Jeremiah 9:24, commentary and pictures

Let no one boast in wisdom, might, or riches, but let all glory be in understanding and knowing the Lord who carries on lovingkindness, justice, and righteousness throughout the earth, for in these He delights. The Lord to be known is Jehovah, the only true and living God, infinitely wise and just and good, beyond comprehension except as revealed in Christ. To know Him is not mere claim or intellectual knowledge, but experimental knowledge of His ways and fatherly character that shows human weakness and sinfulness, leads to faith in Christ as personal Saviour, and ends all boasting in self. This knowledge is the highest education and greatest treasure, of supreme worth in this world and as far-reaching as eternity, for to know the only true God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent is life eternal. He who glories must glory in the Lord Jesus Christ crucified, who is made unto believers wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, and those who know God will reflect His lovingkindness, justice, and righteousness in humble, merciful, and just dealing with others.

Verse Wording and Context

No one is to boast in wisdom, in might, or in riches, but the one who glories is to glory only in understanding and knowing the LORD. To understand and know Him is to know that He carries out lovingkindness, judgment or justice, and righteousness in the earth. These are the things in which He delights. The LORD so known is Jehovah, the only true and living God, the source of all power and glory, known throughout the earth where He does His work.

The word was spoken to Israel, whom He brought out of bondage that they might serve Him. They wandered long in idolatry and slighted His warnings, yet He stayed His judgments to plead with the impenitent. He yearned over His erring children and in every way sought to teach them the way of everlasting life, deferring chastisement to grant yet another opportunity for repentance. Only the most thorough reformation of heart and reformation of life practice can avert the impending doom. Trust in the temple and its services is vain, for rites and ceremonies cannot atone for sin, and claim to be His chosen people cannot save from the inevitable result of continued transgression.

The next verse adds that circumcision does not shield a people from punishment. Those whose hearts remain selfish, impure, proud, and deceitful are no cleaner before God than the uncircumcised. Outward religious signs and claims of special standing have no value when they serve self-exaltation, for knowing God calls for devotion of heart, mind, and strength.

Rejection of Human Boasting

No wise person is to boast in wisdom, no mighty person in might, and no rich person in riches, honor, power, or nobility. Temporal honor, riches, and power, the great objects of ambition among worldly people, are unworthy of the highest aspiration, and the only worthy ground for glorying is understanding and knowing the Lord who exercises lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth because He delights in these things. To place human wisdom or power to control where God should be leads to loss, while true confidence rests in knowing that He is Lord. God has made the wisdom of this world foolish, and has chosen foolish, weak, base, and despised things to confound the wise and mighty and to bring to nothing the things that are.

All boasting in personal merit is out of place, including boasting in wisdom, might, riches, long service, hardship, privation, trial, personal endowments, position, and achievements when they are used to claim preference, honor, and larger reward from God. Gifts and talents come from God and must be returned to Him in faithful use, so misusing them gives no cause for pride. Human wisdom, strength, wealth, learning, and acclaim give no ground for self-confidence, self-sufficiency, independence, superiority, or for salvation and success. Human wisdom is foolishness unless sanctified by God, and human reasoning and ability are gifts from God rather than grounds for claiming independence from their Source or superiority over it. God reveals His wisdom to those who value His word and are not bound up with worldly display, pride, or ambition, while those who rely on their own gifts and worldly ideas find their wisdom to be foolishness before God.

The verse forbids exalting, praising, trusting, or depending on finite people, human teachers, preachers, or human gifts, status, and achievements as though they were gods. Praise and trust belong to God rather than to frail human beings, for all talents come from Him and must be returned to Him. Praising a man for ability to stir feelings or for preaching harms both him and those who praise him. True knowledge is knowing God, not thinking oneself too wise to learn or to need Him, and this rebukes self-conceit and human claims to wisdom.

It also rebukes servants who work in a self-gratulatory spirit and think more of the reward than of the privilege of serving Christ. Such a spirit shows itself in self-righteousness, self-advancement, distrust of God, and jealous, grudging complaint when goodness and liberality are shown to others. That complaining spirit proves no connection with God.

True Glory in Knowing God

The only rightful ground for glory is understanding and knowing the Lord, not wisdom, strength, might, riches, or wealth. True glorying gives all glory to God, praising His name, magnifying Him with thanksgiving, ascribing to Him glory and honor and power, praising Him with all the heart and glorifying His name forevermore, and joining together to magnify the Lord and exalt His name. That knowing is knowing God and doing His will, recognizing Him above human claims to control and living in obedience to Him.

To know God is to recognize Him as the source of all power and glory and the giver of all wisdom, ability, talents, success, positions, and achievements. All such gifts are entrusted by Him and must be returned faithfully and used in His way, so people must not claim the glory for themselves, trust their own ability, or take ground for self-confidence, self-glory, self-sufficiency, or pride. Dependence on Him is shown in humility and faithful work rather than trust in human ability.

Knowing God is experimental knowledge of His ways and paternal or fatherly character as Christ taught it, received as light directly from Him, requiring devotion of heart, mind, and strength, obedience, remaining under His discipline, and a living connection rather than trust in human ability. Outward religious signs and claims of special standing have no value when they serve self-exaltation, for circumcision does not shield a people from punishment when hearts remain selfish, impure, proud, and deceitful. Those connected with God's work are therefore to obey God and remain under His discipline rather than claim glory for themselves.

Knowing God means more than claiming knowledge of Him. It leads people to see their own weakness and sinfulness and by faith to rely on Christ as personal Saviour, to magnify Christ rather than self and represent God's character to the world, to walk humbly before God rather than relying on human strength, self-reliance, or a sense of superiority, and to realize human finiteness and dependence on God, which stops all boasting. Mere intellectual knowledge apart from the great truths centering in Christ is nothingness, and no one is fitted to instruct youth without knowledge of God and of Christ in the soul as a learner from the divine Instructor.

The verse is both a reproof of human pride and a promise that those who walk humbly with God can do His will. Its words are a great treasure to be grasped, valued, lived, and practiced.

God's Character and Delight

The verse reveals God by what He does throughout the earth, for He carries out lovingkindness, judgment or justice, and righteousness, and in these He delights. To understand and know Him is to know this character, and not to glory in wisdom, strength, or riches, but in Him and not in self or personal righteousness. These qualities that show who He is are also the pattern His people are to reflect in life and conduct, including dealings with others and in business.

He is the source of all wisdom and of intellectual as well as spiritual power, infinitely wise and just and good. Even the wisest cannot comprehend Him, for beyond this little atom of a world lie unnumbered obedient worlds, and apart from Christ He cannot be comprehended. Mere intellectual knowledge apart from the great truths that center in Christ is nothingness, and no one is fitted to instruct youth without knowing God and Christ in the soul as a learner from the divine Instructor.

Because He exercises lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, He is unwilling to chastise and stays His judgments to plead with the impenitent. He yearns over erring children, seeks in every way to teach them the way of everlasting life, and delays chastisement to grant yet another opportunity to repent. His goodness leads sinners to repentance and to Christ, so the change in a sinner's life comes from His goodness and not from human virtue or effort, and those brought to Christ must give Him the credit. He judges righteously, looking at the heart rather than judging by outward appearance.

Highest Education for Eternity

To understand and know the Lord who carries out lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth and delights in these things is the highest education, the highest knowledge, and the greatest knowledge. It is knowledge of indescribable value, of supreme and lasting worth in this world and as far-reaching as eternity. To know the only true God and Jesus Christ whom He sent is life eternal.

This knowing is experimental discipline in God's ways and paternal character as Christ taught, received as light directly from Him. That knowledge and discipline develops character and fits the soul for the life that measures with the life of God, while keeping eternity in view. It guards against temptation, shapes character to become like God, and forms the foundation of true education and service.

It goes beyond mere science and literature, beyond knowledge of the physical universe, animal life, natural science, and mechanical inventions, beyond foreign languages and anything merely human. Mere intellectual knowledge apart from the great truths centering in Christ is nothingness. Many miss the true knowledge because in obtaining an education they seek what others will regard as wonderful knowledge.

This knowledge must govern all schooling and learning, so that no method or human study crowds out the Word of God as counselor. Prayerful study of Scripture educates and refines the mind. Light is to be taken in only to be imparted in good works, with abilities devoted to God and shared with others rather than used in service of evil, making doers of the Word fit for heaven.

This knowing is the knowledge of the Holy which is understanding, through which are given all things that pertain to life and godliness. To know the only true God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent is life eternal, the sure result of submission to God and obedience to His holy law. It stands opposite to the eternal destruction earned by disobedience to God's law and sowing to the flesh.

Refusing to know God is a choice with consequences. People are judged according to how they use or abuse the privileges given them, and those who disregard God's law have no place in His kingdom.

Christ the Wisdom Glorified

No flesh can glory in God's presence, but the one who glories is to glory in the Lord, which means being in Christ Jesus and glorying in Christ crucified, who to those who are saved and called is the power of God and the wisdom of God. To understand and know God is to know Him through Christ crucified, for human wisdom, might, strength, riches, status, and nobility after the flesh give no ground for boasting before God. God has made the wisdom of this world foolish, so boasting belongs in the Lord and not in human achievement.

Christ is made unto believers wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so all boasting belongs in the Lord rather than in self, human ability, or personal righteousness. The highest ground for glorying is knowing and understanding God, and that true knowledge is found through Scripture and in Jesus Christ in whom these gifts are given. Glorying in the Lord is therefore centered in Christ, in whom the believer receives all that is needed for acceptance and salvation.

God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and the weak things to confound the mighty, and base and despised things to bring to nothing the things that are. To those who perish the preaching of the cross is foolishness, while true preaching and faith stand not in enticing words of man's wisdom but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, in the power of God. The wisdom to glory in is the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto glory, which none of the princes of this world knew, for had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. Any human being who undertakes to become wisdom for another will come short.

Jesus accepts intellectual people with influence and talents when they accept the light He brings and follow humble obedience in the simplicity of Christ, instead of choosing worldly wisdom and attractions that blind them to the beauty and power of the truth. This glorying belongs to all alike, for Christ died for all, and all may alike be recipients of His grace.

Practical Godly Living

To know the Lord who carries out lovingkindness, judgment and righteousness across the earth and delights in these things is to take on those same qualities as the pattern for life, so that humble, kind, compassionate, merciful, tender and loving conduct becomes the only fitting ground for boasting. That likeness must shape all dealings with others, including business, rejecting oppression and acting with justice and care for those in need.

Knowing God shows itself in merciful and tender treatment of others rather than harshness or severity, and in earnest effort to save those in danger of being lost. It calls for humble, willing service in which even small tasks done in complete self-surrender are acceptable to Him. It also turns the wealthy from self-interest to recognize responsibility to God and to the needy, using means to serve others.

Those entrusted with responsibility in the church and its institutions must therefore reject self-importance, self-sufficiency, pride, greed and injustice, and undergo genuine reform and conversion. Human talents and positions come from God, so leaders are to depend on Him rather than trust their own ability, showing that dependence in humility and faithful work. To know God is to make Him first and honor Him, and when this is done He blesses the work, supplies wisdom and help, sends angelic ministry, and is honored with Jesus as chief Physician.

Righteous character and conduct formed by this knowledge honor God more than imposing buildings, outward prosperity, or claims of prosperity tainted by pride, greed and injustice. True glory brings honor to His name through wise use of heavenly gifts, as when the wisdom, righteousness, energy, piety, justice and magnanimity seen in Solomon witnessed to all nations of the excellence of the God he served, so that Israel for a time stood as the light of the world showing forth His greatness, rather than glorying in surpassing wisdom, fabulous riches, power and fame.

Following His infinite counsel in all things includes repenting for past neglect of children and youth and redeeming the time in their education and care, since the highest education is experimental knowledge of His ways and fatherly character that develops character and fits the soul for the life that measures with the life of God. Many miss this because in seeking education they aim at what others will regard as wonderful knowledge in science, foreign languages or merely human attainment, whereas for teachers the highest ambition is to practice Christianity in life. Knowing God in this way is true godliness, receiving pure light directly from Him and walking in righteousness, holiness, purity and godliness rather than following teachings mingled with evil and heresy. Students who receive wisdom and knowledge from Him are to devote their abilities to Him and share that wisdom with others rather than use their powers in service of evil.

All boasting belongs to the Lord, for His goodness leads sinners to repentance and to Christ, and the change in a sinner's life comes from His goodness rather than human virtue or effort, so those brought to Christ must give God the credit. Human reasoning and ability are gifts from Him, not grounds for claiming independence or superiority over their Source, and exalting people who are disloyal to Him dishonors the Creator.