Jer. ii. 4 — 6. Hear ye the word of the Lord, 0 house of Jacob, and all the families of the house of Israel : Thus saith the Lord, What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me, and have ivalked after vanity, and are become vain ? Neither said they, Where is the Lord, that brought us up out of the land of Egypt?
HOW marvellous is the condescension of Almighty God ! There is not in the universe a man that would bear with his fellow-man as God beareth with his people. Amidst all the indignities that they offer him, he follows them with entreaties, reasonings, ex- postulations, if by any means he may prevail upon them to turn to him, and thus to avert from them- selves his merited displeasure. In my text, all Israel are challenged by him to assign a reason for their contemptuous treatment of him. As by the Prophet Micah he says, " O my people, what have I done unto thee ? and wherein have I wearied thee ? testify against mea:" so here he challenges them all to say, " What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me ?"
Here we are called to consider, I. The complaint he makes —
Grievous, indeed, had been the departure of God's people from him, and their insuperable attachment to idols. Jeremiah says of them : " It is the land of graven images: "they are mad upon their idolsV
a Mic. vi. 3. b Jer. 1. 38.