Jeremiah 34:1-22.  Yesterday we finished a section in the middle of Jeremiah that focused more on hope that on predictions of destruction and disaster.  That post was kind of long.  The issue of the predictions to Levi and David is kind of complicated.  Bible experts don’t totally agree on how it will all work out.  We can be sure though that it will all work out because God’s predictions are 100% so far.  One interesting idea that I did not include yesterday is that the Levites represent some other group and that God used them because of what their group implies.  Remember Levites were priests, guys who got to go talk to God directly.  In the New Testament we learn that believers in Jesus are a “royal priesthood” and a “holy nation” (1 Peter 2:9).  Some experts think that the predictions we read yesterday apply to “spiritual descendants” of Israel.  Prophecy can have more than one fulfillment as we have discussed.  It would not surprise me if there was some kind of “spiritual” fulfillment of this prediction but I also think the language pushes us to see a real fulfillment in the lives of the “house of Judah” and the “house of Israel” first.

Today’s reading returns to the where we left off before the “Book of Consolation” (chapters 30-33).  The events of chapters 27-29 occurred in the earlier parts of Zedekiah’s reign.  In  588 BC, Zedekiah King of Judah, gave in to the people and rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar had made this third son of Josiah (the king of Judah at the beginning of Jeremiah’s work as a prophet) about 11 years earlier.  In response to the rebellion Nebuchadnezzar marched to the area in 588 BC. and besieged Jerusalem.  The siege began in 588 BC and Jerusalem fell in 586 BC, 18 months later.  At some point in the middle of the siege Hophra, Pharaoh (king) of Egypt launched an offensive in the area.  Nebuchadnezzar pulled back from Jerusalem to deal with the Egyptians.  It was during this break in the siege that Jeremiah redeemed the land of his relative (Jeremiah 32) and gave the other messages in the “book of consolation” (chapters 30-33) while he was captive in the courtyard of the palace. The people of Jerusalem thought the war was over as we will see in today’s reading and began to get quite comfortable again.

In verse 1 we see Jeremiah getting a message from God, we also see that Nebuchadnezzar is back.  Not only did he bring his army, but he had troops from all of the kingdoms he had conquered.  It was the responsibility of conquered kingdoms to give money to the king who now controlled them and they also had to provide troops.  We are also told that not only is Jerusalem under siege but so are other cities in Judah. In verses 2-3 Jeremiah remains true to the message God has given him, a message that has been consistent through out.  Jeremiah is told to go to Zedekiah and tell him Jerusalem will fall and Zedekiah will face Nebuchadnezzar personally (see Jeremiah 32:4 where Jeremiah uses the exact same language).  Zedekiah is then to be told that he will not die by the sword but will be taken captive to Babylon where he will “die in peace” (v. 5).  In verse 6 we are told that Jeremiah delivered the message to Zedekiah.  In verse 2 we were told that Jerusalem and “all it’s cities” were under attack by Nebuchadnezzar.  By the time Jeremiah delivered the message to Zedekiah only two other cities remained, Lachish (25-30 miles southwest of Jerusalem) and Azekah (13-15 miles southwest of Jerusalem).  Letters that were written during the Babylonian invasion were uncovered in the early 1900’s in Lachish.  The letters talk about the appearant fall of Azekah to the Babylonians.  It would not be long before Lachish and Jerusalem were destroyed too.

According to Jeremiah 52:11 Zedekiah was in prison in Babylon until the day of his death.  In verse 5 we are also told that spices would be burned for him upon his death just like spices had been burned for the kings who were before him.  In 2 Chronicles 16:14 we see a funeral for one of the previous kings, Asa, all kinds of spices were put in the tomb with the body and a ceremonial fire was lit to honor him.  The Israelite people did not generally cremate bodies so that is not what the fire was about.  In 2 Chronicles 21:19 we see the death of another king, Jehoram, for whom the honorary fire was withheld.  Asa had been a faithful king to God, while Jehoram was hated by the people (2 Chronicles 21:20).  The practice was not put into place by God and seems to have been more a reflection of the attitude of the people.  Even though he had been put into power by Nebuchadnezzar, the Israelites in Babylon may still have considered Zedekiah the last of their legitimate kings.  According to 1 Chronicles 3 Zedekiah was a direct descendant of David.  Remember the people of Judah were looking for God to fulfill his promise to David.  Even Jeremiah was predicting that David would have a king on the throne; that was part of the hope given in the last three chapters.

Zedekiah would have been constantly on the minds and in the hearts of the exiles, his death, even in prison, would have been a big deal.  It is very likely that they would want to honor him at his death.  Some Bible experts doubt that the exiles in Babylon would allow such a show of national pride and connections with a rebellious king like Zedekiah.  From the Bible and other historical records we know that the Jewish people lived as a group in Babylon on their own land and had a fairly free life.  Also we don’t know when Zedekiah died. We also don’t know how big the celebration that God told Jeremiah about was.  It seems possible that the people in exile could have performed the funeral ceremony described in 2 Chronicles 16 and here in verse 5.   Also Zedekiah was 21 when Nebuchadnezzar made him king in 597 BC.  In 539 BC the Babylonian Empire was conquered by Cyrus king of the Persians.  Zedekiah may have died some years after the conquest by Nebuchadnezzar and his funeral may not have been very important to the Babylonian king by that time.

Verses 8-11 describe events that show us the true nature of the people of Judah.  In verse 8 Jeremiah is going to get another message from Yahweh (LORD).  In verses 8-11 we are told why.  Zedekiah commanded the people to release all of their slaves.  Slavery was widespread in the ancient world.  Generally slaves were thought of as property and completely at the mercy of their masters.   The Law of Moses, however, had very strict rules about how slaves were to be treated (Leviticus 25, Exodus 21 and Deuteronomy 15 contain some of these rules).  One rule required that slaves be released after six years of service.  In the Law of Moses there was a requirement that all debt be forgiven every seven years.  This was based on a fixed calendar and occurred on specific years.  There is some question whether the release of a slave was based on this calendar or on when they started work.  The law of release also mentions giving the slave provisions in the seventh year.  In the nation, under the law, no one was to work on the seventh year.  Also all debts were to be forgiven on the seventh year.  Many slaves were slaves because they sold themselves for a price; it was sort of a debt; they were borrowing money for their service.

It seems more likely to me that the release of slaves was on the fixed calendar; as part of the “Sabbath” (seventh) year.  During the initial part of the siege it may be that Zedekiah hoped to divert the wrath of God, as seen in the invasion by the Babylonians (Jeremiah 25:9) by declaring a Sabbath year.  It may have also been a way to motivate the slaves to work at reinforcing the walls of the city.  Some experts believe that the slave owners would have been relieves since they would not have to care for their slaves during a time of famine (due to the war).  The people evidenty went along with the idea and released their slaves, for whatever reasons.  In fact they made a big deal out of it with a ceremony in the Temple during which the people made a covenant (or promise to God) to let their slaves go free.

When the siege was lifted (Nebuchadnezzar was off fighting Hophra) the people evidently thought it was all over so they went back to “business as usual” and they backed out of their promise to God and forced their former slaves back to work for them.

In verses 12-16 Jeremiah receives the specific message from God about the situation.  In these verses God reminds them of where they all came from; their forefathers had been a bunch of slaves in Egypt that God rescued.  He also reminds them that when he created the laws that the Israelites stood before Moses who read all of them and promised to follow them; they would be God’s people and he would be their God.  This was an official contract, agreement, or covenant between the Israelites and God.  Of course one of theses laws was the law of release after seven years.  God then reminds the people that their forefathers never obeyed the law.  In fact they didn’t even really listen to it (instead of turning (inclining) their ear to listen they turned it away).  In verse 15 we learn that the inhabitants of Jerusalem had started to obey this rule of God (because of Zedekiah’s encouragement to do so) but in verse 16 we learn that they backed out; broke their contract, promise, or covenant with God.

In verses 17-22 God then tells the people that because of their broken promise that he is going to release them, to the sword and disease and famine, he is going to bring Nebuchadnezzar back to finish what he had started; conquering and destroying Jerusalem.  In verse 17 we see an all important part of why God is going to bring the disaster on them; people were watching.

In verse 18 we get a little look at part of the ceremony that the people had performed.  In the ancient world contracts or covenants were serious business and various ceremonies or other rituals were performed to show that the people making the contract were serious.  Sometimes the people would have a mean together and both lick a piece of salt (Numbers 18:19) other times a piece of clothing would be given as a pledge (like collateral but under the law it needed to be returned and was only symbolic), sometimes blood would be sprinkled around (like the Passover celebration), and sometimes an animal would be cut into pieces and the people making the contract would walk between the pieces (probably as a serious way of indicating that this should be their fate if they broke the contract). The people of Judah had made a promise to God to release the slaves like he had commanded and had sealed their contract with the cut up animal ceremony.  It was all very public, now they were breaking the contract.  The invasion was God’s way of applying the consequence that they agreed to for breaking the deal.  The world needs to know that God is serious about disobedience, disrespect, and rebellion toward him.  Failure to see the consequences of sin here and now can lead to an eternity excluded from God’s forever kingdom.  As bad as the exile was for those in Babylon being exiled from the forever kingdom is infinitely worse.  In Revelation 20:11-15 we see that those banished from the kingdom go to Hell.  Hell is described as eternal fire, the place where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched (Mark 9:44, Isaiah 6624), and the outer darkness where there is crying and grinding of teeth (Matthew 22:13).  We also know from Revelation 20 that Hell was originally created as the place of banishment for the angles who chose not to be a part of God kingdom.  The reality of an existence without God is: there is nothing good about it, that is why Hell is what it is.

We see in verse 19-20 that the people who “walked between the parts of the animal” would die in the siege and their bodies wouldn’t even get a burial.  In the Jewish world that was perhaps the worst thing that could happen.  In verses 21-22 we see that the king and the officials would be delivered to Nebuchadnezzar to do with what he would.  Evidently at the time of this message Nebuchadnezzar was still away dealing with Hophra but God assured them he would bring Nebuchadnezzar back to finish the invasion. God confirmed that he was going to destroy Judah, for a while it would have no inhabitants.

It is important to see how serious God is about honoring him with our lives.  Sometimes people like to think rebellion and disobedience toward God (sin) doesn’t hurt anyone.  In fact sometimes people think we need to disobey him to keep people from getting hurt.  The reality is our sin does hurt, it misleads those around us and it makes us think God doesn’t really care all that much.  But he does care that much.  God is pure and our impurity needs to be dealt with if we are going to be with God.  It is so serious that God the Son took on human flesh so he could die in our place.  Some people like to joke about Hell, “Hey I want to be there because all of my friends will be there!”  Don’t kid yourself, without God existence is miserable.  God made and maintains all that is good in the universe without him it is just bad.  If you want a little taste of Hell just look at the misery in the world around you; the trouble that we have brought into our existence.  Multiply that by forever and all the time and you might get a little idea.  We need to seriously take God up on his offer to fix our relationship  and honor and please him with our lives as appreciation for what Jesus has done for us.

God thank you for saving me.  Help me not make promises I can’t or won’t keep.  Help me honor you with all that I do.  Thank you for a way to miss out on Hell.  Help me show other the way to you.  Let me be serious about our relationship.

Jeremiah 33:14-26.  Today’s reading is the end of the “Book of Consolation” a section of hope in the middle of the very depressing “book” of Jeremiah.  Jeremiah spent a lot of time delivering messages of warning to the people of Judah.  Of course the idea of a warning is that, if you listen, you might avoid something bad.  So throughout Jeremiah there was always a little hope.  In chapters 31-33 we see a switch from warnings to predictions of restoration.  Just like a little hope was mixed with the warnings, in this sections there is a reminder of the trouble with the predictions of restoration.

Yesterday focused mostly on the restoration of Judah.  The land was destroyed and the people were in exile in Babylon, but the personal creator of the universe promised to bring the people back and fix their towns.  In verse 9 we saw that the “nations” would praise and honor Yahweh because of what he was doing for the Israelites.   In today’s reading we see the promises are bigger than just Judah (the Southern Kingdom).

In verses 14-18 we have a prediction from Yahweh that “days are coming” when he will fulfill his promises about Judah (the Southern Kingdom) and Israel (the Northern Kingdom);the complete nation of Israel.  In those days God will cause a “righteous branch of David to spring forth”.  Trees grow by forming a “bud” on a branch or the trunk, the bud grows into a branch.  We call the young branch a “shoot”.  Sometimes children are called “offspring”.  We also refer to a part of a family as a branch or offshoot.  In Jeremiah 23:5 we see that this is a reference to a descendant of David that God had promised.  The promise to David was that he would have a king on the throne of Israel forever.  He probably thought that this would be a succession (one after the other) of kings.  In reality is will be one king who reigns forever (Jesus).  Jeremiah is also told that this descendant will be “righteous”.  The idea there is never doing anything wrong; of being right with God.  We are also told that he will “execute (make) justice and righteousness on the earth”.  That word “execute” is the same word “make” or “wrought” from yesterday.  We see that this new and good king will be very hands-on about justice and righteousness.  Justice refers to deciding cases, like a judge.  The king will deal with things that people do wrong.  He won’t just be about the negative, though, he will also be very hands-on about helping people do what is right.

In verse 16 we see that Judah and Jerusalem will be saved and be safe.  Jerusalem will have a nick name “Yahweh our righteousness”.  That name is very cool because it actually tells us how the new king will help people be right with God; Yahweh will do it.  Romans 3:19-26 make it clear that God will make our relationship with him right (righteous) by applying the rightness of Jesus’ life to us; Jesus took our punishment and we get his rightness (righteousness) instead.  This is in a legal sense (remember God is interested in justice) but it is also in a practical or real sense too.  Once Jesus has remove the offence in our lives God is free to help us live better for him.  He does this through the work of the Holy Spirit who comes into our lives like an awesome director.  The idea of “saved” in this verse is the idea of being “delivered” like from captivity.  The exiles in Babylon probably though of this in terms of being brought back to Jerusalem from Babylon.  But verse 14 makes it clear that this prediction or promise involves more that just the Jews in exile.  There may have been a partial fulfillment when they returned to the land after the 70 years in exile but the promise wasn’t completely fulfilled and still isn’t; it’s waiting for “the days to come”.

In verse 18 we learn that the promise to David is not the only thing that will be fulfilled forever, there would be permanent representation to God.  Again the people probably thought that their “system” of honoring God would have a permanent succession of priests.  Priests were supposed to talk to God for the people.  The truth is that there would be one forever priest that would talk to God for the people, none other than Jesus, the righteous branch.  In those days Jesus will be both priest and king.

It is interesting that the author of Hebrews tells us that Jesus is a “high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek” (Hebrews 5:6; 6:20; 7:11-22).  Melchizedek was the king of Salem (Jerusalem) back in Abraham’s day (Abram).  After winning a battle Abraham was on his way home when another king in the area came out to fight him.   Abraham was met by Melchizedek who gave him food and drink and also “blessing” him.  We are told that Melchizedek was a priest of “God most high”.  (It is interesting that Abraham uses a similar name for God but adds Yahweh before it, remember all of this was way before God told Moses his personal name).  Abraham gave an offering to Melchizedek as a way of showing respect for the blessing.  We should understand that although Melchizedek wasn’t an Israelite (Israel hadn’t even been born yet) and the Law of Moses hadn’t been written yet, that there has only ever been one true God, Yahweh, and Melchizedek evidently knew of him and tried to honor him (same story with Job).   We see in Hebrews that Jesus is the same kind of priest, that his position doesn’t depend on the Law of Moses and the formal system of Priests who were all descendants of one of Israel’s sons; Levi (thus Levitical priests).  In fact in Hebrews 7:12-14 seems to indicate that Jesus had no connection to the tribe of Levi (at least officially, some experts think he might have had some levitical blood in him but he was not formally considered a Levite.  He certainly wasn’t a candidate to be a priest according the rules of the Mosaic Law).  One other interesting thing, the name Melchizdek means “King of Righteousness”, pretty interesting when you consider what we are reading today and plug in the information from Romans 3 and from Hebrews, Jesus is the forever king who is righteous but went to God and used his righteousness for us; he presented himself as the sacrifice for sin once for all (Hebrew 7:27)

But the promise in verse 18 clearly mentions “Levites” and talks about them “never lacking a man to present offerings “continually”.  Those offerings include grains and meat.  There are a few facts that we need to take a look at in dealing with this prediction.  First, it was revealed to Jeremiah by God; the words were God’s and the ears were Jeremiah’s.  We have to try to hear first with Jeremiah’s “ears” or understanding.  Second we need to keep in mind that God is talking about “days” that are “coming”.  All of the events occur in “those days”.  A lot of times Old Testament prophecies are hard to understand until we see their fulfillment or at leas part of it.  For instance the promised coming one, the Messiah, was to be a king in the line of David but Isaiah also presents him as a suffering servant (Isaiah 52-53).  Jesus is that Messiah and in his day the people were focused on the kingly predictions.  When Jesus presented himself as a sacrifice instead the people did not understand.  Today as we look back we can see that Jesus was fulfilling a part of his role as the Messiah and that there is more to come, the kick butt king part.  If you have read the Old Testament Connection you know that God was using the people of Israel and the system that he set up for them to live under to help the whole world understand the “sin” problem.  The priests would represent the people to God.  The people were supposed to participate in certain rituals; certain offerings and sacrifices as a way of showing that they understood the trouble we are all in.  The offerings and sacrifices were also a reminder to them and to the rest of the world of the “sin” mess.   Some of the animal sacrifices wee designed to remind us all that blood (a symbol of life) was required to deal with sin.  As we saw above Jesus was the actual fulfillment of the requirement, he gave his life to pay for ours; he was the “lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world” (see “The Old Testament Connection”).  Just because Jesus paid the price for the sins of the world does not mean that the sacrifices of the Levites could not still have purpose.  As we saw in Romans (above) the requirements of the Law do not make us right with God they just teach us.  Just as the sacrifices before Jesus pointed to the need for an ultimate sacrifice, sacrifices that may be performed in the future could have the same purpose.  God’s words to Jeremiah seem to indicate that just that sort of thing is actually going to happen.  In Ezekiel 37-39 that prophet predicts that Israel will become a nation once again under her forever king.  In Ezekiel 40-43 he gives a very detailed account of the rebuilding of the Temple and new animal sacrifices including a “sin offering”.  Now remember that these offerings did not really deal with sin, they were reminders.  When Jesus takes control of the earth and becomes the fulfillment of the promises to Israel, and Abraham, and David he will be ruling over all the resurrected believers as well as survivors of the time of Jacob’s trouble.  People will live extraordinarily long times and new people will be born.  Justice will be swift in his reign.  After 1000 years of reign there will be one last rebellion.  This shows us that people will still be making choices about their relationship to God.  The need for reminders about sin will still exist and the function of the Levites would still have a purpose.  It seems like the prediction in Jeremiah 33:18  probably relates to this time after the “Time of Jacob’s Trouble” (the seven year tribulation described in Daniel and Revelation) a time referred to as the “Millennium” or the “Millennial Kingdom”.

In verses 19-22 God tells Jeremiah that his promises will be fulfilled to David and the Levites just as surely as the forces of motion of the planets will continue.  God assures Jeremiah that the descendants of David and the Levites will be numerous, this echoes a promise that God made to Jacob (Israel) (Genesis 28:13-15; 46:3-4).

In verses 23-26 God gives one last message to Jeremiah in this section of hope.  God asks Jeremiah if he hears what the people are saying.  He doesn’t identify which people but they are talking about the Israelites; these two “families”.  The two families could be David and Levi (mentioned before, v. 22) or it could be David and Jacob (mentioned after, v.26) or it could mean Israel and Judah (way back in v. 14).  Verse 22 isn’t in the immediate context of the message and neither is verse 14.  In verse 26 the word descendants may apply specifically to Jacob (Israel, see “What’s in a Name”), while David is mentioned with respect to a more specific promise.  But of course Jacob or Israel includes all the descendants from the twelve tribes, both kingdoms, including the descendants of David who was a Benjamite and part of the Southern Kingdom.  So the “people” doing the talking are not Israelites.  Back in verse 9 we saw that God would restore the Israelite people and this would bring him honor “before all the nations”.  It was probably the nations around Israel who were talking smack on Israel saying that God had dumped them.  God brings back his example from the previous message about his “covenant for the day and night”.  He describes this
“covenant” as a “fixed pattern”, “fixed law”, of “appointed ordinance”.  The words used here in Hebrew are “to put, place, or make” (it can also mean “to plant”) and “statutes or ordinances”.  For this second word we would normally think of laws but the word has a very permanent idea in it.  It comes from a root that means to engrave or cut into.  Think of the Ten Commandments that were cut into pieces of stone in the days of Moses and were still in the “Ark of the Covenant” (a fancy box) in the Temple in Jeremiah’s day 900 years later.  I have books that are maybe 20 years old that are already starting to show signs of age, on the other hand my daughter was showing me pictures of statues she saw in Italy that are hundreds of years old and still bright and whole.  Stone and engraving last a long time, God is definitely trying to communicate permanence here.  His laws of planetary motion are permanent and so are his promises to Israel and to David.

In verse 26 God ends this section of hope by confirming that he will remember his promise to Israel to make his people a large nation and his promise to David that his descendant(s) will forever.  Based on who God is hearing talk (the nations) this restoration certainly involves the promise to Abraham too.  In Genesis 12:2-3 God promised to make Abraham a “great nation” (Abraham would have understood this to mean a lot of people) whom God would “bless”.  This “blessing” by God would make Abraham’s “name great” (everyone would know who he was because of his “success, power, and prosperity”; he would be “rich and famous” in our words).  The end result would be that all the nations of the world would also be blessed.  In Genesis 22:18 God told Abraham that in his “seed” (descendants) all the nations would be blessed.  This blessing was to come through the Israelite people but in Galatians 3:16 Paul told the churches in the area of Galatia that this promise really involved one particular descendant, Jesus (see also Genesis 3:15 where we see a related promise).

So the people who thought that God had abandon Israel would be surprised when they were restored 70 years later, and the people who think that God isn’t going to finish dealing with his plan to “bless all the nations” will be surprised when Jesus returns and establishes Israel in their land forever.  God keeps his promises all of them.  The Israelites needed to remember that and we all need to understand that too.  And remember his promise include mercy (v. 26), not giving us what we deserve, but that mercy required his gracious sacrifice; a gift we must receive.

God there are lots and lots of details in the promises you have made.  Some have conditions others do not.  The promises involve lots of groups and individuals.  Some of the promises have more than one fulfillment and they overlap.  Help us not get lost in the details to the point where we miss the point.  The point is your love, mercy and grace.  We offended you and broke our relationship with you.  You have provided the solution through Jesus.  You want to “bless” us with a restored relationship with you in your forever kingdom.  A kingdom filled with happiness and healing and you (Revelation 21-22).  Thank you for caring.  Thank you for having a plan.  Thank you for following through on your plan even when we have turned our backs on you.  Thank you for caring about all of us and each of us.  Help many turn back to you.  Thank you for restoring me to your kingdom.