Dear Christian friends:

Next Wednesday is Ash Wednesday the first day of Lent. During Lent we think much about the wonderful work of Jesus who suffered and died for us. The Lenten lessons and sermons clearly show Jesus is the one way back to God. There is no other road for a sinner to get back home to his God.

Our text this morning shows how foolish it is if we refuse to change and follow that road back to God. It tells us why we are wise to follow:


Common sense tells us to go on the road back to God. The Jews had turned off of that road. God sent Jeremiah to warn them. But they refused to change. So Jeremiah says in Jeremiah 8:4-5, "This is what the Lord says:

“When people fall down, do they not get up?
When someone turns away, do they not return?

Why then have these people turned away?
Why does Jerusalem always turn away?

They cling to deceit;
they refuse to return."

How foolish. So we have fallen into sin. We are foolish or crazy if we do not confess and come again to God for help and forgiveness. When the pastor preaches in sermons or privately or a friend shows that we have turned off of God's right road we are wise to listen and turn around.

Our conscience tells us to do this. God has given us a conscience. We should listen to it and obey it. Judah did not, "None of them repent of their wickedness, saying, “What have I done?” (Jeremiah 8:6) Cain said the same after he killed his brother Able.

We are tempted to disregard our conscience too. If one does not listen to his conscience he grows more stubborn and more wild after sin as Judah. "Each pursues their own course like a horse charging into battle." (Jeremiah 6:6)

God's grace makes it possible. The migratory birds obey their instincts which God has given them and fly south for the winter and north again for spring and summer. They obey God's laws in nature.

God has put His law into our hearts. His good Word about our sin and forgiveness of sin through Jesus Christ. We know God's honest, true and good Word. We know He expects us to make an honest confession and then trust in Jesus' blood for forgiveness.

God has given us the one true, perfect road back to Him. That road is through Jesus Christ. He says, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." (John 14:6)

This Lenten Season especially on Wednesdays we will have a wonderful opportunity to gather here and learn again of the wonderful way back to God. It is for all and it is free. All can afford it. You only need to believe. You don't need a car. You don't have to pay a toll tax on this road back to God. It is in your Bible and in your church.

We are very foolish if we don't get on this road back to God. We are even dumber than the birds.

"Even the stork in the sky
knows her appointed seasons,
and the dove, the swift and the thrush
observe the time of their migration.
But my people do not know
the requirements of the Lord."
(Jeremiah 8:7)

If we don't we become false men. If we refuse to follow that road in our Bible, then we become liars and false. The Jews refused to follow God's way in Jesus Christ, but they still kept their Bible and temple worship. They said, "We are wise, for we have the law of the Lord." (Jeremiah 8:8) Although they continued to go the temple and read the Bible Old Testament they were not sorry about their sin and continued also to worship false gods and do much evil.

But God said they have changed God's word with lying pen and follow lying teachers. (Jeremiah 8:8b) So that happens also today. If you refuse to repent and honestly confess and refuse Jesus' blood and mercy then soon you will join false churches and follow false teachers and believe in their lies. I have seen that happen often, also with the deaf.

They don't like true, honest preaching so they pull out of our true Lutheran Churches and go join other churches that teach many false things. Then God says of them as He said of Judah:

"The wise will be put to shame;
they will be dismayed and trapped.
Since they have rejected the word of the Lord,
what kind of wisdom do they have?"
(Jeremiah 8:9)

So what wisdom is in them? None! They are lost! They stubbornly refuse to walk on the one true way back to God.

This should be a good warning to us that we don't stubbornly refuse the right way to God, but humbly confess our sins and believe in Jesus Christ. Our Lenten Sermons will help us to do this.

Amen.