May it please Almighty God to
bless us for a little while as we meditate in his word. Let's
turn to the prophecy of Jeremiah, one of the Old Testament prophets,
and we'll read from chapter 23 and we'll read verse 28. The
prophecy of Jeremiah, chapter 23 and verse 28. The prophet that hath a dream,
let him tell a dream. And he that hath my word, let
him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat,
saith the Lord? As I'm sure we know, the prophet
Jeremiah lived in a very difficult time. It was a period when Israel
were, for the most part, walking contrary to God and they had
had many prophecies telling them that unless they changed, unless
they reverted to that true worship and the true God, then they would
be taken into captivity and they would go down into that place
called Babylon and they would be there for 70 years. Well, Jeremiah lived as one of
the prophets to tell them and to warn them of this situation
and he was a very faithful prophet and he was almost by himself
and you can imagine how tough that must have been to continually
tell the people how wrong they were, what they were doing, walking
contrary to the law of God, and being ignored. And not only being
ignored, sometimes Jeremiah was put into prison, the Word of
God describes it as a dungeon, and it was a very unpleasant
place, but he continued to faithfully tell the people and the king
what was right and what was wrong. And it's good when there are
people who are faithful, who do believe and do say that which
is right, and do not a hedge about it and do not say things
which are wrong. We should be very thankful to
have such an account as this book of Jeremiah, which speaks
very faithfully to the people. Now we've read in this chapter
this morning, this 23rd chapter, really the prophet is speaking
to the people and telling them how there were many false prophets. And of course we might think
well that was right and that related only of course to those
days and years when this was written. Well we should always
recognize that of course the Bible is written for every day. And it's written for us today
as it was for people in those days. And what it does for us
today depicts to us very often what the situation is that we
find ourselves in in the present age. And of course, the day and
age in which we live is a day not dissimilar to that, because
many people worship a false god. Many people don't worship God
at all. Many people have no concern to worship God. They want to
carry on just pleasing themselves, doing what they want to do. And
if there's a religion which suits them and they can carry on doing
what they want to do, well that's what they will take up and that's
what they will continue with. Well it was That situation really,
that Jeremiah was concerned about. And in this 23rd chapter, he's
speaking very much about the false prophets. There were those
who were good, but they were few and far between. Many were
false prophets. And in these verses, the one
that we read particularly, speaks about the prophets who have a
dream. And they think that that dream
is that which is right. Whatever it may refer to, whether
it's in accordance with the word of God or not, they're happy
to propagate that and say, this is the truth and this is what
you should follow. And again, we find that today.
There are many people who preach a gospel, not the true gospel. It's their gospel. It's the gospel
as they interpret the Bible. It's not the gospel as the word
of God clearly declares to us. And so here he says to us here,
the prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream. He can
speak that which he understands to be perhaps right. And often
these things are spoken because the person wants to be well thought
of. We have many examples don't we
today and what we can call the prosperity gospel people preach
but if you do this you'll have many riches and many benefits
but they don't actually speak about the effect of God's word
into the heart into the very soul and so he illustrates and
says the prophet that had the dream let him tell a dream And
then he says, and he that hath my word, that means he who is
influenced by the Bible, by the word of God, he that hath my
word, let him speak my word faithfully, and not to alter it, and not
to change it, and not to suit it to what he thinks that people
might like to hear. You see, a faithful preacher,
and Jeremiah was a faithful preacher. He didn't just pander to the
people. He wasn't worried whether he
was thought well of or not. He was concerned to preach the
gospel. The sad thing is, many people
today are more concerned what people think of them, rather
than what God thinks of them. And that's a very solemn truth. And so the prophet says here,
he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully. And then he gives us a very simple
illustration, one for us to understand. He says, what is the chaff to
the wheat, saith the Lord? We can read many words, and they
may not make a lot of sense to us. But when we have a very simple
illustration, it does begin to give us a picture. And so I'm
sure at this time of the year when the harvest has thankfully
been pretty well brought in now, and we should be very thankful
for it, there is in the corn, and like this case here, the
wheat, there is the actual center And outside of it, there is what
we refer to as the chaff. Now, the wheat itself is the
center, which of course is that which is good, and that's why
the wheat is harvested, to actually take the grain. But the actual,
the outside of it, the chaff, is really of no value at all. Now you may say, well therefore
I understand that. Well I hope we all understand
that. And that really is the illustration that Jeremiah is
making to direct us to the truth of God. And that means there's
perhaps a lot of false religion, just something which is not substantial,
just a mere outside. It looks alright. It looks alright. But there's no goodness in it.
You can take corn and you can find there the chaff and you
can take the chaff off, but there's no benefit from it. You can't
eat it, there's no goodness in it. It doesn't do you any good,
it might look alright, but it's no good. We need the seed, because
in that wheat centre, in that seed part, there's the goodness. And that's what we need. And
that's just what you and I need in our spiritual life. It's not just an outward performance. It's not just the outward scene.
So you can see sometimes people are just very content with just
giving what we might call a performance. Yeah, they look all right, they
look as though they're religious, and yet you see there's no real There's no true godliness. And you might say, well, what
does that really mean? Well, it really means this. That
which is just the outside is just something which is pleasing
to men, pleasing to our flesh. That which is inside is that
which is pleasing to God, and that which is beneficial to us. You might say, well, what then
is that in reality? Well, true religion directs us,
without any doubt, to Almighty God. God the Father, God the
Son, and God the Holy Spirit. You might say, well, I understand
that. What's the point in that? Well,
there's no point in one sense, unless the Holy Spirit has directed
us to realize that we have a need. And we have a need because we
have disobeyed God's law. And that means because we have
sinned against God. We have done that which is wrong. We haven't done that which is
right. And we need to be forgiven from all our sins. And we cannot
forgive ourselves. And we cannot put right what
we have done wrong ourselves. So we are really in quite a desperate
and needy situation. And so when Jeremiah says in
these very simple words, what is the chaff to the wheat? He means, what's the difference?
Well the reality is it's a great separation. Because it separates
between false religion and real religion. False religion is just
an outward appearance. We might refer to it like this.
It's just of the flesh. Real religion is that which is
inside us. It's that which God does in touching
our heart. So it has a true effect. on again our innermost being
which is of course our soul. And an outward religion will
fail. An outward religion would disappear
when we come to die. And it won't be of any benefit
to us at all. What we all need is to know that
the Holy Spirit has spoken to our hearts. to our very soul
and that will have a very real effect and it's something that
you won't be able to shake off and you won't want to shake off
because you will realize it is the work of God's Spirit there's
something within you and you find there's been a change Whereas
you were careless and you carried on in your life, doing just what
you wanted to do, pleasing yourselves, when the work of God comes and
touches our heart and speaks to our heart, we'll realise that
we are a sinner before God and we need to be saved from our
sins and that to be saved means that we need the salvation of
God. We need to know that the Lord
Jesus Christ has come into this world to save sinners and to
have it very personally applied so that we know that Jesus Christ
has come into this world to save me. And you may say, well, why
is that so important? It is so important because all
of us must come to the day when we must die. There's no escaping the day of
death. We can escape many things. We
cannot escape the day of our death. That will come. We don't know when it will come.
But what we want to know is when that comes, that we shall then
go and to be with Christ forever. The Bible tells us, which is
far better. And it's good then when the Spirit
of God shows us that we have a need of God to come to us and
to work within us and to give us that new life, that new birth. You know, the Lord Jesus, when
he spoke on the earth in the third of John's Gospel, he speaks
there about two Nicodemus. Nicodemus had come to Jesus And
he was inquiring on what he should do and et cetera. And the Lord
spoke to him very clearly and told him in very simple words.
This is what he told him. You must be born again. Jeremiah couldn't, I mean, Nicodemus
couldn't understand what that meant. He'd never heard it before. He never realised that he must
be born again. He just couldn't understand it. But the Lord Jesus explained
it to him, that he had to be born again with a new nature. He would still possess his old
nature, his old life, his life, the body in which he lived. But
the difference would be, if he was born again, he would have
that new life within him. His soul, which is in him, would
be alive. And that's what he needed. And
therefore Jesus told him that very clearly. More than once,
you must be born again. And so must we all. Without any
doubt, if you and I are to go to heaven when we die, we must
be born again. We cannot just wander on in life
aimlessly, like false preachers, say, well, the great thing in
this life is to have this and possess that and God will give
you this and God will give you that. The most important thing
for us is to know that we are born again. And if we are born
again to know that Jesus Christ, the only savior of mankind, has
come into this world to save us, to deliver us from the wrath
to come, to free us from our sins, so that all our sins are
taken away. You may say, well, why do you
say that? Because in heaven, there is no sin, no sin. It's a perfect place, a place
of wonder and amazement, total happiness, and that forever,
and no sin. So if there's no sin there, that
means that you and I cannot get there if we have sin. We need all our sin to be taken
away, and there's only one way that that sin can be taken away,
and that is through what the Lord Jesus Christ has done. Now then, coming back to these
words here, this powerful illustration, what is the chaff to the wheat? You and I need then, not that
which is peripheral, we need that which is, if you might say,
internal. You see, when there's the corn
growing, you can't actually see the seed inside, it's all covered,
you know, with this chaff. But when the chaff's blown away,
when it's harvested, there is the corn, there is the true wheat. And my friends, that's what you
and I need to possess. The life of God in our souls. The true wheat, a true religion,
not a false religion. That's what Jeremiah was so concerned
about in this day and age in which he lived. many years ago
now. And he preached very faithfully
to warn people, warn people about their condition and to warn people
about false prophets, false preachers. And you and I need to be warned
today about false preachers, false prophets. We don't want
to come to that situation and find that we are lacking, that
we don't possess the real life of God in our soul. There are many illustrations
for us in the Bible to tell us about this, and you sure know
about the book of Psalms, a very wonderful book, and in the very
first psalm, the very first psalm, it's only a short psalm, and
it tells us this blessed is the man that walketh not in the council
of the ungodly that means in the council of false prophets
nor standeth in the way of sinners that's those who are ungodly
nor sit in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is what he loves,
is in the law of the Lord, that means in the truth of God's word,
and in his law doth he meditate night and day. Now while we are
ungodly, while we are still following all the things of this world,
we won't meditate on the things of God night and day. They just
won't rest in our minds. Comes to Sunday and perhaps we'll
come and find somewhere to worship and go and worship and think
that we've done our duty and we've collected a few points
in our favor. But to the true believer, to
a true believer who's born again, the things of God will be very
real and very precious. And the psalmist goes on to say,
and he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that bringeth
forth his fruit in his season. His leaf also shall not wither,
and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. You may have noticed
we're in a time of drought at the present time. You may have
seen many leaves withering, lack of water, put in a spiritual
context, lives wither for lack of the work of the Holy Spirit
in our hearts. And so he goes on to say, the
ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth
away. Well, today are you and I like
chaff, just a mere outward religion, or do we possess a real religion? Therefore, The ungodly, those
who are not born again, therefore the ungodly shall not stand in
the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. You see, none of us, unless we're
forgiven of all our sins, will ever stand with the church of
God, the people of God, in heaven at last. We shall all be cast
out. And so we read the last verse
in this little psalm, for the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous,
but the way of the ungodly shall perish. So all those who are
chaff are ungodly. All those who are true wheat
are godly. And all of us here this morning
need to know that we are wheat and that we're not chaff. that
we don't have just a superficial religion but that our religion
is true and our religion is real and our religion emanates from
Almighty God. You see, true religion has real
value. True religion is eternally good. Natural religion, the things
of our flesh will only last while we live. Then they will disappear,
they will depart, they will be of no real value to us. So what a blessing it is then,
if we can understand what Jeremiah is speaking here. What is the
chaff to the wheat? saith the Lord." It's not a question
that Jeremiah suddenly thought he should speak these words.
He was influenced by the Spirit of God to write them. And it's
good then as we consider the Word of God, because that's what
it says. Who so speaks my word, let him speak my word faithfully. Jeremiah was faithful in the
words that he spoke. He didn't pretend that the people
were all right. He didn't pretend that the preachers
were all right. He was very faithful in pointing
out that which was false and that which was true. And he speaks
about those who are false prophets. And he says this, He says, I have not sent these
prophets. God had not sent them. I have
not sent these prophets, yet they ran. I have not spoken to
them, yet they prophesied. It's very sad and very solemn
to know there are many people who fancy they'll start preaching. Fancy that it's a good idea.
Fancy that God perhaps has called them when he never has. He never
has. It's a very wonderful and it's
a very blessed position to be called by God to preach the Gospel
because those who preach the Gospel direct the hearers with
regard to their lost condition because of their sin and directs
them to the Saviour, the only way of salvation. Every true
God-sent preacher should show very clearly the need of everyone. We all need to be saved. We all need to be delivered. When the Apostle Paul was on
the earth, he had a very wonderful experience
and it's very interesting the experience he had he was told
by God to go and preach the gospel in a certain place Macedonia
and he went there and he preached in the capital of Macedonia which
was Philippi and because he was doing that which was right the
people didn't like it and actually they hated it and they took him
and beat him and put him in prison. Well, the result was that the
jailer, the person looking after he and Silas in the prison house,
they were there and they were asleep and at night there was
a great earthquake and the jailer thought the prisoners had escaped.
But Paul cried out, we're all here, do thyself no harm. And so what happened was then
the Jaina freed the prisoners, and the prisoners then poured
and silenced. They preached the gospel to this
Jaina. With the result, the Jaina said,
what must I do to be saved? Before he'd been against Paul.
But now as he'd heard the gospel, he'd heard the good news, he
now asked, what must I do to be saved? He was concerned then
about himself. And it is really good for all
of us if you and I believe here and are concerned about ourselves. What must I do to be saved? Saved from all his sin. And what
did Paul say? Very simply, believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. You see what a blessing
it is then if God has given us or will give us faith to believe
that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation, the
only one who can save us. There's no other name given under
heaven or in earth whereby we must be saved. And let us be
very clear, you and I are on the earth today. We're journeying
on. We don't know how many more days
we'll have on this earth. But the vital thing is to know
that we are indeed saved. And that means to know the Lord
Jesus Christ has died for us and he's taken away all our sin. that we are clean, we're washed. In a spiritual sense, we're washed
in the blood of the lamb. Well, what is then the chaff
to the wheat? Very simple, isn't it? Very simple,
but you and I need to know whether we are just chaff just child
for whether we are wheat and if we are wheat then we possess
the life of God in our soul. We have the evidence that we
are born again. We have the evidence that whereas
at one time we had no spiritual sight of these things, we didn't
understand these things, and we can say, one thing I know,
whereas I was blind, now I see. Or, put it another way, our ears. We've never heard the Gospel. We've never heard. the truth
of the gospel. There have been many vain preachers
who never actually directed us to the way of salvation. What
a wonderful thing it is if our ears have been opened, have been
unstopped, so that we've heard the good news of the gospel.
It may not have been to us good news to begin with. We may have
thought it was bad news. We may have thought, well, that
preacher's spoiling my life. I want to carry on doing all
the things in the world that I want to do. I don't want to
give these things up. I don't want to follow an example,
the blessed example of the Lord Jesus Christ. I want to please
myself. Well, we can be thankful that
the word of God is powerful. And the Word of God speaks right
inside to our very heart. And it's a good and wonderful
thing. When that occurs, when that occurs,
we are condemned because of our sinful life. We are condemned
because of the way we've lived. We realize we are guilty before
God. And we come praying, we come
crying, to God for mercy. And it's the evidence then that
we are not chaff, but we are wheat. And you see, wheat is
good because wheat is necessary. And wheat is that which you and
I need in a spiritual sense to partake of, spiritual food. There's no food in husk. There's no food in chaff. There
is food in wheat, in the kernel, if you like, the center of the
actual corn. That's which is so good and so
necessary. And in a spiritual sense, something
outside is of no value. But you and I must know and spiritually
feed upon the Lord Jesus Christ. Because that food is eternal. Naturally, we need food every
day. When the Lord gives us this spiritual
food, it's eternal. Because what is it? It's the
gift of eternal life. What a wonderful favour then
it is to have and be fed with this. The Lord Jesus spells it
out at length in the sixth chapter of John. You can go home and
you can read the sixth chapter of John. It's there at length,
and it describes how Israel of old, they were provided with
the manna which they ate every day for those 40 years, and it
kept them alive. But the Lord Jesus says, that
was good, but they're all dead. naturally and there's no more
manner they needed spiritual food and we need today spiritual
food and that spiritual food as the Lord Jesus points out
is himself that means feeding upon the Lord Jesus Christ it
doesn't mean physically eating Christ that means rejoicing in
what the Lord Jesus Christ has done when he was upon the earth
to save our souls. That's the reality of true religion. So to ask the question, if we
are wheat Are we partaking of Christ? Are we feeding on Christ? Do we love to hear the Gospel? Do we love to hear about the
Lord Jesus Christ? Is that what we come to hear?
It's not some fancy thing, something which just is pleasing to our
natural mind. It's that which touches our heart. That which warms our heart. that which has encouraged us
to know that we are those who are born again because the Holy
Spirit has shown us our need, caused us to consider our ways,
caused us to pray to Him for mercy. What a wonderful and great
and blessed favour that is. You see, this is the reality
of religion. It's not charm. It's got substance. It's got reality. It's got the
life of God. It's got the evidence of the
work of the Spirit. It's not something that you and
I have just produced ourselves. It's not of this world. It emanates
from God. Well, my friends, just ponder
these words. As I say, Jeremiah was a faithful
man. And he was so concerned, desired,
that the people might not listen to a false prophet who let them
down short, who pretended what they were doing was all right
and they could carry on. No, you and I are blessed to hear
the Gospel. And what a mercy it is then when
the Lord enables us to look to Him, look to the Lord Jesus Christ
for all our salvation. There's hope in none other The
only name of blessed savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Well,
what you and I think today of Jesus Christ, what is he to us?
What is he to us? Well, I hope he is someone that
you really want to know. And if you know that you really
love to know and to realize that you love him because He's first
loved you. Not that you loved God first. No, it's because God loved you. And that's an amazing thing,
isn't it? We never deserved God to love
us. But what a mercy if you and I
know something of His love. You see, that love, if you and
I know something of it, will never be removed. And it will
go with us through life, take us into eternity. we should enjoy
his love forever and ever. What a blessing. May we all know
it and not be satisfied then with a false religion. Amen.