Jeremiah 24-25

Hope And Destruction

Format of Jeremiah...halfway there!

But one thing that all scholars agree upon is this, that the chapters we are looking at today, chapters 24-25, are a dividing line in the book of Jeremiah. Chapters 1-24 have the overarching theme of the Lord making His case against Judah, responding to Jeremiah’s personal fears and complaints, as well as numerous extended sections of poetry that largely serve as warnings to the Jewish people of the judgment that is to come, and explanations as to how that judgment is a just response to their overwhelming idolatry and sin for centuries in the land.

Chapter 25 on shifts to a different tone, still clearly Jeremiah’s voice, but now the focus is on historical narrative- the events that are happening, that will happen, and there is far less poetry and much more prose. And, as it happens, these chapters are precisely in the middle of the book. So one could say that the first half of Jeremiah is prophesy, often in poetic form, and the second half is narrative, with a plot moving forward. It isn’t quite as cut and dried as all that. We have seen some narrative in the first chapters, such as the Lord’s call to Jeremiah in the first chapter or the betrayal of Jeremiah by his relatives, and the second half in Jeremiah still does contain some prophetic poetry, but by and large they are quite different. 2 different genres of writing and the genres point to a reality- that the Lord communicates with us spiritually, divinely, through His Word, through His people, and spiritually through the Holy Spirit in our hearts, and then His Word is realized, it happens and bears fruit in the ‘real world’. And the second half of Jeremiah is the real world actualization of the Word of the Lord in the first half.

Maybe a clever way to say it would be that the Word of the Lord is realized in the World of the Lord.

I am going to preach first from Chapter 25 and then go backwards to Chapter 24. Chapter 25 is a chapter of judgment against Israel that becomes apocalyptic as it unfolds, encompassing the whole world.

Jeremiah 25:8–11 ““Therefore thus says the Lord of hosts: Because you have not obeyed my words, behold, I will send for all the tribes of the north, declares the Lord, and for Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants, and against all these surrounding nations. I will devote them to destruction, and make them a horror, a hissing, and an everlasting desolation. Moreover, I will banish from them the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the grinding of the millstones and the light of the lamp. This whole land shall become a ruin and a waste, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.”

Jeremiah 25:12–14 “Then after seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, declares the Lord, making the land an everlasting waste. I will bring upon that land all the words that I have uttered against it, everything written in this book, which Jeremiah prophesied against all the nations. For many nations and great kings shall make slaves even of them, and I will recompense them according to their deeds and the work of their hands.””

Jeremiah 25:17–26 “So I took the cup from the Lord’s hand, and made all the nations to whom the Lord sent me drink it: Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, its kings and officials, to make them a desolation and a waste, a hissing and a curse, as at this day; Pharaoh king of Egypt, his servants, his officials, all his people, and all the mixed tribes among them; all the kings of the land of Uz and all the kings of the land of the Philistines (Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron, and the remnant of Ashdod); Edom, Moab, and the sons of Ammon; all the kings of Tyre, all the kings of Sidon, and the kings of the coastland across the sea; Dedan, Tema, Buz, and all who cut the corners of their hair; all the kings of Arabia and all the kings of the mixed tribes who dwell in the desert; all the kings of Zimri, all the kings of Elam, and all the kings of Media; all the kings of the north, far and near, one after another, and all the kingdoms of the world that are on the face of the earth. And after them the king of Babylon shall drink.”

Jeremiah 25:30–33 ““You, therefore, shall prophesy against them all these words, and say to them: “ ‘The Lord will roar from on high, and from his holy habitation utter his voice; he will roar mightily against his fold, and shout, like those who tread grapes, against all the inhabitants of the earth. The clamor will resound to the ends of the earth, for the Lord has an indictment against the nations; he is entering into judgment with all flesh, and the wicked he will put to the sword, declares the Lord.’ “Thus says the Lord of hosts: Behold, disaster is going forth from nation to nation, and a great tempest is stirring from the farthest parts of the earth! “And those pierced by the Lord on that day shall extend from one end of the earth to the other. They shall not be lamented, or gathered, or buried; they shall be dung on the surface of the ground.”

**Judgment will be brought, ultimately, against all the Earth, starting with the Jewish people, and extending to all the nation. This is the final judgment- depicted more fully in Revelation 20, alluded to many times by Jesus in the Gospels.

It is a serious and frightening picture of God’s wrath finally being poured out in full upon humanity who have fallen so far away from Him.

The issue is nothing less than can God be trusted? Are His promises reliable? If all you had was chapter 25, with its terrible promise of judgment, it would indeed be just, but it would break God’s promises.

The Lord promised Abraham that his descendants would not only flourish and be uncountable in number, but that his descendants would be a blessing to all the nations… so in other words Israel would not only survive but in fact be an instrument of salvation for the whole world, somehow. That was the promise of God, the core promise upon which the entire Jewish nation was built.

The pagan gods were famous for being unreliable. In the stories told about them they acted very human, shall we say. They would switch allegiances, fall in and out of love, get irritated, go to war, betray friends, etc. The pantheon of gods of the Egyptians or Babylonians or Assyrians all acted very much like the kings of the day, which is not surprising...they were not real...they were just the reflection of ourselves because we invented them.

But YHWH was not like that. He revealed Himself to His people as the only God, with a unity of purpose and character...

Deuteronomy 6:4–5 ““Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.”

and- Psalm of David

Psalm 145:10–13 “Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures throughout all generations. The Lord is faithful in all his words and kind in all his works.”

The Lord is faithful in all His words, and there are no other gods who can oppose Him, and He is one in character in person, He is faithful and unchanging. As Balaam says reprovingly to Balak in Numbers 23-

Numbers 23:19 “God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?”

So the Lord has promised that Israel would be this blessing. How would this be if the Lord was destroying Israel- and all the other nations besides?

These are all Scriptures, truths, that the Israelites of Jeremiah time would have heard and known about, and I think they believed them- but they believed them in completely the wrong way. They seemed to rely upon this aspect of God’s fidelity and truthfulness and promise keeping in such a way that it allowed them to do whatever they wanted to do, because God would always be their God. They took for granted, in other words, their permanent and special relationship to God, and took it to mean that they could pretty much do whatever they wanted to do, including even worshiping other gods who were not god that allowed them to do unholy things while still professing that they were true Israelites, who belonged to YHWH.

One of the common metaphors that the Lord uses is that He is like a husband whose wife is consistently and regularly cheating on Him. She does not leave Him. She does not divorce Him, she just has no faithfulness to Him because she assumes that he will always be faithful to her no matter what she does.

Jeremiah 7:1–10 “The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: “Stand in the gate of the Lord’s house, and proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of the Lord, all you men of Judah who enter these gates to worship the Lord. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Amend your ways and your deeds, and I will let you dwell in this place. Do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.’ “For if you truly amend your ways and your 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, in the land that I gave of old to your fathers forever. “Behold, you trust in deceptive words 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, and then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are delivered!’—only to go on doing all these abominations?”

So here is the problem, laid out. The Lord will not tolerate, ever, sinful behavior. He will not look the other way or ignore it or pretend it does not exist. And His people have turned away from Him and embraced sin as preferable to a life lived for God who is holy, all the while holding up their special relationship with YHWH as a badge of honor, as a special get out of jail free card, as it were.

Matthew 3:9 “And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.”

John 8:39–44 “They answered him, “Abraham is our father.” Jesus said to them, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing the works Abraham did, but now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. … You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”

This is not an ancient problem, recorded in dusty volumes of old, of which we know nothing. This is very much a here and now problem, and will remain so until Christ returns. Let me lay it out as simply as I can. People want to sin. People want to do things that benefit themselves first, that is our “natural”, which is to say ‘sinful’ nature. That is our default when left to ourselves.

But people also fear God in their hearts. They know, without being taught, that they are not right with their Creator

Romans 1:20 “For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.”

So what people are tempted to do is to find a formula that satisfies their itching ears that proclaims them to be righteous in God’s eyes, while at the same time they can do whatever they wish. And we see this all the time in God’s church, among His people. I am not talking about sin, just to be clear. Every church has sin in it, every person has sin in them- no one is perfected in this life.

In Jeremiah’s day and in Jesus’ day the formula was that we are the Jewish people. We are the chosen ones of God. We are the elect. God has committed Himself to us. Look, His glorious temple is at the heart of our city Jerusalem. He would never permit anything to happen to His temple, nor, by extension, to us.

Today it is just the same. People are perfectly capable of saying that Jesus is their savior, that Christ is Lord, that God is real and they might even be baptized or a member of a church, but all it is for them is checking boxes to feel that they are safe with God, while living whatever life they want to live without acknowledging His Lordship over them, without acknowledging His Word, without making knowing Him and following Him the number one priority in their lives. People want salvation without the Cross, grace without repentance, love without sacrifice, and that is a formula that does not exist. It is an illusion.

So then how does the Lord remain faithful in keeping His promises if destruction is the destiny of Israel and the nations ?

So we have the good figs and the bad figs. Let’s talk figs. (King James- Naughty figs)

Now, Chapter 24. We have already seen in Chapter 23 the Lord revealing to Jeremiah that a Messiah is coming whose name will be “the Lord is our Righteousness” and through Him all Israel will be saved, and His significance with regard to salvation will surpass even the entire Exodus narrative, the saving of Israel from destruction in Egypt.

But now something else is revealed, in its own way something even more surprising, that the judgment that Judah is about to experience is going to be, in its own way, a blessing for the people of God.

Jeremiah 24:4–7 “Then the word of the Lord came to me: “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Like these good figs, so I will regard as good 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 pluck them up. 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.”

אַכִּיר

Piel Stem- meaning ‘to recognize- but Piel stem intensifies the verb - so ‘glass broke’ becomes ‘glass shattered’. So

“regard as good” means to recognize intensely as ‘good’. God will grant the Exiles a heart of faith and they shall return to the Lord with their whole heart, and, as Jeremiah has prophesied, that people shall return after 70 years.

‘Good’. The Lord is choosing the Exiles to be His people moving forward. They will be the ones who return to God with their whole heart.

Why would it be the ones who are taken into slavery and Exile that God chooses? Are they better people? Are they the good ones? There is no evidence of that. They are simply declared (regarded) as good by God and chosen to move His salvation plan forward. But there are 2 experiences that they have that had to have been significant.

One, they suffer. They are impoverished, some are enslaved, and they are in a foreign land. They are strangers in a strange land and they know it. And this humbles them. (Psalm 137 by the rivers of Babylon)

Two, they miss the presence of the Lord. (example of my grandparents’ home). They see what it is like to live in a land that does not acknowledge the Lord at all and has no knowledge of holiness or righteousness or the presence of God who loves them.

Psalm 79:11-13

Let the groans of the prisoners come before you;     according to your great power, preserve those doomed to die! 12 Return sevenfold into the lap of our neighbors     the taunts with which they have taunted you, O Lord! 13 But we your people, the sheep of your pasture,     will give thanks to you forever;     from generation to generation we will recount your praise.

The Lord uses our experience of suffering, of alienation, of loss, of His absence, to draw us to Him, we who hunger for the presence of the Lord. Yet we cannot escape this salient fact, that some people hunger for the presence of the Lord, and some do not. Most do not. And that is clearly a matter of good figs and bad figs, those whom the Lord has ‘recognized’ and those whom He has not. For some people this is offensive, that the Lord would pick some to be bad figs, as it were, and some to be good.

Romans 9:14–18 “What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills.”

Romans 9:19–21 “You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?”

Romans 9:22–26 “What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles? As indeed he says in Hosea, “Those who were not my people I will call ‘my people,’ and her who was not beloved I will call ‘beloved.’ ” “And in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’ ””

Ephesians 1:3–14 “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as children through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.

We who are gathered here today to worship our God, have faith, hope and love in our hearts. And these things were given to us as gifts from our heavenly Father, even as our very salvation is a gift. And we are tasked as individuals and as a community to offer that gift freely to any passerby or anyone who will listen, that salvation can be found in the saving work of Jesus of Nazareth, and he will not scorn any who are willing to humble themselves and repent of their sin. Any lost sheep can at any moment hear the voice of their shepherd and come joyfully home, and so will another ripe fig, regarded as good by God, appear in the bowl.