Jeremiah 7:21 - Meaning and Application

God had already shown the people that the temple would not protect them while they filled it with evil. Here he shows them that their sacrifices would not make up for their sins, and would not be accepted, while they kept living in disobedience. He speaks of their outward worship with clear contempt in Jeremiah 7:21. It is as if he says, “Keep piling burnt offerings on top of sacrifices. Add one sacrifice to another. Turn your burnt offerings, which were meant to be fully given to me, into peace offerings, so that you can eat the meat. That may be all you get from them, a few good meals. But do not expect any other benefit while you live this careless way.”

Some take his words to mean, “Keep your sacrifices for yourselves. Serve them at your own table, because they are not acceptable at my altar.” The point is plain: their rituals had become useless to them because their hearts were not right with God. For a full explanation, he shows, first, that obedience was the only thing God really required of them, in Jeremiah 7:22-23.

He appeals to the original agreement by which God formed them into a people, when he brought them out of Egypt. God made them a kingdom of priests for himself, not so that he could enjoy their sacrifices the way false gods were said to enjoy pagan offerings. Scripture speaks of the idols of the nations as if they feasted on the fat of sacrifices and drank the wine of drink offerings (Deuteronomy 32:38). But God is not served by food as people are. “Did I speak to your fathers, when I brought them out of Egypt, about burnt offerings and sacrifices?” The point is not that sacrifices were never commanded, but that they were not the first or main thing.

God gave the moral law before he gave the ceremonial law. The ceremonial laws came later as tests of obedience and as helps to repentance and faith. The Levitical law, that is, the system of worship given to the priests and Levites, begins with words like, “If any man of you brings an offering, let him do so and so” (Leviticus 1:2; Leviticus 2:1). That sounds more like rules for sacrifice than a command to sacrifice as the main duty. But what God did command, and what he bound them to by his own authority, was this: “Obey my voice” (Exodus 15:26). That was also the condition of being his special people. “If you will obey my voice indeed” (Exodus 19:5).

So God’s call is this: be careful to do the duties that come from basic right and wrong, and keep the positive commands too, from a spirit of obedience. Then “I will be your God, and you shall be my people.” That is the highest honor, joy, and comfort any human being can have. Live in a way that is ordered and steady. In everything, seek to match God’s will and word. Walk within the boundaries he has set, and in all the ways he has commanded. Then you can be sure it will go well with you.

This demand is very reasonable. It makes sense that infinite wisdom should lead us to what is right, that the one who made us should command us, and that the one who gave us our being and sustains us should also give us law. And the promise is very encouraging: let God’s will be your guide, and his favor will be your happiness.

Second, he shows them that disobedience was the only thing he had against them. He was not rebuking them for failing to bring sacrifices, since they had continually offered them before him (Psalm 50:8). They hoped to use their sacrifices to bribe God, so they could keep on sinning. What God had always charged them with was breaking his commandments in daily life, even while they kept up some acts of devotion, in Jeremiah 7:24-25 and following.

First, they put their own will against God’s will. They did not listen to God or his law. It was as if the law had never been given, or had no force. They would not even incline their ears to hear it, much less bend their hearts to obey it. They wanted their own way. They would do what they chose, not what they were told. Their own plans guided them, not the wisdom of God. What they thought right, they called lawful and good, even if God’s word said the opposite. The desires and passions of their evil hearts became their law, and they walked by what pleased their eyes.

Second, if they began well, they did not keep going. They soon turned back. They talked of making a captain and returning to Egypt again, and they refused to go forward under God’s leading. At one point they promised well: “All that the Lord says, we will do.” If they had kept that frame of mind, things would have gone well. But instead of going on in the way of duty, they turned back into sin and became worse than before.

Third, when God sent them messages through his servants to remind them of the written word, the prophets were doing their proper work, but the people still refused to listen. God had servants among them in every age since they came out of Egypt, people sent to warn them of their faults and remind them of their duty. He rose up early to send them, as men rise early to call servants to work (Jeremiah 7:13). But they were as deaf to the prophets as they were to the law in Jeremiah 7:26. They would not listen or even incline their ear. This had been their pattern all along. They had the same stubborn and resistant spirit as the generations before them. It had become the character of the nation, and a bad one it was, following them until it finally destroyed them.

Fourth, their conduct was still the same. They were worse, not better, than their fathers. Jeremiah himself would soon be able to testify against them, or would find it proved before long, in Jeremiah 7:27. “Speak all these words to them,” God says. “Charge them plainly with disobedience and stubbornness. But even that will not change them. They will not listen to you or pay attention to you. Call to them as plainly and earnestly as you can, but they will not answer you. They will either give no answer at all, or no obedient answer. They will not come when you call.”

So Jeremiah must tell them directly that they deserved the name of a disobedient people, ripe for destruction, as in Jeremiah 7:28. “Say to them, This is a nation that does not obey the voice of the Lord their God.” Their stubbornness was well known. They sacrificed to the Lord as their God, but they would not let him rule them as their God. They would not accept either the teaching of his word or the correction of his discipline. Neither warning nor punishment would reform them. Truth had died among them. They could not receive it, and would not submit to it or be guided by it. They would not speak truth either, because no one could trust their words. Truth had been cut off from their mouths, and lying had taken its place. They were false toward both God and people.