Consistently Deliver God’s Message No Matter What. 

Jeremiah 37:1-21                              Kevin E. Jesmer

Key Verse: 37:9                                3-25-18

“This is what the Lord says: Do not deceive yourselves, thinking, ‘The Babylonians will surely leave us.’ They will not!” (NIV)

Part 1: Stay Faithful To The Lord’s Message (1-10)

Verses 1-10, “Zedekiah son of Josiah was made king of Judah by Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; he reigned in place of Jehoiachin son of Jehoiakim. 2 Neither he nor his attendants nor the people of the land paid any attention to the words the Lord had spoken through Jeremiah the prophet.

3 King Zedekiah, however, sent Jehukal son of Shelemiah with the priest Zephaniah son of Maaseiah to Jeremiah the prophet with this message: “Please pray to the Lord our God for us.”

4 Now Jeremiah was free to come and go among the people, for he had not yet been put in prison. 5 Pharaoh’s army had marched out of Egypt, and when the Babylonians who were besieging Jerusalem heard the report about them, they withdrew from Jerusalem.

6 Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet: 7 “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: Tell the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of me, ‘Pharaoh’s army, which has marched out to support you, will go back to its own land, to Egypt. 8 Then the Babylonians will return and attack this city; they will capture it and burn it down.’

9 “This is what the Lord says: Do not deceive yourselves, thinking, ‘The Babylonians will surely leave us.’ They will not! 10 Even if you were to defeat the entire Babylonian army that is attacking you and only wounded men were left in their tents, they would come out and burn this city down.”

The word God spoke through Jeremiah was very unpopular. No one wanted to hear that Babylon was going to conquer Jerusalem. Egypt was on the march, but Jeremiah knew that Egypt could not save them.

King Zedekiah closed his ears to God’s word. The people of the land paid no attention to the word of the Lord. Again, how foolish this is. They closed their hearts because the Babylonian invasion was not happening quickly. Decades went by since Jeremiah started to speak the message of repentance. The people couldn’t believe that God would allow his temple and his holy city to be burned and his chosen people sent into exile. They also had hope in the Egyptians and also in their weak efforts to defend themselves. These false hopes were hindering them from coming to God. They were trusting in idols also. They felt if they sacrificed to certain idols then things would get better. All of these factors were at play and as a result the people simply refused to accept God’s way of salvation. Satan really had their hearts and their minds under lock down.

Isn’t that the way it is for so many? They are filled with false hopes that things will get better without Jesus. They think that God would never allow things to get worse. And so, they remain in their brokenness, holding onto false hopes and never experiencing God’s salvation and deliverance, because they never repent and place their faith, hope and trust in God. They have no mind to pay attention to the word of God. How sad. How tragic.

This is the problem with idol worship and why it is so evil. Idol worship gives people a false hope that their future will be better. They turn to idols. They hope in idols. They live in these false hopes and never receive healing and deliverance through the Gospel.

Even today, there are false religions or philosophies that enslave people with false hopes. They set themselves up as saviors. They tell their adherents that their problem is because they have abandoned sincere devotion and if they just get sincerer to the false religion, then things will get better for them. But things do not get better, because their false religions are groundless and impotent to bring any change. They spend a lifetime mired in lies and false hopes and die in their sins. They will receive eternal condemnation because they never come to know their only Savior, Jesus Christ. That is why God rales against false religion and idols, both in Jeremiah’s time and in our own day.

There was evidence that the king had a sense of the truth. In his heart he knew that Jeremiah was right. He asked for his prayer. I believe that this was the “image of God” within him speaking. The king has an intuitive knowledge of God for he was created by God. God, by his Spirit, was also trying very hard to communicate to him. All of this was producing within him a nagging suspicion that Jeremiah was in fact right. But the king was so entangled by sin that he was stuck and could not come to God in repentance and faith.

We are all made in God’s image. We are all equipped to hear the voice of God for we are his creation. God is speaking to us, his people, 24/7. But how hard it is to hear God and his voice? We need his grace to hear his gentle, inviting, guiding whisper.

God was looking for nationwide repentance. That could only happen if the top leaders, like the king, personally repent and set the example for the entire nation. And so, Jeremiah was sent to the leaders with the word of God.

There was much pressure for Jeremiah to change his message. The king was asking him to pray for him. Jeremiah felt the threat of being thrown into prison.  Everyone paid no attention to the word of God and some even seemed to be upset about his message. Why not change his position and cave in with a “crowd pleasing” message? In spite of pressure, Jeremiah did not change his message. God’s will did not change. He would turn his peoples’ hearts through the besieging Babylonian army and exile. Only a nationwide repentance and faith in God could save them.

God has given us the Gospel message. There are so many wonderful things about the Gospel that are easy to accept. But there are many things that are hard to accept, things like repentance of sin and placing our hope and trust only in Jesus Christ. Think of a basket that is mostly filled with delicious apples. But there are also some delicious onions as well. The apples are delicious but the onions can make you cry. When you partake of the Gospel, you eat both the apples and the onions. As messengers of the Gospel, we must preach the apples and the onions also. We just cannot preach just the apples (things that people easily accept.) As we preach, we trust God that he will work in peoples’ hearts. Jeremiah rightfully did not change his message for the king. He was faithful to the word of God.

Part 2. Stand Firm On God’s Word Even Under Persecution (11-21)

Verses 11-21: “11 After the Babylonian army had withdrawn from Jerusalem because of Pharaoh’s army, 12 Jeremiah started to leave the city to go to the territory of Benjamin to get his share of the property among the people there. 13 But when he reached the Benjamin Gate, the captain of the guard, whose name was Irijah son of Shelemiah, the son of Hananiah, arrested him and said, “You are deserting to the Babylonians!”

14 “That’s not true!” Jeremiah said. “I am not deserting to the Babylonians.” But Irijah would not listen to him; instead, he arrested Jeremiah and brought him to the officials. 15 They were angry with Jeremiah and had him beaten and imprisoned in the house of Jonathan the secretary, which they had made into a prison.

16 Jeremiah was put into a vaulted cell in a dungeon, where he remained a long time. 17 Then King Zedekiah sent for him and had him brought to the palace, where he asked him privately, “Is there any word from the Lord?” “Yes,” Jeremiah replied, “you will be delivered into the hands of the king of Babylon.”

18 Then Jeremiah said to King Zedekiah, “What crime have I committed against you or your attendants or this people, that you have put me in prison? 19 Where are your prophets who prophesied to you, ‘The king of Babylon will not attack you or this land’? 20 But now, my lord the king, please listen. Let me bring my petition before you: Do not send me back to the house of Jonathan the secretary, or I will die there.”

21 King Zedekiah then gave orders for Jeremiah to be placed in the courtyard of the guard and given a loaf of bread from the street of the bakers each day until all the bread in the city was gone. So Jeremiah remained in the courtyard of the guard.”

Jeremiah was about to leave Jerusalem for a short time. The Babylonian army had retreated thinking that the Egyptian army was coming. Jeremiah was going to return. He only wanted to leave the city to go to the territory of Benjamin to get his share of the property among the people there. But he was stopped by the guard. He was arrested and accused of deserting to the Babylonians. He was sent to house that was converted to be a prison and there he was beaten and left for a long time. He really felt that death was looming.

It goes to show you how much control the king had over the people. Even if there were some people accepting the word of God through Jeremiah, and wanting to submit to the Babylonians, they were hindered from obeying the word of God. If the king didn’t believe it them no one was going to believe it.

The king was actually stopping people from obeying the Lord! He was doing it out of his own deceived heart. He did know better. He was acting out of fear, self-preservation and according to his own rationale. Despite of the reasons why, he was hindering people from doing the right thing. When someone, or some entity literally stops someone from coming to God and obeying God…that is evil.

When the Babylonians temporarily retreated in the face of an advancing Egyptian army, it looked as if Jeremiah were wrong. But he was not wrong. The Babylonians would be back.  Jeremiah continued to insist that surrender to Babylon was God’s way and their hope. This was God’s word to them. They needed to accept it as a matter of life and death.  But they continued in their resistance. Jeremiah asked for one favor. He asked to be removed from the prison he was in for he knew the would die. The king granted his request and was sent to a courtyard in a kind of house arrest.

Those who do not accept God’s word as God’s word cannot understand it. Nor can they accept it. But the servant of God must continue to speak God’s word, without compromise. He cannot change God’s message hoping that if the message is changed then people will accept it. No way. They need to remain true to God’s message to his people.

This is not easy for there are consequences. There can be rejection, persecution, prison and even death for some. But regardless of the consequences any servant of God, in any generation must remain true to God’s message. And our message today is the Gospel.

Prayer: “Lord, you have given us your word. You do not change. Your word does not change. Help me to remain true to the Gospel no matter what goes around me.”

One Word: Stay true to the Word of God.