Year 2, Week 13, Day 4 Bible Reading Observations

Year 2, Week 13, Day 4

I have a brief observation for today’s reading of Jeremiah 28-29.

Today’s reading continues the second segment of Jeremiah. This second segment of Jeremiah (chapters 21-29) consists of two sets of messages that provide specific historical contexts. The first set of messages, which consisted of three messages, ran from Jeremiah 21-25. Today’s reading completes the second set of messages from the second segment of Jeremiah. Jeremiah 28 continues the story begun in the previous one, as it takes place in the same year and concerns the yoke that Jeremiah put on his neck. However, the false prophet Hananiah offers an alternative explanation to Jeremiah’s call for Judah to submit to the Babylonians: “Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon” (Jeremiah 28:2). Hananiah suggests that the bondage to Babylon would be short-lived. Jeremiah reiterates his Word from the LORD concerning Babylonian captivity and adds the imminent judgment of Hananiah as a false prophet. Jeremiah 29 contains excerpts from two letters Jeremiah sent to the exiles in Babylon. He sent the letters soon after Jehoiachin’s deportation to Babylon (597 BC), early in the reign of Zedekiah, urging them to turn the LORD and trust Him: “Thus says the LORD of hosts, behold, I am sending on them sword, famine, and pestilence…I will pursue them with sword, famine, and pestilence, and will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth…because they did not pay attention to my words, declares the LORD, that I persistently sent to you by my servants the prophets, but you would not listen, declares the LORD” (Jeremiah 29:17-19).

One of the things that struck me from today’s reading was Jeremiah’s words to those who were already in Babylonian captivity: “For thus says the LORD: When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope” (Jeremiah 29:10-11). Contrary to the promises from the false prophets, the duration of captivity would not quickly come to an end. The exile would last seventy years. The exiles should make plans to stay in captivity and make the best of it: “Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease” (Jeremiah 29:4-6).

Not only were the exiles to settle down in their place of captivity and live obediently to the LORD, they were also to seek the good of the city in which they were held captive: "But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let your prophets and your diviners who are among you deceive you, and do not listen to the dreams that they dream, for it is a lie that they are prophesying to you in my name; I did not send them, declares the LORD” (Jeremiah 29:7-9). But seeking the welfare of the city where they were sent was defined by two activities: prayer and the Word. The exiles were to pray to the LORD on behalf of the Babylonian cities where they lived. Second, the exiles were to stop embracing the lies of the false prophets and live oriented around the true Word. In other words, the welfare of the city hinged on the people of God who lived in those cities being people who sought the LORD and lived according to the Word.

The long-term promise was that after seventy years, the LORD had plans of a great future and a bright hope. However these hope-filled, future plans entailed an earnest seeking of the LORD: “Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the LORD, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, declares the LORD, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile” (Jeremiah 29:12-14). The future and hope that awaiting the exiles consisted, not merely a return trip home, but a strong spiritual awakening. Without this awakening, the future and hope that Jeremiah speaks of would be unrealized. 

In fact, seventy years later, Daniel would realize that the exiles were on the verge of forfeiting their future and hope by their lack of seeking and obeying the LORD: “I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the LORD to Jeremiah the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years. Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the LORD my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules” (Daniel 9:2-5). But Daniel’s sensitivity to the LORD would not be shared by most and while the exiles would return to the LORD, the full realization of a great future and a bright hope would not come to fruition even during Daniel’s time.

What struck you in today’s reading? What questions were prompted from today’s reading?

Pastor Joe