Things can get so bad, and people can become so antagonistic to the Lord and his standards, to his truth, that really we cannot pray for them anymore; the land is too far gone. And we surely see something of that in the land in our day.
What then is the point of these fervent offers of mercy and grace that we constantly come across in these chapters, with the prophet appointed by the Lord to plead with the people? It is not because there is any hope of the people returning to God: certainly not the vast majority of them. The continued appeals of the Lord really serve to add to the coming judgment of the people. They are given as a demonstration that the people will not listen, will not respond. But the prophet must continue to make them. And there is an element of a ministry of judgment about witness our ministry today. Of course our primary objective is to see souls saved, and to reach out to needy souls, and we pray for them and plead with them. But at the same time, even though the Holy Spirit works and souls are called out, it is all part of the judgment, so that it can be said to many lost souls: ‘You were pleaded with repeatedly, even up to the very eleventh hour, and you did not respond.’ The preachers pleaded; people witnessed; people set before you the possibility of mercy, and you would not turn. Then of course another purpose of the continuing appeals is to call individuals. Eben though the land will not turn, individuals may turn, and that is why Jeremiah is inspired to provide so many evangelistic arguments in his preaching – some of the most graphic in the whole of the Scripture. They are appeals to individual people, and that is their prime objective.