"You have not obeyed me ..." (Je 34:17 ESV)

In Jeremiah 34:8-10 we see that the Israelites made a covenant with God and freed their slaves as they had been instructed in the Law.

This story gives us God's perspective on obedience:
"And they obeyed, all the officials and all the people who had entered into the covenant that everyone would set free his slave, male or female, so that they would not be enslaved again. They obeyed and set them free. But afterward they turned around and took back the male and female slaves they had set free, and brought them into subjection as slaves." Jeremiah 34:10-11 (ESV)

They did what God wanted, and then waffled.

Hindsight, it's easy for us to see their problem. Nonetheless, I've been in the same situation. We can't kid ourselves to think that we can flip back and forth on issues.
"I'll repent about this again"
"I'll ask God for forgiveness"
"I've been forgiven before"

You know this isn't repentance, right? I did, and I still got caught up in it.

Here's God's response:
“Therefore, thus says the Lord: You have not obeyed me by proclaiming liberty, every one to his brother and to his neighbor; a behold, I proclaim to you liberty to the sword, to pestilence, and to famine, declares the Lord. I will make you a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth." Jeremiah 34:17 (ESV)

Not very passive is it? I need to remember the intensity of God's response in Jeremiah when I'm reading what John wrote in his first letter:
"This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us."
1 John 1:5-10 (ESV)