Proclaimer Blog
An unpreached sermon part 2
If it is true that Jeremiah 17 encourages us to be realistic about the heart (our hearers and our own), it is also true that it contains a glorious picture of the regenerate heart which allows us to be optimistic as well. In a classic chiasm (I know, I know, but this one really is) Jeremiah sandwiches verses 7 and 8 with the bleak assessment we saw yesterday in 5-6 and 9-10. And what a glorious glimmer of hope. The regenerate heart is bountiful, beautiful even. It's an extended metaphor which describes the man who trusts in the Lord – drawing on language from Psalm 1 and elsewhere, The Lord, through Jeremiah, describes a tree which survives every onslaught and continues to bear fruit in every condition.
And we can thus be optimistic about the heart because one came to earth whose heart was exactly like this! Supremely, verses 7 and 8 describe the heart of Jesus. And we can be optimistic because his heart can be our heart as he forgives, restores and fills us with his transforming Spirit. So we can be optimistic about the hearts of those we preach to (yay!) and optimistic about our own hearts (double yay!). We do not have to live with that besetting sin all our lives. We can kick that habit and transform our speech. Or rather, the Spirit working in us bringing us from glory to glory can do it. This is the victory the Bible speaks about.
What an encouragement for preachers! Our work is not in vain because the mighty Spirit of the living God applies the preached word to our own hearts and those of our hearers and makes us more like our Saviour Christ and his perfect heart.
Preachers of the gospel of grace have every reason to be optimistic about the heart.