HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, October 5, 2024 – Over and over, I find myself returning to the book of Jeremiah. It draws me – haunts me, even – no matter how many times I read it. If you take out the references to “Judah” and “Israel” and replace them with “Christians” and “Christendom”, Jeremiah is speaking directly to us today. God, through his Spirit, is speaking directly to us today. We need to read Jeremiah this way.

The worldly church hangs its hat on the sound bite John 3:16, neglecting to remind those who delay embracing Truth that at some point it will be too late to do so. The religious fairy tale is that God will save all those who call out to him right up to and including when Jesus comes back, and that we’ll all live happily ever after. But there is such a thing as “too late”. We’ve seen it with Noah. We’ve seen it with Sodom. We’ve seen it with Jeremiah and with the prophecies of Ezekiel.

Are we seeing it again today?

Jeremiah was excoriated by his contemporaries for pointing out that it was too late for the Judeans and Israelites to repent, as God had already decided on their defeat and exile and the destruction of Jerusalem. God even warned the prophet not to offer prayers for his own people, that he “would not hear them”. Not surprisingly, the people who opposed Jeremiah continued to insist that God had their back and would help them defeat their enemies, just like he had done in the past. But things had significantly changed for what had once been “God’s people”. Even while assuming God’s blessings and protection, they’d turned away from God and had adopted lifestyles that were worse than those of the heathens around them.

It’s a tricky situation, to have to inform people that time’s up and their trust in the status quo is in vain. No-one wants to hear that message. Jesus had to deliver the same message to what were formerly his people, warning them that God had left the room already. Not surprisingly, they rejected not only him but his message and continued to delude themselves into believing they were still God’s people, even while they crucified God’s Messiah.

Part of the reason why the “too late” message is so ill-received is that things still seem to be going along fine when the message of doom is being relayed. Jeremiah started preaching 40 years before the destruction of the first temple. Jesus started preaching 40 years before the destruction of the second temple. In both scenarios, people were generally settled on their lees, thinking that God must be OK with the status quo, as he hadn’t really indicated otherwise, had he? I mean, where was the lightning? Where were the thunderbolts? If God were angry with them, wouldn’t he be doing something to make it obvious that he was angry?

But God did do something – he sent prophet after prophet, until finally sending Jeremiah. Then he sent yet more prophets until finally sending Jesus. In between Jeremiah and Jesus, the surviving remnant of God’s people underwent fiery trials, with many of them falling away. There is never a time when God doesn’t let us know exactly where we stand with him, believer or not. It’s not God’s fault that he and his prophets are ignored.

Judaism was already a done deal long before the destruction of Jerusalem by the occupying Roman army in 70 AD. It’s important to note that Judaism didn’t die then; it was already dead 40 years earlier, when Jesus was preaching. I don’t know exactly when it died, but it was already dead then. By the time Jesus showed up, Judaism had become a death cult with no other end for its adherents but death. The worldly Christian church is also a death cult with only death as its end. The precise moment of its fall I don’t know. I just know that it’s dead. You cannot come to God through the worldly church, any more than you can come to God through Judaism. Judaism serves Judaism, just as the worldly church serves the worldly church, and both ultimately serve Satan. You can only come to the living God through the living Word, Jesus Christ, and that only while there’s still time.

I do not have a happy message today. There is a silence in Heaven that precedes the age of God’s final Judgement and wrath. The silence is prophesied to take place during a time when everything seems to be going along fine. John mentions it in Revelation, but a similar silence also took place in the years leading up to the flood (those infamous “days of Noah”) and in the years leading to the destruction of the first and second temples. People misinterpret the silence as God looking past or even downplaying sinful behavior (“surely ‘love’ and ‘belief’ must be enough!”), when in fact God has shut the door and left the rebellious to their own devices. I sat at table this week with men who call themselves Christian and yet who are eager to sign up to slaughter the “enemies of Israel”. I sat at table this week with women who call themselves Christian and yet who brag about having multiple lovers. God is not condoning or looking past these behaviors. He’s left these “Christians” to their own devices.

As difficult as it may be to accept (because the worldly church teaches us otherwise), there’s no point in praying for these people.

God will not hear.

They are turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers… Therefore, I will bring evil upon them, which they shall not be able to escape; and though they shall cry unto me, I will not hearken unto them…. Pray not for this people.

Jeremiah 11:10-14