19 And it hath come to pass, when ye say, 'For what hath Jehovah our God done to us all these?' That thou hast said unto them, 'As ye have forsaken Me, And serve the gods of a foreigner in your land, So do ye serve strangers in a land not yours.
20 Declare ye this in the house of Jacob, And sound ye it in Judah, saying, 21 Hear ye, I pray you, this, O people, foolish and without heart, Eyes they have, and they see not, Ears they have, and they hear not. 22 Me do ye not fear, an affirmation of Jehovah? From My presence are ye not pained? Who hath made sand the border of the sea, A limit age-during, and it passeth not over it, They shake themselves, and they are not able, Yea, sounded have its billows, and they pass not over. 23 And this people hath an apostate and rebellious heart, They have turned aside, and they go on. 24 And they have not said in their heart, 'Let us fear, we pray you, Jehovah our God, who is giving rain, The sprinkling and the gathered, in its season, The appointed weeks of harvest He keepeth for us.'
25 Your iniquities have turned these away, And your sins have kept the good from you. 26 For the wicked have been found among My people. It looketh about the covering of snares, They have set up a trap—men they capture. 27 As a cage full of fowls, So their houses are full of deceit, Therefore they have been great, and are rich. 28 They have been fat, they have shone, Yea, they have overpassed the acts of the evil, Judgment they have not judged, The judgment of the fatherless—and they prosper, And the judgment of the needy they have not judged. 29 For these do not I inspect, an affirmation of Jehovah, On a nation such as this, Doth not My soul avenge itself? 30 An astonishing and horrible thing hath been in the land. 31 The prophets have prophesied falsely, And the priests bear rule by their means, And My people have loved 'it' so, And what do they at its latter end?
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Jeremiah 5:19-31
Commentary on Jeremiah 5:19-31
(Read Jeremiah 5:19-31)
Unhumbled hearts are ready to charge God with being unjust in their afflictions. But they may read their sin in their punishment. If men will inquire wherefore the Lord doeth hard things unto them, let them think of their sins. The restless waves obeyed the Divine decree, that they should not pass the sandy shores, which were as much a restraint as lofty mountains; but they burst all restraints of God's law, and were wholly gone into wickedness. Neither did they consider their interest. While the Lord, year after year, reserves to us the appointed weeks of harvest, men live on his bounty; yet they transgress against him. Sin deprives us of God's blessings; it makes the heaven as brass, and the earth as iron. Certainly the things of this world are not the best things; and we are not to think, that, because evil men prosper, God allows their practices. Though sentence against evil works is not executed speedily, it will be executed. Shall I not visit for these things? This speaks the certainty and the necessity of God's judgments. Let those who walk in bad ways consider that an end will come, and there will be bitterness in the latter end.