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I. THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF INDIVIDUAL NEED. The prayer is "heal me;" "deliver me." The prophet shows how deep and pressing is his own need by the use of two figures. He feels the need of something being done internally and externally. Internally he is sick at heart, wounded and bruised in spirit. He needs healing from the state of mind produced through being despised and rejected by his fellow-countrymen. Still worse is the gnawing pain produced as he views the wickedness of the land and takes knowledge of the steadily advancing calamities. But we cannot doubt that beyond all this there was the consciousness of his own heart's pollution and unworthiness. So far as natural constitution and natural tendencies were concerned, he who spoke was no better than those to whom he spoke. Thus, in trying to waken others from their lethargy, he became more thoroughly wakened to his own state. The word which God had put into his mouth was spoken, not only to the outside audience, but down to his own sinning and ignorant heart. God cannot take for prophets and apostles those who care little about their own spiritual need. Paul became a better apostle because he reckoned himself, in such sincerity, the chief of sinners. It ought to be no marvel that those to whom we speak are indifferent to their state, if we who speak to them are largely indifferent to our own.

II. THE VANITY OF SEEKING ELSEWHERE THAN TO GOD. The very confidence which Jeremiah expresses that, if only God heals him, he will Be truly healed, seems to indicate that he had some experience of other modes of healing, such as had looked very promising at first, but proved utterly vain in the end. As a general rule, we have to Be disappointed in human agencies of healing Before we can be satisfied with the Divine one. It cannot be said that the nature and depth of the disease are adequately discovered, until we discover, from experience, how vain human resources are against it. We may be able to mitigate symptoms, to deaden pain, to rouse into a temporary cheerfulness; but in the end the relapse is certain and more confirmed than ever. It was a great thing for the prophet to Be brought to feel, as he evidently was, that anywhere else he went would Be with the probability of failure. With God there is not only the certainty of success, that success is with him alone.

III. THE PROPHET'S CONFIDENCE IN GOD AS A HEALER. The way in which he expresses this confidence is most worthy of notice. His confidence is, not that God will do something for him, but that whatever God does will be adequate for the end in view. It is much to feel that one may count upon Divine sympathy and effort; it is still more to feel that whatever help God gives will rise to the intensity of the need. He who gives the spirit of conviction, working deep in the natural heart and showing its diseased state and defiling, polluting activity, gives also the spirit of a real healing. The great ground of apprehension arises, not from the magnitude of the spiritual disease, but from the indifference of the sufferer and his indisposition to submit his heart to God's searching, healing power. The moment we are willing to submit ourselves to the great Physician, that moment the worst disease becomes a manageable and a virtually conquered thing. The course of the healing process may be long, tedious, and painful; but what matter these, if the end be perfect healing and everlasting health? - Y.

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KJV: Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.

WEB: Heal me, O Yahweh, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for you are my praise.