Wayward Children

Do you ever wish your children would just make the right choices? You teach, you beg, you plead, but still they insist on their own way!

God teaches, and begs, and pleads too, for His wayward children to stop following after gods that are no help at all.

Jeremiah 3:12-25 (NLT) recounts His heartache. Although this passage was written with Israel as the example, it applies to us too!

Therefore, go and give this message to Israel. This is what the LORD says:

“O Israel, my faithless people,
      come home to me again,
for I am merciful.
      I will not be angry with you forever.
Only acknowledge your guilt.
      Admit that you rebelled against the LORD your God
and committed adultery against him
      by worshiping idols under every green tree.
Confess that you refused to listen to my voice.
      I, the LORD, have spoken!

“Return home, you wayward children,”
      says the LORD,
      “for I am your master.
I will bring you back to the land of Israel—
      one from this town and two from that family—
      from wherever you are scattered.
And I will give you shepherds after my own heart,
      who will guide you with knowledge and understanding.

“And when your land is once more filled with people,” says the LORD, “you will no longer wish for ‘the good old days’ when you possessed the Ark of the LORD’s Covenant. You will not miss those days or even remember them, and there will be no need to rebuild the Ark. In that day Jerusalem will be known as ‘The Throne of the LORD.’ All nations will come there to honor the LORD. They will no longer stubbornly follow their own evil desires. In those days the people of Judah and Israel will return together from exile in the north. They will return to the land I gave their ancestors as an inheritance forever.

“I thought to myself,
      ‘I would love to treat you as my own children!’
I wanted nothing more than to give you this beautiful land—
      the finest possession in the world.
I looked forward to your calling me ‘Father,’
      and I wanted you never to turn from me.
But you have been unfaithful to me, you people of Israel!
      You have been like a faithless wife who leaves her husband.
      I, the LORD, have spoken.”

Voices are heard high on the windswept mountains,
      the weeping and pleading of Israel’s people.
For they have chosen crooked paths
      and have forgotten the LORD their God.

“My wayward children,” says the LORD,
      “come back to me, and I will heal your wayward hearts.”
“Yes, we’re coming,” the people reply,
      “for you are the LORD our God.
Our worship of idols on the hills
      and our religious orgies on the mountains
      are a delusion.
Only in the LORD our God
      will Israel ever find salvation.
From childhood we have watched
      as everything our ancestors worked for—
their flocks and herds, their sons and daughters—
      was squandered on a delusion.
Let us now lie down in shame
      and cover ourselves with dishonor,
for we and our ancestors have sinned
      against the LORD our God.
From our childhood to this day
      we have never obeyed him.”

What God substitute do you keep chasing that is breaking the heart of God?