Further Thoughts, 10/4/11

Speaking of Jeremiah though- here are some cool verses that stuck out to me:

"In spite of all this, her unfaithful sister Judah did not return to me with all her heart, but only in pretense," declares the Lord. The Lord said to me, "Faithless Israel is more righteous than unfaithful Judah." (Jeremiah 4:10-11)

This goes back to that whole idea behind lukewarm faith, I think.

How can you say, "We are wise, for we have the law or the Lord," when actually the lying pen of the scribes has handled it falsely? (Jeremiah 8:8)

Imagine if we have false scriptures. The Mormons would never let us live it down...

"Correct me, Lord, but only with justice- not in your anger, lest you reduce me to nothing." (Jeremiah 10:24)

I probably shouldn't, but I laugh at this visual. Like, "Whoops, didn't mean to decimate you there. Sometimes I just get so caught up in things..."

"Therefore I will teach them- this time I will teach them my power and might. Then they will know that my name is the Lord." (Jeremiah 16:21)

I really want to know more about this whole idea of the Name of the Lord. Scripture clearly marks it as important. I just wish I knew why and how to treat it accordingly. Like, is it okay to use the name Yahweh in casual conversation? Or in a song of worship? There's a song that CitiChurch sings where the whole chorus basically just repeats His Name over and over, and I never sing it because I think it could be disrespectful.

"My heart is broken within me; all my bones tremble. I am like a drunken man, like a man overcome by wine, because of the Lord and His holy words." (Jeremiah 23:9)

Gosh, don't you just wish that God's words would have such a powerful impact on you every time you open up the Word?

This time I read through the book of Ecclesiastes. I can't for the life of me figure out what Solomon is trying to say; you would think that with all that wisdom, he would have figured out a way to explain it to us simple folk. It seemed like he kept going back and forth on a few issues. First it's better to be full of sorrow and mournful than to be happy, then he decides that there's absolutely no point to life beyond the persuit of happiness.... One minute the man who toils is a fool and the next he's the only one whose life has any perpose. I mean, I realize that this whole book is basically Solomon venting his frustrations in his old age about how he wasted his life, but yeesh. I just want to yell at him, "Get a grip! What's done is done and stop fussing about it and ruining it for the rest of us!"

Yes, I realize that this probably makes me a fool. I know that Solomon was wiser than anyone before or during his time... but still.