Seek The Old Paths

Robert Meredith

    “Thus saith the Lord, stand ye in the ways, and see and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.  But they said, We will not walk therein” (Jeremiah 6:16).  Jeremiah spent his ministry trying to call the children of God back to the Lord.  The people of Judah, though, said, “we will not walk therein.”  God had told them to return to the old paths, the paths that God had instructed them to live, but they refused.  They were like so many people today who refuse to follow the righteousness of God.

  Paul said of the Jews of his day, “For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge.  For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God” (Romans 10:2-3).  These Jews believed in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and were very zealous religiously, but were lost.  They were not following God’s way, the Christ.  The Apostle Paul continued writing of them when he penned, “For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth” (Romans 10:4).  Christ is the end, that is, the purpose or aim or goal of the law.  The purpose of the Old Testament law was to bring the Christ, and thus provide a way to become right with God (Galatians 3:24).  When these Jews rejected Jesus, they were rejecting God’s righteousness, or commandments (Psalm 119:172), and they then continued following their own religious system or path, not God’s.  The first century Jew tried to live his life his way, and felt that God would be pleased with that.  God, however, is never pleased with those who follow another path.

  On another occasion Paul made this statement, “For do I persuade men or God?  Or do I seek to please men?  For if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10).  When we think of the religious path that we are to walk, we should always walk in the path of God’s choice and not walk in a path that would seek to please men.  Let us not be men-pleasers, but follow God, yield unto His righteousness (His commandments and system of salvation), and continue to ask for the old path, wherein is the good way.  If we walk therein, we shall find rest for our souls.