Tag Archive | Jeremiah

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, day 227

Aug14

    Day 227—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading, with more of Israel’s history and prophecy.

    Day 227 – Jeremiah 30 – 31 (Bad news, but then glorious news, future, then WAY future)

Jerimiah 30. The promises of God (more than 22!) stand out in this chapter: restoration, return, bonds & yokes broken, end of servanthood to foreigners, salvation, a King, medicine and healing, retaliation against their oppressors, compassion, rebuilding, their position as the people of God.

What a glorious, hopeful message this must have been to the exiles! And a Messianic hope!  “Their Prince shall be one of themselves; their Ruler shall come out from their midst; I will make Him draw near, and He shall approach Me, for who would dare of himself to approach me?, declares the LORD. And you shall be my people, and I will be your God.”

.

Jeremiah 31.  Prophecies of the nation’s restoration are continued in this chapter, both closely future and distant, end-times future.

“I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, I have continued my faithfulness to you.  AGAIN, I will build you and you shall be built, O virgin Israel (What???)  AGAIN, you shall adorn yourself with tambourines and shall go forth in the dance of the merrymakers.  AGAIN, you shall plant vineyards on the mountains of Samaria; the planters shall plant and shall enjoy the fruit.”

“For the LORD has ransomed Jacob and has redeemed him from hands too strong for him. They shall come and sing aloud on the height of Zion, and they shall be radiant over the goodness of the LORD…”

“I will turn their mourning into joy; I will comfort them and give them gladness for sorrow. I will feast the soul of the priests with abundance, and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, declares the LORD.”

And in the far future… “I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, NOT like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke (the law)…”    “But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel AFTER THOSE DAYS,  I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD’ for they shall ALL know me, from the least to the greatest.  For I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more.”

“Behold the days are coming, declares the LORD, when the city shall be rebuilt for the LORD.”    “It shall not be uprooted or overthrown  anymore forever.” (see Revelation 3:12, 21:2)

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, day 226

Aug13

    Day 226—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading, with more of Israel’s history and prophecy.

    Day 226 – Jeremiah 26 – 29 (Jeremiah threatened & spared, Zedekiah & Nebuchadnezzar, a false prophet, letter to the exiles)

Jeremiah 26 repeats the message and threat to our prophet from 11 years earlier when God offered the relenting of the disaster if the people would repent. (More recently, there is no such offer.) Jeremiah’s life is/was threatened, but the city officials spare him, listing other prophets whose lives were spared in the days of Hezekiah and Jehoiakim.

.

Jeremiah 27. Jeremiah’s message now is to the kings of Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre, and Sidon. As the object lesson to accompany the message, Jeremiah was to make and wear a wooden yoke on his neck.

The message from the Creator of earth and everything in it, “I have given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, MY SERVANT, (in that he serves God’s plans).  All the nations shall serve him, and his son, and his grandson until the time of his own land comes. Then, many nations and great kings shall make him their slave. 

BUT if any nation or kingdom will NOT serve this Nebuchadnezzar and put its neck UNDER THE YOKE OF THE KING OF BABYLON, I will punish that nation with sword, famine, and pestilence.”   

“But any nation that WILL bring its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve him, I will leave on its own land to work it and dwell there,” declares the LORD.

Then Jeremiah warns the people of Judah and Jerusalem not to listen to false prophets and priests but to submit to Nebuchadnezzar’s yoke.  God promises to bring back the vessels of the House of the Lord when He brings back the exiles…in 70 years. (One year for every Sabbath year they did not honor.)

.

Jeremiah 28. In that same year when Zedekiah (the last king to reign), the false prophet, Hananiah spoke against what Jeremiah said, saying instead that the LORD would break the yoke of Babylon and bring back the people in TWO YEARS.  To illustrate his false prophecy, he went to Jeremiah, took the yoke off his neck, and broke it.  

Soon after Jeremiah went to Hananiah with this word from the LORD, “You have broken wooden bars, but you have made in their place bars of iron. I have put upon the neck of all these nations an iron yoke to serve Nebuchadnezzar, and they shall serve him.”

“Furthermore, listen Hananiah, the LORD has not sent you, and you have made this people trust in a LIE. Therefore, behold, I will remove you from the face of the earth. This year you shall die, because you have uttered rebellion against the LORD.”

Hananiah died in the seventh month.

.

Jeremiah 29. Then Jeremiah sends a letter to the exiles whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, along with King Jehoiachin, the queen mother, and all the officials and craftsmen. 

Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem.…

” Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters, multiply there, and do not decrease. But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.
“When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.
Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart, I will be found by you, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.”

Jeremiah 29:5-14

But to those who refused to surrender to Nebuchadnezzar, the LORD said…

“Behold I’m sending on them sword, famine, and pestilence, and I will make them like vile figs that are so rotten they cannot be eaten. I will pursue them with sword, famine, and pestilence and will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a curse, a terror, a hissing, and a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them because they did not pay attention to my words.”

The LORD trashes the lying words of the false prophets Ahab and Zedekiah. Then the king of Babylon “roasts them in the fire!!!” God also curses the false prophet Shemaiah, and all his descendants, none of whom will see the return from exile…. for speaking “rebellion against the LORD.”

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, days 224 and 225

Aug12

    Day 224 & 225—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading, with more of the book of Jeremiah

NOTE: Sundays and Mondays are posted together.

    Day 224 – Jeremiah 18 – 22 (potter & clay, broken flask, Jeremiah persecuted, Nebuchadnezzar, Sons of David & Josiah, )

Jeremiah 18 continues with the inevitable destruction of Judah/Jerusalem, this time with the illustration of the potter and the clam (Isaiah used this three times.). Shaping, re-shaping, and destroying pots is what the potter and what God does… as it seems good to them. 

When the people plot against Jeremiah for his counsel, the prophet prays to God.

.

Jeremiah 19. Jeremiah again goes to the potter to buy a flask. He’s to take the elders of the people and the priests and go to the Valley of Hinnom. He is to proclaim God’s disaster on Jerusalem and its people because of “the blood of the innocents”, the sons burned as offerings to Baal. He is to tell them of the bodies of their own sons and daughters in that “Valley of Slaughter” and then break the flask in the sight of the men.  “So I will break this people and this city, so that it can never be mended.”

(NOTE: The place, Topheth (drums) mentioned here, is another name for the valley of Hinnom or the Valley of Slaughter, where, when the children were burned as sacrifices to Baal, drums were beaten loudly to drown out their screams.)

.

Jeremiah 20. After hearing these things, Pashhur, the priest and chief officer in the house of the LORD, persecuted Jeremiah by putting him in stocks. When he was released, Jeremiah proclaimed a curse on Pashhur and his house. They would be taken to Babylon and die there.

Jeremiah laments his calling, saying he is persecuted whenever he speaks the Word of the LORD.  But if he tries to keep in the words, “there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary of holding it in, and I cannot.”

“O LORD of hosts, who tests the righteous, who sees the heart and the mind, let me see your vengeance upon them, for to you have I committed my cause.”

.

Jeremiah 21.  Judah’s last king, Zedekiah, sends Pashhur and Zephaniah to Jeremiah to inquire about Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon. “Will God do his wonderful deeds and make this king withdraw from us?”

But the LORD tells Jeremiah a different message. On the contrary, God will not help them fight the Chaldeans but will take their own weapons and fight against Judah Himself, “with outstretched hand and strong arm, in anger and in fury and in great wrath. And I will strike down the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast. They shall die of great pestilence. Afterward, I will give Zedekiah, king of Judah, and all his servants and the people in this city who survive… into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar.”

But the merciful God warns the people, “I set before you the way of life and the way of death. He who stays in this city shall die by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence. But he who goes out and surrenders to the Chaldeans… shall live. For I have set my face against this city for harm and not for good.  It shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.”

.

In Jeremiah 22, God warns both the king of Judah, and the sons of Josiah (the last four evil kings), “Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness.”   And to “Coniah” (Jehoiachin), “I give you into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar. I will hurl you and the mother who bore you into another country where you were not born, and there you shall die.  Write this man down as childless, a man who shall not succeed in his days for NONE of his offspring shall succeed in sitting on the throne of David and ruling again in Judah.”

(NOTE: Jehoiachin wasn’t actually childless. This points to the fact that none of his descendants… down to Joseph, the husband of Mary, would ever sit on the throne in Israel.  So then, how can Jesus then be the Messiah?  It was because Joseph was NOT involved in the bloodline of Jesus (as His step-father).  Jesus’s blood right to the throne of David came through Mary from David’s son Nathan (not Solomon), bypassing the curse. See Luke 3:313-32 and Jeremiah 36:30.)

..

    Day 225 – Jeremiah 23 – 25 (Promise of the righteous Branch, evil/false leaders of His people, good & bad figs illustration, 70 years of captivity)

Jeremiah 23. God curses the evil leaders (shepherds) who have led his people astray and tells of a time when a Good Shepherd, a Righteous Branch of David’s line will reign as king and deal wisely, 

Jeremiah is heart-sick for all the false prophets and ungodly priests in the land, who, like Sodom and Gomorrah turn the people to evil.  God says to pay no attention to them when they prophesy peace and prosperity, for God WILL bring disaster on them and all who listen to them.  God is EVERYWHERE. He fills the heaven and earth. The false prophets cannot hide from Him.

.

Jeremiah 24. After Nebuchadnezzar had taken from Jerusalem, King “Coniah” (Jehoiachin, grandson of Josiah), his officials, craftsmen, and metal workers, to Babylon, the LORD showed Jeremiah a vision of two baskets of figs. One basket held delicious, good figs, while the other one had very bad, disgusting figs.

God pointed to the good figs as “the exiles from Judah, whom I have sent away from this place to the land of the Chaldeans. I will set my eyes on them for good, and I will bring them back to this land. I will build them up and not tear them down; I will plant them, and not uproot them. I will give them a heart to know that I am the LORD, and they shall be my people and I will be their God, for they shall RETURN TO ME WITH THEIR WHOLE HEART.”

As for the stinky, bad figs, God said, “…and so I will treat Zedekiah, (the last) king of Judah, his officials, the remnant of Jerusalem who remain in this land (those last 11 years), and those who dwell in the land of Egypt. I will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a reproach, a byword, a taunt, and a curse in all the places where I shall drive them.  And I will send sword, famine, and pestilence upon them until they shall be utterly destroyed from the land that I gave to them and their fathers.”

(NOTE: These verses quote Deuteronomy 28:25, 37, and are also fulfilled in the history of the long dispersion until Messiah returns.)

.

Jeremiah 25 again speaks harsh words by God to the people who “persistently did not listen to Him, or obey his words, but provoked Him to anger.  

God will “devote the cities of Judah and their inhabitants to destruction.” (Think Jericho.)  “This whole land shall become a ruin and a waste, and these peoples shall serve the king of Babylon SEVENTY YEARS. After the seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation for their iniquity. 

Then the LORD sends (literally?) the prophet Jeremiah with “the cup of God’s wrath to all the nations.  First to Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, Egypt, Uz, all the cities of Philistia, Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre, Sidon, the coastland across the sea; Dedan, Tema, Buz (and all who cut the corners of their hair), Arabia, the mixed tribes of the desert, Zimri, Elam, Media, the north far and near, all the kingdoms of the world that are on the face of the earth. And after them, Babylon shall drink it.” 

“Behold, I begin to work disaster at the city that is called by my name… I am summoning a sword against all the inhabitants of the earth.”  Prophesy against them, Jeremiah, “The LORD will roar from on high…. against His fold and against all the inhabitants of the earth.”  ” for the LORD has an indictment against the nations,”   “He is entering into judgment with all flesh, and the wicked will be put to the sword.”

(NOTE: Although against the nations at Jeremiah’s time, this has “end-time” implications and must ultimately be fulfilled in the time of tribulation. (Revelation 6 – 19)

 

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, day 223

Aug10

    Day 223—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading, with more of Israel’s history and prophecy.

    Day 223 – Jeremiah 14 – 17 (Terrible drought, false prophets, no turning back, famine-sword-death, trust & the Sabbath) These chapters reveal the sternness of the Lord, the pleading and depression of Jeremiah, an a glimmer of hope for the obedient.

Jeremiah 14 begins with a dire picture of drought and famine and Jeremiah pleading for God to relent.  ONCE AGAIN, God tells Jeremiah, “Do not pray for the welfare of this people. Though they fast, I will not hear their cry, and though they offer burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by sword, by famine, and by pestilence.”

Jeremiah then points out FALSE prophets who say Judah will not see those things, and God responds, “I did not send them, nor did I command them to speak. They are prophesying a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds.” 

The rest of the chapter is either Judah or Jeremiah for Judah pleading for God to relent, even acknowledging their wickedness. They tell God they know the false gods cannot bring rain; only He can!

 

Jeremiah 15.  Here, God responds to their pleading. It’s too little, too late. “Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my heart would NOT turn toward this people. Send them out of my sight.”   “I will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth because of what Manasseh, the son of Hezekiah, king of Judah, did in Jerusalem.”  See 2 Kings 2:2-7, 10-15

Jeremiah is overcome with grief at this and wishes he had not been born.

God reminds him of His promised protection for the remnant of Judah who obeys.

Still,  Jeremiah, in self-pity, asks God not to fail him like a streambed that’s dried up.  God reprimands his prophet for feeling sorry for himself and tells him to repent.  He does, and God promises to protect him.

 

Jeremiah 16.  God tells Jeremiah NOT to take a wife and have children because those who are born then will suffer deadly diseases, perish by the sword, and by famine.  Both great and small shall die in the land. They shall not be buried or lamented.

When the people ask why these predictions, Jeremiah is to say, “Because your fathers have forsaken me and have gone after other gods and have served and worshiped them, and have forsaken me and have not kept my law, AND because YOU have done worse than your fathers.”   ” Therefore, I will hurl you out of this land into a land that neither you nor your fathers have known, and THERE you SHALL SERVE OTHER GODS DAY AND NIGHT, for I will show you no favor.”

HOWEVER….. for the faithful remnant, the LORD promises restoration.  And their deliverance from Babylon will be greater than their former deliverance from Egypt.  And such deliverance will result in Israel never again turning to idols. They will entirely and permanently renounce idolatry.

 

Jeremiah 17. After that vision of hope, the passage turns again to their horrendous sins of idolatry, depending on their own flesh, and dishonesty in gaining wealth.

Thus says the LORD:
Cursed is the man who trusts in man
and makes flesh his strength,
whose heart turns away from the LORD."

"Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
whose trust is the LORD.
He is like a tree planted by water,
that sends out its roots by the stream,
and does not fear when heat comes,
for its leaves remain green,
and is not anxious in the year of drought,
for it does not cease to bear fruit.

The heart is deceitful above all things,
and desperately sick;
who can understand it?
I the LORD search the heart
and test the mind,
to give every man according to his ways,
according to the fruit of his deeds."

"Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed,
save me, and I shall be saved,
for you are my praise." (Jeremiah)

Then the LORD tells Jeremiah to go to the gates of Jerusalem, and remind the people of the importance of “keeping the Sabbath Day holy unto Him.”  He tells them the results of their hearing and obeying His words (blessings) or NOT listening and keeping the day holy (destruction). 

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, day 222

Aug9

    Day 222—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading: Israel’s history and Jeremiah’s prophecy.

    Day 222 – Jeremiah 10 – 13 (Idols & the Living God, Judah breaks covenant, Jeremiah & God, a loincloth)

Jeremiah 10 writes of the stupidity of fashioning your own idols of wood, silver, and gold, of dressing them up and taking them where you go. How foolish! They can neither do good or evil. Unlike the LORD.

There is NONE like Him. He is the true God, He is the living God and the everlasting King. He is the one who formed all things. The LORD of hosts is His name.

 

Jeremiah 11 tells again how God is righteous, caring for His own people and promising them the land of milk and honey if they would but obey His voice. And THEY did not obey or incline their ear, but everyone walked in the stubbornness of his evil heart.  And so, the LORD is bringing disaster upon them.

Again God tells Jeremiah, “Do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their trouble.”

 

Jeremiah 12. Jeremiah now argues with God about why the wicked still prosper, seeming foolish because he could not see their end and in judging God.  But God reminds him of the invaders coming, overwhelming the land like a flood.  Both the Babylonians and God’s sword of condemnation are the same.

But, God, ever so merciful, says, “After I have plucked them up, I will again have compassion on them, and I will bring them again, each to his heritage and each to his land.”   

In His compassion, God even promises the other nations, “And it shall come to pass, if they will diligently learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name, “as the LORD lives,” even as they taught my people to swear by Baal, then they shall be built up in the midst of my people.”

 

Jeremiah 13. God gives Jeremiah an object lesson.  He is to go buy a linen loincloth, wear it for a few days, then take it off, go to the Euphrates, and hide it there.  After many days, he was to go and dig it up. But it was spoiled and good for nothing.  God said THIS was His spoiling the “great pride” of Judah, who stubbornly followed their own heart and went after other gods. 

Since a loincloth clung close to a person’s skin, so God made the house of Judah cling to Him that they might be His people, a name, a praise, and a glory. But they would not listen. 

Then God gives the message, “Hear and give ear; be not proud, for the LORD has spoken. Give glory to the LORD your God before He brings darkness… before your feet stumble on the twilight mountains, and while you look for light, He turns it into gloom and makes it deep darkness.”

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, day 221

Aug8

    Day 221—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading, with more of Israel’s history and prophecy (Jeremiah).

    Day 221 – Jeremiah 7 – 9 (God’s ultimatum, the people’s response, & dire results, Jeremiah’s grief for the people & God’s response)

Jeremiah 7.  The “faithless” people of Judah were holding the Temple of the LORD as a kind of “lucky charm,” thinking that as long as they worshiped God in the Temple, they could do whatever abomination they wanted outside the premises.

“Don’t trust in these deceptive words, ‘This is the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD,” to keep you from exile.” No!  God wants heart evidence of repentance.

“Amend your ways and your deeds, and I will let you dwell in this place.”   

“For if you TRULY amend your ways and deeds, if you TRULY execute justice one with another, if you do not oppress the sojourner, the fatherless, or the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own harm…. THEN I will let you dwell in this place.”

However, God knows their hearts.

“Behold you trust in those deceptive words (the Temple, the Temple) to no avail. will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known (all those 10 commandments) and then come and stand before ME in this house and say, “We are delivered!” — only to go on doing all these abominations?

“Has this house, which is called by My name, BECOME A DEN OF ROBBERS IN YOUR EYES?“

And then God gives Jeremiah instructions concerning them. “As for you, do NOT pray for this people or lift up a cry or prayer for them, and do NOT intercede with me, for I will not hear you.”

Wow, that is truly serious for God to tell him that there are people beyond prayer.

Jeremiah 8. The LORD tells His prophet that the land of Judah will be covered with their bones like dung. And death shall be preferred to life for all the Remnant that remains. Then Jeremiah mourns the unrepentance of the people of Judah.

“Why has this people turned away in perpetual backsliding…they refuse to return.”

“I mourn, and dismay has taken hold of me. Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why, then has the health of the daughter of my people not been restored? Oh, that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people.”

Jeremiah 9. The “weeping prophet” continues to mourn for the people and the land that will be desolate and destroyed. “I will take up weeping and wailing for the mountains, and a lamentation for the pastures of the wilderness, because they are laid waste…”

“WHY???” asks the sorrowful prophet, and God answers.

“Because they have forsaken my law that I set before them and have not obeyed my voice or walked in accord with it, but have stubbornly followed their own hearts and have gone after the Baals,”

And so, God says He will feed them with bitter food and give them poisonous water and scatter them among the nations and send the sword after them till they are consumed. I will punish ALL those who are circumcised merely in the flesh — all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.”

EXTRA: Read God’s words in 9:23-24 about what a person should be boasting about, and compare with how Paul uses this in 1 Corinthians 1:26-31

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, day 220

Aug7

    Day 220—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading, with more of Israel’s history and prophecy.

    Day 220 – Jeremiah 4 – 6 (Continuous judgment is prophesied on Judah for their rejection of the LORD)

Jeremiah 4. This chapter begins with God holding out hope to Judah, if they would repent, turn from their wickedness, and “return to Him.” 

“Remove your detestable things from my presence…. and swear ‘As the Lord lives,’ in truth, justice, and righteousness.”

“Break up your fallow ground, and sow NOT among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to the LORD: remove the foreskin of your hearts, O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; lest my wrath go forth like fire and burn with none to quench it, because of the evil of your deeds.” 

“O Jerusalem, wash your heart from evil, that you may be saved. How long shall your wicked thoughts lodge within you?”

And yet, they will not, so the destruction God forewarned about will surely come. 

 

Jeremiah 5. An offer of hope is held out if ONE just man can be found.

“Run to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem; look and take note! Search her squares to see if you can find a man, one who does justice and seeks truth that I may pardon her.”

But none can be found.  “They have made their faces harder than rock; they have refused to repent.”   

“Hear this, O foolish and senseless people, who have eyes, but see not, who have ears, but hear not. Do you not fear me?’ declares the LORD. Do you not tremble before me?”

“But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart; they have turned aside and gone away. They do not say in their hearts, ‘Let us fear the LORD our God.’

And the LORD’s response?  “Shall I not punish them for these things, declares the LORD, and shall I not avenge myself on a nation like this?”

 

Jeremiah 6. The prophet writes of impending disaster for Jerusalem, calling for the people to be warned. “This is a city that must be punished; there is nothing but oppression within her.”

“Behold their ears are uncircumcised, they cannot listen; behold the Word of the LORD is to them an object of scorn; they take no pleasure in it.  Therefore, I am full of the wrath of the LORD; I am weary of holding it in.”

Therefore, hear, O nations, and know, O congregation, what will happen to them. Hear, O earth; behold, I am bringing disaster upon this people, the fruit of their devices, because they have not paid attention to my words, and as for my law, they have rejected it. 

 

Read the horrific details of the destruction of Jerusalem and its people in these chapters and know why Jeremiah cries “My anguish, my anguish! I write in pain! Oh, the walls of my heart! My heart is beating wildly; I cannot keep silent, for I hear the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Crash follows hard on crash; the whole land is laid waste. Suddenly my tents are laid waste, my curtains in a moment. How long must I see the standard and hear the sound of the trumpet?” 4:19-21

2024GOAL – Reading Through The Bible Chronologically, day 219

Aug6

    Day 219—We are in the eighth month of Bible reading, with  Israel’s history and Jeremiah’s prophecy.

    Day 219 – Jeremiah 1 – 3 (the “weeping prophet” prophesies for 50 years, during the last 5 kings of Judah, and beyond the fall of Jerusalem to Babylon where he writes his last words of the book)

Jeremiah 1. Jeremiah is a young priest when God calls him to be a prophet to the nations.  At first, Jeremiah refuses, saying he is too young (20-25) and doesn’t know how to speak (much like the great leader Moses in Exodus 3).

But God, in both men, will take no excuses. He will empower Jeremiah and be with him to deliver him. And like Isaiah, the LORD then touches Jeremiah’s mouth, but with His hand, not a burning coal.

Right away, God tells Jeremiah that kings of the north will come and “set their thrones” at the entrance of Jerusalem. Disaster will come because Judah has forsaken Him.  And to Jeremiah, “But you, dress yourself for work; arise, and say to them everything I command you.”  “They will fight against you, but they shall not prevail against you, for I am with you, declares the LORD, to deliver you.”

Jeremiah 2. His first action was to go through Jerusalem and tell them about how it used to be. How they used to love God and follow Him. How Israel was holy to the LORD.  Then, that heartbreaking question Jeremiah was to ask them,

“What wrong did your fathers find in me that they went far from me, and went after worthlessness, and became worthless? 

The wrong was NOT on God’s part but on theirs.

“Be appalled, O heavens, at this; be shocked, be utterly desolate, declares the LORD, for my people have committed TWO EVILS;  they have FORSAKEN ME, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns FOR THEMSELVES…broken cisterns that can hold no water.”

Jeremiah 3. Through Jeremiah, God accuses his people of being harlots, whores with many lovers. Because of this pollution in the land, God has withheld the rain. Yet they refuse to be ashamed.

Jeremiah is to tell Judah to see how “faithless Israel” turned from God and would not return. And how God sent her away with a divorce decree… “because she took whoredom lightly.” (idolatry) “Treacherous Judah” is even worse!

And yet, God’s heart is one of forgiveness if His people will return to Him in repentance.

“Return, faithless Israel, declares the LORD. I will not look on you in anger, for I am merciful, declares the LORD; I will not be angry forever. Only ACKNOWLEDGE YOUR GUILT, THAT YOU REBELLED AGAINST THE LORD YOUR GOD, and scattered your favors among foreigners under every green tree; and that you have not obeyed my voice, declares the LORD. Return, O faithless children, declares the LORD.”

When Israel finally repents, God will restore their land and bless them. There will be shepherds to teach them the truth, God’s own presence will be on the throne in Jerusalem (NOT the Ark of the Covenant), all nations will gather to His presence, and they will no more stubbornly follow their own evil hearts.

NOTE: It’s unknown when/where the Ark of the Covenant went.  Did the Babylonians take it? Did it come back 70 years later when the exiles returned? Some say that Jeremiah hid it before the Babylonians took the city.

Whichever… verse 16 of this chapter states, “And when you have multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, declares the LORD, they shall no more say, “The ark of the covenant of the LORD.” It shall not come to mind or be remembered or missed; it shall not be made again.”

(Indiana Jones aside, we are not to look for it.)

1 Corinthians 3:16 states that today, believers are God’s temple, and He dwells in them by His Spirit.