Today's Daily Lesson comes from Jeremiah chapter 7 verses 4 through 11:
4Do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is* the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.’
5 For if you truly amend your ways and your doings, if you truly act justly one with another, 6if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own hurt, 7then I will dwell with you in this place, in the land that I gave of old to your ancestors for ever and ever.
8 Here you are, trusting in deceptive words to no avail. 9Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known, 10and then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are safe!’—only to go on doing all these abominations? 11Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your sight?
Yesterday I preached on this text. It was written 2,500 years ago. Jesus quoted it 500 years later. And two millennia later it is still applicable. It is not okay to come and worship God on Sunday while Monday through Saturday exploiting neighbors or arguing for policies which punish and/or afflict the most vulnerable. And as I said yesterday, it is not okay to come to church maskless and without social distancing and think that God that kind of worship.
True worship is how we treat people. For that is the true Temple of God -- the Temple of the Human Being. It is holy and to be kept undefiled.
Let us honor it in all we do.
Ryon Price is Senior Pastor of Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas.
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