“Desperately Wicked”
“The heart is desperately wicked” — past cure by human medicine. Learn that you need conversion, or a new heart. When we speak of the necessity of a change to some people, they begin to be affected by it, and so they put away some evil habits, as drinking or swearing or lying, they put these away, and promise never to go back to them. Now they think the work is done, and they are in a fair way for heaven. Alas foolish man! It is not your drinking, or your swearing, or your lying that is desperately wicked — but your heart. You have only been cutting off the streams; the source remains polluted. The heart is as wicked as ever. It is the heart that is incurable. It is a new heart that you need. Nothing less will answer your need. Learn that you must go to Christ for this!
Robert Murray McCheyne
1813-1843
Pilgrim
thejunglemissionary
Bill
fourpointer
Manfred
abidingthroughgrace
Chris Hohnholz
A hard truth. That verse in Jeremiah doesn’t leave much up to interpretation. What we need is conversion, to become something new.
I have to agree with this McCheyne. So often these days you will hear close to the same exposition of Jeremiah 17:9, and then the last sentence – instead of saying, “Learn that you must go to Christ for this!” – will be, “Learn that you are unable to go to Christ for this!”