Jeremiah 17:9 - Oh How We Need Jesus!
Jeremiah 17:9 - Oh How We Need Jesus!
Jeremiah 17:9 (NLT) The human heart is most deceitful and
desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?
An important verse describing the natural condition of man.
[Ryrie SB]
When God created human beings in his own image, there was no
sin in the human heart. However, God made humans free to choose
whether to obey or disobey. When Adam and Eve disobeyed, sin entered the
heart of the human race. As the first humans fell into sin, they
condemned all those yet to be born to come into this world with a
stubborn, sinful nature.
Humanity has fallen a long way from the perfection of the
Garden of Eden--so far that God considers the human heart to be
"deceitful" and "desperately wicked." Even those who are saved and made new
in Christ have hearts that are still inclined toward sinning.
Thankfully, believers are no longer in complete bondage to sin. We can
choose not to sin, and when we fall we can count on God's forgiveness
and the arms of Jesus to lift, us up once again.
If you have been saved, but don't be surprised at the strong
pull of sin. The battle with sin will continue until your death--or
until Jesus comes back. If you fall, however, confess your sin and let
Christ help you get up, dust off, and keep going. [The One Year Bible
for New Believers re Jer.17:9]
Man was originally endowed with noble powers and a
well-balanced mind. He was perfect in his being, and in harmony with God. His
thoughts were pure, his aims holy. But through disobedience, his powers
were perverted, and selfishness took the place of love. His nature
became so weakened through transgression that it was impossible for
him, in his own strength, to resist the power of evil. He was made
captive by Satan, and would have remained so forever had not God
specially interposed. It was the tempter's purpose to thwart the divine
plan in man's creation, and fill the earth with woe and desolation.
And he would point to all this evil as the result of God's work in
creating man.
In his sinless state, man held joyful communion with Him "in
whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." Colossians
2:3. But after his sin, he could no longer find joy in holiness, and
he sought to hide from the presence of God. Such is still the
condition of the unrenewed heart. It is not in harmony with God, and finds
no joy in communion with Him. The sinner could not be happy in
God's presence; he would shrink from the companionship of holy beings.
Could he be permitted to enter heaven, it would have no joy for him.
The spirit of unselfish love that reigns there --every heart
responding to the heart of Infinite Love --would touch no answering chord
in his soul. His thoughts, his interests, his motives, would be
alien to those that actuate the sinless dwellers there. He would be a
discordant note in the melody of heaven. Heaven would be to him a place of
torture; he would long to be hidden from Him who is its light, and the
center of its joy. It is no arbitrary decree on the part of God that
excludes the wicked from heaven; they are shut out by their own unfitness
for its companionship. The glory of God would be to them a consuming
fire. They would welcome destruction, that they might be hidden from
the face of Him who died to redeem them.
It is impossible for us, of ourselves, to escape from the pit
of sin in which we are sunken. Our hearts are evil, and we cannot
change them. "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one."
"The carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the
law of God, neither indeed can be." Job 14:4; Romans 8:7. Education,
culture, the exercise of the will, human effort, all have their proper
sphere, but here they are powerless. They may produce an outward
correctness of behavior, but they cannot change the heart; they cannot
purify the springs of life. There must be a power working from within,
a new life from above, before men can be changed from sin to
holiness. That power is Christ. His grace alone can quicken the lifeless
faculties of the soul, and attract it to God, to holiness. {SC17,18}
Americans are obsessed with before and after pictures. A
little dab of jell gives an elderly man a surprisingly youthful
appearance, while a simple makeover miraculously transforms a plane-Jane
into a stunning beauty. A portly man tries the latest fad diet and
sheds multiple unwanted pounds. I too have a before and after picture,
greater and more enduring than these. In 1990, I experienced a change so
radical, that it can only be explained in one way. Life began again for
me. In despair, I sat in a treatment center, strung out on alcohol
and cocaine. I earnestly sought divine intervention, and Jesus came
to my rescue. As I reflect on this metamorphosis, wells of joy
flood my soul.
Day after day, I look into the hardened and hurting faces of
men who need change. Mere physical or mental change cannot produce
lasting effects. This change must take place inside, in the heart of the
man. The Bible tells us that the heart of man is desperately wicked.
As a minister at the prison, I spend little time on the symptoms of
this heart disease. Instead, I try to move to the root of the
problem, SIN. Sin has separated us from God, and has led us down a road
of destruction. When we accept Christ as our Substitute for sin,
Savior from Sin, and Strength to overcome sin, we can finally be what
God intends us to be. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature,
old things are passed away, behold, all things are became new.
Chaplain Steve Plemmons
FINDING A RELATIONSHIP WITH JESUS:
http://www.abible.com/salvation/
