The Book of Jeremiah

Hebrew Study

Explanation

The chapter opens with a grim scene: even the dead will not rest. Enemies will drag "the bones of the kings... princes... priests... prophets" from their graves and spread them "before the sun, and the moon, and all the host of heaven", the very idols they had worshiped. The astral gods they served in life cannot even protect their bones in death. For the survivors, life will be so bitter that "death shall be chosen rather than life." Then God probes the mystery of their stubbornness with two questions from ordinary life: "Shall they fall, and not arise? shall he turn away, and not return?" When people fall, they get up; when they wander off the road, they turn back. Why then does this people alone "hold fast deceit" and "refuse to return"? God had listened for one honest word of repentance, "no man repented... saying, What have I done?" Instead each one charged ahead in sin "as the horse rusheth into the battle." And God shames them with creation: the migrating "stork," "turtle" (dove), "crane," and "swallow" all "know" and keep their God-appointed seasons, "but my people know not the judgment of the LORD." The birds obey instinctively; God's own people will not.

Gospel Focus

God's two questions in verse 4 are pure grace in disguise: "Shall they fall, and not arise? shall he turn away, and not return?" The whole point is that returning is the natural, sane thing to do, when you fall you get up, when you stray you turn back, so why not with God? Repentance is not an unreasonable demand; it is the obvious response of anyone who realizes they have wandered. The heart of true repentance is the question no one in Judah would ask: "What have I done?" That single honest question opens the door the prodigal walked through when "he came to himself" (Luke 15:17). And the birds put us to shame. Creation instinctively keeps its Maker's order, "the ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib: but Israel doth not know" (Isaiah 1:3). If a stork can follow God's seasons, how much more should we, who bear His image, know "the judgment of the LORD" and return to Him. Do not "hold fast deceit." Ask the question that begins all healing, "What have I done?", and turn back to God, who is always ready to receive the one who returns.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

God turns to the intellectual and religious elite, the "wise" scribes who prided themselves on possessing "the law of the LORD." But their claim was hollow: "the pen of the scribes is in vain", their handling of Scripture had become a lie because they "rejected the word of the LORD." Possessing the Bible is worthless if you refuse to obey it. God asks the piercing question, "what wisdom is in them?" There is no true wisdom in a heart that casts off God's word, however learned it appears. Then the chapter repeats, almost verbatim, the indictment of chapter 6: the whole nation "from the least even unto the greatest is given to covetousness," the prophets and priests "deal falsely," they cry "Peace, peace; when there is no peace," and they have grown so hard they "could not blush." Because they have rejected the source of life, the fruit of life fails: "there shall be no grapes on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade." A people who reject God's word will find that "the things that I have given them shall pass away from them."

Gospel Focus

Here is a vital warning for the well-taught and the religiously educated: to possess God's word is not the same as to obey it, and mere expertise in Scripture is no substitute for submission to it. The scribes had "the law of the LORD" and yet "rejected the word of the LORD", they knew the text and refused the truth. Jesus rebuked the same error, "ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God" (Matthew 22:29), and warned scholars who "search the scriptures" yet "will not come to me, that ye might have life" (John 5:39-40). Knowledge that does not bow to Christ is not wisdom at all, for "the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom" (Proverbs 9:10) and in Christ "are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Colossians 2:3). Study of the Bible must lead to the Author, or it becomes "the lying pen." And notice the repeated false peace, "Peace, peace; when there is no peace", the perennial temptation to soothe rather than save. Let your knowledge of Scripture drive you to obey it and to come to the Christ it reveals, lest all the good things God has given "pass away."

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Now the people themselves speak, in the voice of despair. "Why do we sit still?" they cry, and urge one another to flee to the "defenced cities" and hunker down in silence. But they know why the blow has fallen: "for the LORD our God hath put us to silence, and given us water of gall to drink, because we have sinned against the LORD." Here at last is an admission of guilt, though it comes too late to avert the disaster. Their words in verse 15 are among the saddest in the book: "We looked for peace, but no good came; and for a time of health, and behold trouble!" They had been promised peace by the false prophets, and now reality has arrived. The enemy's cavalry is heard "from Dan" in the far north; "the whole land trembled" at the neighing of the warhorses, and the invader "devoured the land." And God adds a final horror: "I will send serpents, cockatrices, among you, which will not be charmed." This judgment is like snakes no charmer can soothe, a danger that cannot be talked away or managed. The bitter cup must be drunk.

Gospel Focus

"We looked for peace, but no good came." This is the bitter harvest of every false hope. The people had been fed "peace, peace" for so long that the arrival of real trouble left them stunned. Any peace not grounded in a right relationship with God is a mirage, and it evaporates exactly when we need it most. There is a peace that does not fail, but it is found only in Christ: "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth" (John 14:27). The world's peace collapses under trouble; Christ's peace "passeth all understanding" and "keeps" the heart even in the storm (Philippians 4:7). Notice too the "water of gall", the bitter cup of judgment for sin. At Calvary they offered Jesus "vinegar to drink mingled with gall" (Matthew 27:34), a small echo of the far bitterer cup He truly drank, the cup of God's wrath against our sin, "the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" (John 18:11). Because He drank the gall for us, the peace He gives can never be a false "peace, peace." When trouble comes and every worldly comfort fails, only the peace purchased at the cross will hold.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

The chapter ends inside Jeremiah's breaking heart. "When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint in me", he can find no comfort. He hears the cry of his people from exile, "them that dwell in a far country," and their bewildered question, "Is not the LORD in Zion? is not her king in her?" They wonder why God did not protect them, and God answers with His own question that exposes the real cause: "Why have they provoked me to anger with their graven images?" Then comes verse 20, one of the most poignant laments in all Scripture: "The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved." The season of opportunity has closed, and salvation was not seized. Jeremiah so identifies with his people's pain that he says, "For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I hurt; I am black" with grief, "astonishment hath taken hold on me." And out of that anguish rises the chapter's famous cry: "Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?" The medicine exists; the physician exists; why is the patient still sick? The tragedy is not that healing was unavailable, but that it was refused.

Gospel Focus

"Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there?" Jeremiah asked it as an aching question; the gospel turns it into a triumphant answer. Yes, there is a Balm in Gilead; His name is Jesus. He is the Great Physician who said, "They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick" (Matthew 9:12), and who was anointed "to heal the brokenhearted" (Luke 4:18). The old spiritual sings the gospel back to Jeremiah: "There is a balm in Gilead, to make the wounded whole." The medicine and the Physician were always there; the tragedy of Judah was that they would not come to be healed. And verse 20 is a warning every soul must heed: "The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved." There is a season of grace, and it does not last forever, "now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation" (2 Corinthians 6:2). The most tragic words a person can ever say are, "the harvest is past... and we are not saved", to have let the Balm and the Physician pass by. Do not wait until the summer ends. The Balm of Gilead is offered now; come to the Great Physician and be made whole.