When you keep tripping over the same sins—anger, sarcasm, insecurity, thoughtlessness—it’s natural to wonder, “What is wrong with me?” In this post on Jeremiah 17:1–11, we trace that question beneath behavior and willpower to the deeper reality of a hard, diseased heart that cannot fix itself—and to the hope of a God who promises nothing less than a new heart through Christ.
In this post, we explore:
- The difference between everyday failures and the deeper “character flaws” that won’t budge, no matter how many books you read or resolutions you make
- What theologians call “total depravity”—not that we’re as bad as we could be, but that sin has touched every part of who we are: mind, will, emotions, and desires
- Jeremiah’s first image: sin engraved with an iron stylus on the tablet of the heart, and why that points to hardness, permanence, and a “broken chooser” that consistently picks sin over God
- How idolatry in Judah (and in our lives) leads God to hand people over to the very things they want, and why that is both judgment and a severe mercy
- The desert bush and the well-watered tree: a vivid picture of trusting in human strength versus trusting in the Lord, and how sin is fundamentally relational—a turning away from God, not just rule-breaking
- Why sin makes us blind to real life, leaving us barely surviving in a spiritual wasteland while faith draws living water even in seasons of drought
- Jeremiah’s diagnosis of the heart as “deceitful” and “desperately sick,” and what it means to see sin not just as bad choices, but as a deep, incurable disease apart from God’s intervention
- The limits of behavior change, spiritual “techniques,” and even well-meant disciplines when they’re treated as a way to heal ourselves from the outside in
- God’s promise of the new covenant (Jeremiah 31; Ezekiel 36): a new heart, a new Spirit, and a law written on the heart rather than chiseled against it
- Richard Sibbes’ picture of Christ’s love as the only fire strong enough to melt an adamant heart—and the invitation to “live under the sunshine of the gospel” until our hearts grow soft and tender toward God
By the end, you’ll have a more honest and hopeful answer to “What is wrong with me?”—and a clearer sense that the solution is not gritting your teeth, but receiving a heart only God can give. You’ll be invited to stop treating sin as a surface problem you can manage, to bring your hard places into the warmth of Christ’s love, and to trust that the God who exposes your heart is the same God who delights to make it new.
Series: Questions Jeremiah Answered
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