OVERVIEW:
God’s faithfulness to the Davidic Covenant (34:1–11); Israel’s unfaithfulness to their fellow countrymen (34:12–22); Israel’s unfaithfulness to their God (35:1–19); Israel’s rejection of God’s word (36:1–32); Jeremiah preaches against a false sense of security and self-deception (37:1–10); Jeremiah is imprisoned (37:11–21); Jeremiah is delivered (38:1– 16); Jeremiah presents alternatives to Zedekiah (38:17–28).
HIGHLIGHTS & INSIGHTS:
We enter the second and third sections of the book of Jeremiah in today’s reading. Whereas the first 33 chapters detailed the fate of Judah, chapters 34 and 35 detail the fate of Jerusalem, and chapter 36 to the end of the book is basically detailing the fate of the Gentile nations. This is the fulfillment of what God said to Jeremiah when He first called him: “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations. See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.” (1:5, 10)
As chapter 34 opens, Babylon is about to overtake Jerusalem. God tells Jeremiah to go and tell King Zedekiah that the city would, in fact, fall to the Babylonians, but that he would not be killed in the invasion. The fact that God was willing to spare this wicked king’s life is not only a testimony of His incredible mercy and grace, but a testimony of His faithfulness to keep His promises. As we have talked about, in the Davidic Covenant, God had promised that David’s lineage would survive. Though the covenant was obscured, in the fact that David’s kingly line would actually live in exile, the covenant was not revoked.
In verses 12–22 of chapter 34, God speaks through Jeremiah to show Israel that they had not been faithful to one another by disobeying His plan for releasing on the seventh year, those, who for financial reasons, had sold themselves into slavery. In chapter 35, He uses the example of the faithfulness of the Rechabite family to reveal to Israel their unfaithfulness to Him. Oh, in the same way that the family of Rechab stood as a shining light in the midst of the darkness in Jeremiah’s day, may our families likewise bring glory to God against the “lukewarm-ness” (Revelation 3:15-17) and apostasy of our day! (1st Timothy 4:1)
Chapter 36 is absolutely classic in terms of revealing the divisive nature of the word of God and its utter indestructibility! Because Jeremiah had been forbidden to enter the temple (36:5), he was forced to dictate the words of the Lord for Baruch, the scribe, to write into a scroll and deliver to the leaders of Israel, once again, calling for Israel’s repentance. The words were so powerful that the temple officials sent them to the king. As the words were read to the king by Jehudi, before he could get to the fourth “page”, the king grabbed it out of Jehudi’s hand, took out his pen knife and began cutting it to shreds, just before throwing it into the fire! It’s a very interesting story, and very easy to follow. But there is more than meets the eye that is really going on here. The chapter actually opens up to us one of the clearest explanations in the entire Bible about the whole process of the inspiration and preservation of Scripture!
The process of inspiration is described in verses 4 and 6 and, interestingly enough, it is precisely how 2nd Peter 1:21 says it happened: “For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God SPAKE as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” Jeremiah SPOKE his words to Baruch the scribe, but the words Baruch wrote weren’t actually JEREMIAH’S WORDS, they were the very “WORDS OF THE LORD”! (36:4)
Jeremiah restates the process in verse 6 as he says to Baruch: “Go thou, and read in the roll, which thou hast written from my mouth, the words of the Lord.” By the way the story unfolded, and how God orchestrated the recording of it, it is apparent that God wanted to make sure we totally understood exactly how the actual process of inspiration and preservation works. In verse 17, God records the words of the temple leaders to Baruch: “Tell us now, How didst thou write all these words at his mouth?” Baruch responded in verse 18: “He pronounced all these words unto me with his mouth, and I wrote them with ink in the book.” In other words, what Baruch had in written form, were the very words of God; what is often referred to, in theological circles, as the “original manuscripts”. But it is important to note, that what happened in this chapter to Jeremiah’s “original manuscripts”, is the same thing that happened to the entirety of the original manuscripts in history. They were totally destroyed! But remember, God not only “inspired” His word and words, He also promised to “preserve” them! (Psalm 12:6–7; Matthew 5:18) Notice in Jeremiah’s account of how this actually unfolded, that though the “original manuscripts” were no longer in existence, “somehow” God had no problem remembering exactly what they said, and He certainly had no problem producing a copy that contained “all the words of the book (the “original manuscript”, as it were) which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire”! (36:32)
The reason this is so significant, is that many people today balk at the very idea of believing that the Bible we are able to actually hold in our hands (as opposed to original manuscripts that do not exist!) is the very word and words of God, just as He intended them. Every word, in fact! (Proverbs 30:5) However, it only stands to reason, that if God went to the “trouble” of inspiring His words in/on original manuscripts (that He obviously did not intend to keep in existence or we’d have them!), it certainly is no trouble for Him to preserve them in a book that we can actually wrap our hands and our lives around!
Another contention people seem to have with those who have a faith-based view of the Bible (i.e. have faith in God’s promise to preserve His word! Psalm 12:6–7; Matthew 5:18) has to do with the italicized words in our King James Bible. When the “original manuscripts” were being penned, the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, and the New Testament was written in Greek and Aramaic. Obviously then, most translations of the Bible into other languages were translated out of copies of manuscripts that were written in these original languages. Since there is no such thing as a “word for word” translation (for the simple fact that in translating from one language to another, some words do not have a corresponding equivalent!) as the King James translators we’re translating the Bible into English, the italicized words were “added” to convey the meaning of the original language when there was no English equivalent. The argument is, how can we believe that we hold in our hands “every word of God” (Proverbs 30:5), if there are words that have been “added”? But the question we need to ask ourselves is, is that actually uncharacteristic of how God has previously worked in the whole process of inspiring and preserving His word? Notice that the last verse of Jeremiah 36 says that not only did the copy God produced contain every single word of the “original,” check this out: “And there were added besides unto them (in other words, besides the words that were written in/on the “original manuscripts!”) many like words”! (36:32)
In chapters 37 and 38, Jeremiah continues to hammer the message of Jerusalem’s destruction per God’s instruction, and is cast into prison for carrying out God’s will. For a detailed unfolding of chapters 37 and 38, refer to the outline provided in today’s “Overview”.
CHRIST IS REVEALED:
By JEREMIAH, WHO STOOD AS A FAITHFUL WITNESS TO THE REVEALED WILL OF GOD — Jeremiah 38:2–10 (Matthew 26:59)