11 "So, tell the people of Judah and citizens of Jerusalem my Message: 'Danger! I'm shaping doom against you, laying plans against you. Turn back from your doomed way of life. Straighten out your lives.' 12 "But they'll just say, 'Why should we? What's the point? We'll live just the way we've always lived, doom or no doom.'" 13 God's Message: "Ask around. Survey the godless nations. Has anyone heard the likes of this? Virgin Israel has become a slut! 14 Does snow disappear from the Lebanon peaks? Do alpine streams run dry? 15 But my people have left me to worship the Big Lie. They've gotten off the track, the old, well-worn trail, And now bushwhack through underbrush in a tangle of roots and vines. 16 Their land's going to end up a mess - a fool's memorial to be spit on. Travelers passing through will shake their heads in disbelief. 17 I'll scatter my people before their enemies, like autumn leaves in a high wind. On their day of doom, they'll stare at my back as I walk away, catching not so much as a glimpse of my face."
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Jeremiah 18:11-17
Commentary on Jeremiah 18:11-17
(Read Jeremiah 18:11-17)
Sinners call it liberty to live at large; whereas for a man to be a slave to his lusts, is the very worst slavery. They forsook God for idols. When men are parched with heat, and meet with cooling, refreshing streams, they use them. In these things men will not leave a certainty for an uncertainty; but Israel left the ancient paths appointed by the Divine law. They walked not in the highway, in which they might travel safely, but in a way in which they must stumble: such was the way of idolatry, and such is the way of iniquity. This made their land desolate, and themselves miserable. Calamities may be borne, if God smile upon us when under them; but if he is displeased, and refuses his help, we are undone. Multitudes forget the Lord and his Christ, and wander from the ancient paths, to walk in ways of their own devising. But what will they do in the day of judgment!