Bottom Line

Read Jeremiah 13-15:9
 
Jeremiah 14:19 LORD, have you completely rejected Judah? Do you really hate Jerusalem? Why have you wounded us past all hope of healing? We hoped for peace, but no peace came. We hoped for a time of healing, but found only terror.
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Jeremiah 15:1-2 Then the LORD said to me, “Even if Moses and Samuel stood before me pleading for these people, I wouldn’t help them. Away with them! Get them out of my sight! 2 And if they say to you, ‘But where can we go?’ tell them, ‘This is what the Lord says: “Those who are destined for death, to death; those who are destined for war, to war; those who are destined for famine, to famine; those who are destined for captivity, to captivity.’”
 
PERHAPS one reason many people stay away from Jesus and his church is the bottom line. This is the line that God has established between right and wrong, judgment and salvation. There has been and will be again a certain time when God justly punishes the unjust and rewards the just. Most people do not want to face that defined line. If they would see it, they know they must change. The sinful heart desires the blurry line of self-determination.
   Jeremiah’s prayer in 14:19 is a supplication to God to extend the bottom line into the future. He prays for God to relent and reverse his decision to destroy his nation. Moses and Samuel had prayed similar supplications when there was great sin among Israel. As Jeremiah, these especially chosen prophets and leaders prayed to protect Israel from God’s judgment. The Almighty God had determined this was the bottom line for Judah. And he rejected Jeremiah’s plea. “Those who are destined for death, to death.” and the other “destined” statements are God’s bottom line. 
   This is what we learn of God. He hears our prayers, and he responds to the purpose of his will. The LORD at times answers our intercessions and supplications with, “Yes. I will relent and receive my people back to me.” And sometimes he answers as he does here, “What is destined is certain.” We can be grateful the LORD has a plan and a time of salvation for all who believe. We must live as if that time will come because it will. There is a bottom line to God’s will.