Jeremiah 49:23-33. Today’s reading continues Jeremiah’s messages to the nations and covers two nations Syria and Arabia. Damascus was the capital of a league or confederation of three Syrian kingdoms, the other two being Hamath and Arpad. Kedar and Hazor represent a group of Arab kingdoms. We usually think of kingdoms as places with buildings and palaces but these kingdoms were made up of people who wandered in the desert east of Israel. Most were shepherds living in tents, moving from place to place with their flocks, but some had settle down a little and were farming some land.

Hamath and Arpad had become servant states (vassals) of the Assyrian empire more than a century before Jeremiah lived. In 722 BC. Damascus also became a servant state of the Assyrians. The destruction described here in Jeremiah may be a reference to the invasion by the Assyrians a century before. Assyrians usually took the inhabitants of a city or area and scattered them throughout the empire in an attempt to water down any ethnic or regional loyalties. In the battles to take control of the promised land we see the Israelites destroy or scatter entire tribes of people only to find that the people return and resettle decades later. The Assyrians would also bring people from other parts of their Empire into an area to live and maintain the area. History does not tell us when or by whom but Damascus was eventually repopulated and rebuilt. In 605 BC. The Babylonians overthrew the Assyrian Empire and took control of the area. Of course this change in leadership meant that at least some of the vassal or servant states might try to rebel. In verse 25 God calls Damascus the city of praise, this may be a hint about the situation Jeremiah is describing. It is easy to become proud and over confident when someone is praising you and in this case it looks like God is the one doing the praising. Damascus was an old and proud city and perhaps they tried to resist the new government in Babylon.

In verse 27 we get what might be a couple of other hints about what is going on. God mentions the walls and the fortified towers that he will destroy. Clearly the city was well protected and would have felt pretty secure against invasion. If this was a later rebellion against Babylon they should have remembered the destruction by the Assyrians. Whatever the situation though we want to notice that it is God who is behind the destruction when he destroys there is no real defense. The fact that God takes credit for the destruction does not mean that it was not by the hands of the Assyrians or the Babylonians. Proverbs 21:1 tells us that the “heart of the king is like a river of water in the hands of God and that he directs it wherever he wants it to go.” Although people make real choices in their lives and are accountable for them God is able to use those choices to move history toward his ultimate goals. Ben-Haddad means the “son of Haddad”. Haddad was a local god of the people of Damascus and her allies. Many of the kings of Damascus are referred to as Ben-Haddad. For 150 years this “dynasty” of kings fought against the Israelite people and ultimately against God. It was this proud rebellious people who received a reminder about who was really in control from Jeremiah.

In verse 28 we are specifically told who the earthly foe of the Arab tribes is, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon. Verse 28 seems to refer to an event in the past in which Nebuchadnezzar overthrew these wandering shepherds living east of Israel in the desert. In verse 31 we see that these people also though that they were safe. Their safety clearly wasn’t because of walls and towers it was because they were always on the move and it was hard to catch them and control them. Also a city and all of it’s contents might seem like a real prize in a war but who wants a bunch of dirty tents and sleeping bags. In verse 32 we see the real prize in this battle, the camels and other animals that the “men of the east” owned. Camels would represent transportation and the other animals food and clothing (sheep give us wool remember). While Nebuchadnezzar often kept people groups together and relocated them in his kingdom in this case we see that he scattered the people. Most Bible experts believe that Hazor only referred to a group of people and not a particular place but verse 33 seems to indicate it was a place. It seems likely that even a group of wanderers would have some permanent settlements though no one knows where this one seems to have been. Of course that is the point of verse 33 only the wild animals would ever live there in the future.

Whether these two prophecies referred to past of future events we need to see that they clearly credit God for the action. Neither secure city dwellers in one of the oldest civilizations in the Bible (Damascus is mentioned in the story about Abraham about 2200 BC, Genesis 14:15) nor wandering tent dwellers are outside of God’s power. Neither are they beyond God’s concern. I have mentioned earlier in these posts that the existence of God is clear to all mankind. Paul makes it clear in Romans 1:19-25 that mankind has a habit of ignoring the evidence in creation about a creator God and chooses to honor pieces of the creation (or their own manmade gods) instead. According to 2 Peter 3:9 God does not want anyone to be left out of his forever kingdom, that is why he uses his power and influence in history to make it clear when we defect from him. That is why Jeremiah is writing these prophecies, to help all of us see God’s love and purity. We need to remember that prophets are not all about telling the future but they are about helping us understand our broken relationship with God and how that relationship can be fixed. Here we find two prophecies that make be predictive but certainly are instructive in the serious nature of sin (rebellion and disobedience toward God) and the extent of God’s power.

God thank you for taking the time to warn us. Thank you for caring about all of us from the most secure city dweller to those wandering in the fields. Help us all see before it is too late. Help us avoid being those who fall in the city never to rise again or those who are scattered never to be gathered again. Thank you for your love, love that is patient but also tough. Help us all hear the warnings and turn back to you.