No Matter What, My Message Won't Change
EMERGE
No Matter What, My Message Won't Change
To understand why Jeremiah’s sermon made people mad, it helps to understand how desperate the situation was in Jerusalem. The city was under siege. The most powerful military force in the world—the Babylonian army—was camped outside its walls, cutting off all supplies. Bread rations were starting to run low, and there was no water left in any of the cisterns, only brackish mud.
Very likely, the Babylonians had started to attack the walls of the city, trying to undermine its towers or knock down its gates with battering rams. The prophet Ezekiel offered a grim military briefing about this siege: “Outside is the sword, inside are plague and famine; those in the country will die by the sword, and those in the city will be devoured by famine and plague” (7:15). One way or another, the citizens were doomed
Given the city’s weak tactical position, it is easy to see why Jeremiah’s little sermon was bad for morale. He was announcing that victory was impossible, defeat inevitable. His message was “Surrender or Die.” He was preaching that message not because the Babylonians were invincible, but because God himself was fighting on Babylon’s side.
Even though Jeremiah spoke his message on God’s behalf
That “Gang of Four” (Zedekiah’s policy analysts or cabinet members) wanted assurance of victory, not a dire prophecy of defeat. They wanted a message of peace, not ruin. “Then the officials said to the king: ‘This man should be put to death. He is discouraging the soldiers who are left in this city, as well as all the people, by the things he is saying to them. This man is not seeking the good of these people but their ruin’ ” (38:4).
The persecution of God’s prophet begins with the rejection of the prophetic word. Jeremiah’s enemies were shutting their ears to his life-or-death message.
It is hard not to feel at least a little sympathy for the “Gang of Four” who opposed Jeremiah. The prophet was discouraging the soldiers. The word translated “discouraging” means to “weaken one’s hand.” When the soldiers heard Jeremiah’s message, their hands fell slack, and their weapons dropped from their hands. They were so discouraged that they could hardly lift a finger to defend Jerusalem.
Furthermore, Jeremiah was getting a wide hearing. The soldiers were not the only ones who were discouraged—everyone was discouraged. Jeremiah was confined to the prison courtyard, but people had been passing his sermon tapes all over the city. The word was getting out.
In this case, Jeremiah was no traitor. He was speaking the very words of God. When God’s prophet speaks God’s judgment in God’s name, he is no traitor to God’s people. Furthermore, Jeremiah was preaching sweet grace as well as sure judgment. He was telling God’s people how they could save themselves. The real traitors were the members of the “Gang of Four.” When they rejected God’s prophet, they were rejecting God himself, setting themselves up as the enemies of the living God. That was not courageous; it was foolhardy.
The postmodern attitude toward the church may be illustrated from a 1996 article in Gentleman’s Quarterly.3 At the time the Christian organization Promise Keepers was calling American men to be faithful to God, faithful to their families, and faithful to the church. GQ was terrified by that call. The magazine compared the director of Promise Keepers to Adolf Hitler, describing him as a “raving lunatic” and a “lop-eyed loon.” It also likened evangelical Christians to Islamic terrorists.
Such words are a warning of persecution to come. But they should not come as a surprise. God’s truth sounds dangerous to the post-Christian mind.
Jesus endured the same kind of opposition. When he preached repentance and the kingdom of God, he was rejected as a threat to society. The religious leaders of his day “were looking for some way to get rid of Jesus” (Luke 22:2). They said, “We have found this man subverting our nation” (23:2a). God’s enemies always reject the word of God’s prophet.
6 Then took they Jeremiah, and cast him into the dungeon of Malchiah the son of Hammelech, that was in the court of the prison: and they let down Jeremiah with cords. And in the dungeon there was no water, but mire: so Jeremiah sunk in the mire.
the Ethiopian, one of the eunuchs which was in the king’s house, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the dungeon; the king then sitting in the gate of Benjamin; 8 Ebedmelech went forth out of the king’s house, and spake to the king, saying, 9 My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet, whom they have cast into the dungeon; and he is like to die for hunger in the place where he is: for there is no more bread in the city. 10 Then the king commanded Ebedmelech the Ethiopian, saying, Take from hence thirty men with thee, and take up Jeremiah the prophet out of the dungeon, before he die.
11 So Ebedmelech took the men with him, and went into the house of the king under the treasury, and took thence old cast clouts and old rotten rags, and let them down by cords into the dungeon to Jeremiah.
11 So Ebed-melech took the men with him and went into the house of the king [to a room] under the treasury, and took along from there old rags and worn-out garments and let them down by ropes into the dungeon or cistern pit to Jeremiah.
the Ethiopian said to Jeremiah, Put now these old rags and worn-out garments under your armpits under the ropes. And Jeremiah did so.
13 So they drew up Jeremiah with the ropes and took him up out of the dungeon or cistern pit;