Deu 4:19  And lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the LORD thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven.

The Lord laments the fact that He has caused us to follow the nations:

Jer 17:3  O my mountain in the field, I will give thy substance and all thy treasures to the spoil, and thy high places for sin, throughout all thy borders.

“Mountains” symbolize kingdoms in scripture, and the field is the world” according to our Lord Himself:

Dan 2:35  Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.

Mat 13:38  The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one;

We are the Lord’s “inheritance”, and He is our “heritage”. He must cleanse us of our filthy ways before He can abide in us:

Jer 17:4  And thou, even thyself, shalt discontinue from thine heritage that I gave thee; and I will cause thee to serve thine enemies in the land which thou knowest not: for ye have kindled a fire in mine anger, which shall burn for ever.
Jer 17:5  Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD.

Christ makes clear that this prophecy concerns Himself and His words:

Luk 12:49  I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled?

It is a very instructive fact that the first thing formed by the Lord in a mother’s womb is not the brain of a child, but it is “the heart”. What does this “thing that [is] made” tell us about the invisible things of God” (Rom 1:20)? This is what we learn about the invisible things of God from the fact that the heart is formed first and then the head and the brain:

Rom 1:20  For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

1Co 15:46  Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual.

Depending upon ourselves or trusting in men or our flesh is to “follow our heart”, and when we ‘follow our heart’ we are inevitably “departing from the Lord”, and that is spiritual adultery.

Notice how closely related our carnal mind is to our hardened heart:

Deu 28:65  And among these nations shalt thou find no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest: but the LORD shall give thee there a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind:

Dan 5:20  But when his heart was lifted up, and his mind hardened in pride, he was deposed from his kingly throne, and they took his glory from him:

Our self-righteousness is as natural as breathing because ‘that which is natural’ first dominates, “and afterward that which is spiritual”.

Jer 17:6  For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land and not inhabited.

Such is the fate of our old man. “A heath in the desert”, refers to “a juniper (from its nudity…)”

Here is the Hebrew word which is translated as ‘heath’:

A juniper is contrasted with “a tree planted by the waters”:

Jer 17:7  Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is.
Jer 17:8  For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.

“The man that trusts in the Lord” is not living now with a hardened heart. “The man… whose hope the Lord is” does not “lean to his own understanding” and acknowledges that “it is God [who] works in [Him] both to will and to do of His good pleasure.”

Pro 3:5  Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.

It is obvious that there is a very close connection between the heart and the mind, the “understanding”. The apostle Paul expresses this fact in these words:

Rom 7:15  For that which I do [by following my heart] I allow not [in the spirit of my mind]: for what I would [in my mine], that do I not; but what I hate [in my mind], that do I [through “the law of sin which is in my members”, my flesh, my ‘heart’].
Rom 7:16  If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law [of Christ] that it is good.
Rom 7:17  Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh, [my hardened heart]) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:21  I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
Rom 7:22  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members [my carnal hardened heart].

Gen 6:5  And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Where did men get their “preparations of the heart”?

Pro 16:1  The preparations of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the LORD.

That is right! The Lord made us evil for our own day of our destruction:

Pro 16:4  The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

“The thoughts of [our heart are] only evil continually.”

Gen 27:41  And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing wherewith his father blessed him: and Esau said in his heart, The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then will I slay my brother Jacob.

Abraham’s carnal ‘heart’ could not conceive of him and Sarah having a child in their old age:

Gen 17:17  Then Abraham fell upon his face, and laughed, and said in his heart, Shall a child be born unto him that is an hundred years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear?

It is the Lord’s mercy which takes away our hardened “heart of stone” and replaces it with “a heart of flesh”:

Eze 36:22  Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name’s sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen, whither ye went.
Eze 36:23  And I will sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the heathen, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, saith the Lord GOD, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes.
Eze 36:24  For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land.
Eze 36:25  Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you.
Eze 36:26  A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.
Eze 36:27  And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

When the Lord replaces our “stony heart [with] a heart of flesh”, He is giving us a desire to please Him spiritually, and He is taking away our hardened carnal mind. Our hearts are not literal stone, and “a heart of flesh” is not a literal heart of flesh. “A heart of flesh” here is the positive application of the word ‘flesh’, because the truth is:

1Co 15:50  Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

Deu 4:29  But if from thence thou shalt seek the LORD thy God, thou shalt find him, if thou seek him with all thy heart and with all thy soul.

Deu 4:39  Know therefore this day, and consider it in thine heart, that the LORD he is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath: there is none else.

Deu 5:29  O that there were such an heart in them, that they would fear me, and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children for ever!

Deu 6:5  And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.

As the self-righteous, proud and stubborn whores we are, we think we are “a tree planted by the waters”, when this is the reality of who we are as the rebellious, self-righteous, pride-filled, carnal-minded old man we are:

Pro 30:20  Such is the way of an adulterous woman; she eateth, and wipeth her mouth, and saith, I have done no wickedness.

Rev 3:17  Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked:

Truer words than these have never been written:

Jer 17:9  The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
Jer 17:10  I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.

It is a truly deceived heart which convinces itself that it is “rich and increased with goods and in need of nothing” when the reality is that we are “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.” It is a deceived heart in an adulterous woman who can convince herself that she had done “no wickedness”. Such is the extent of our pride in the self-righteous heart of our old man. That is just how concerned we are with our standing and our reputation with this world. That is how little our hardened heart cares for our reputation with the Lord.

The Lord sees right through us though and rewards us “according to [our]works”. We are not fooling him one moment. The Lord “searches the heart and tries the reins” and He gives us “according to the fruit of our doings”:

1Co 3:13  Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is.

Gal 6:7  Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
Gal 6:8  For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.

Rev 20:12  And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.
Rev 20:13  And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.

Our ‘works’ are not our own, good or evil. It is God who is working “all things” including the evil in the city… after the counsel of His own will. We do nothing of ourselves:

Joh 15:5  I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing [good or evil].

Pro 16:4  The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

Isa 63:17  O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

Amo 3:6  Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?

Eph 1:11  In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

It is “His own will” that those who bear His name will live lives that reflect His character. If anyone thinks that “good works” are not required for salvation, that person has yet to learn that we are “created unto good works which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.”

Eph 2:8  For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Eph 2:9  Not of [our own] works, lest any man should boast.
Eph 2:10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

“We are His workmanship.” Our works are not of ourselves. It is He who is “working all things after the counsel of His own will”. If we claim His name, we must live lives that reflect His character, and it is “by grace”, His chastening grace, that He sees to it His “very elect” are made to reflect His character:

Tit 2:11  For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,
Tit 2:12  Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;

The word translated as ‘teaching’ in Titus 2:12 is the Greek word ‘paideuo’. It is most often translated as ‘chastening’, as in this verse of scripture:

Heb 12:6  For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth [paideuo], and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.

Here is Strong’s definition of this word followed by the list of entries and the various translations of this word in the King James Version:

Here is how ‘paideuo’ is variously translated in the King James Version:

Our heavenly Father has no use for the ‘greasy grace’ in which far too many believe.  It was being taught in Paul’s day that we should “sin that grace may abound”, and Paul forbade that doctrine:

Rom 6:1  What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?
Rom 6:2  God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?

It is toward any who believe such lies that our next verses apply:

Jer 17:11  As the partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool.
Jer 17:12  A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary.

The riches of Christ are gotten only “by right” because they are all “tried in the fire” which is the ‘right’:

Rev 3:17  Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked:

Rev 3:18  I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see.

“Gold tried in the fire” is the words and doctrines of Christ. That is “the place of our sanctuary” because our ‘sanctuary’ is Christ who is seated with His Father on His Father’s throne, which is high above all things on this earth.

Jer 17:13  O LORD, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth [not “in heaven”], because they have forsaken the LORD, the fountain of living waters.

Luk 10:20  Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.

The day is “at hand, even at the door” when the Lord Himself will manifest who is and who is not His people. He will then make very clear who serves Him and who serves Him not:

Mal 3:13  Your words have been stout against me, saith the LORD. Yet ye say, What have we spoken so much against thee?
Mal 3:14  Ye have said, It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the LORD of hosts?
Mal 3:15  And now we call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up; yea, they that tempt God are even delivered.
Mal 3:16  Then they that feared the LORD spake often one to another: and the LORD hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the LORD, and that thought upon his name.
Mal 3:17  And they shall be mine, saith the LORD of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him.
Mal 3:18  Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not.

Mat 24:32  Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh:
Mat 24:33  So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors.
Mat 24:34  Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.
Mat 24:35  Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.

That is our study for today. I pray we are all on our guard against our own desperately wicked and deceitful hearts and that we can discern him that serves God and him that serves Him not.

Here are our verses for next week’s study:

Jer 17:14  Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.
Jer 17:15  Behold, they say unto me, Where is the word of the LORD? let it come now.
Jer 17:16  As for me, I have not hastened from being a pastor to follow thee: neither have I desired the woeful day; thou knowest: that which came out of my lips was right before thee.
Jer 17:17  Be not a terror unto me: thou art my hope in the day of evil.
Jer 17:18  Let them be confounded that persecute me, but let not me be confounded: let them be dismayed, but let not me be dismayed: bring upon them the day of evil, and destroy them with double destruction.
Jer 17:19  Thus said the LORD unto me; Go and stand in the gate of the children of the people, whereby the kings of Judah come in, and by the which they go out, and in all the gates of Jerusalem;
Jer 17:20  And say unto them, Hear ye the word of the LORD, ye kings of Judah, and all Judah, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, that enter in by these gates:
Jer 17:21  Thus saith the LORD; Take heed to yourselves, and bear no burden on the sabbath day, nor bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem;
Jer 17:22  Neither carry forth a burden out of your houses on the sabbath day, neither do ye any work, but hallow ye the sabbath day, as I commanded your fathers.
Jer 17:23  But they obeyed not, neither inclined their ear, but made their neck stiff, that they might not hear, nor receive instruction.
Jer 17:24  And it shall come to pass, if ye diligently hearken unto me, saith the LORD, to bring in no burden through the gates of this city on the sabbath day, but hallow the sabbath day, to do no work therein;
Jer 17:25  Then shall there enter into the gates of this city kings and princes sitting upon 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 shall remain for ever.
Jer 17:26  And they shall come from the cities of Judah, and from the places about Jerusalem, and from the land of Benjamin, and from the plain, and from the mountains, and from the south, bringing burnt offerings, and sacrifices, and meat offerings, and incense, and bringing sacrifices of praise, unto the house of the LORD.
Jer 17:27  But if ye will not hearken unto me to hallow the sabbath day, and not to bear a burden, even entering in at the gates of Jerusalem on the sabbath day; then will I kindle a fire in the gates thereof, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall not be quenched.

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