Jeremiah’s Warning, Israel’s Hope

One of my old mentors, Dr. Charles Feinberg (now with the Lord), encouraged me years ago to read through the Bible continuously. So I committed myself to read through the whole Bible every year.

In the process, many times, it leads to a lot of rabbit trails and studying. Those are some of my most exciting times in the Word.  I must say, however, I have not been able to keep up with Dr. Feinberg, who read through the Bible five or six times a year and in different languages. He spoke 11 fluently.

So here I am coming down the home stretch to finish reading through my Bible once again this year, and I’m currently reading through the prophet Jeremiah. I would recommend that you resolve to do this as the new year approaches. 

Jeremiah’s writings have become even more significant as I read through this time around. As I look at the world scene, it is hard to be so inundated with events that we could never have imagined.

Oh, we know the Bible says in the last days, perilous times will come. Yet, I don’t think we ever imagined that so many of our values and freedoms, in America especially, would be turned on their heads as we have witnessed in the last couple of years. I say this as one who has been a student of Scripture for almost 50 years. I knew difficult times were coming but never visualized so many things converging together as fast as they have (birth pangs).

The formation of a coming New World Order through the UN and the World Economic Forum (WEF), without even a shot being fired. Economic issues are a major concern with inflation, an unstable stock market, talk of a digital currency and ESG tracking, and economies around the world in serious trouble. 

Add to that a looming food crisis with farmers unable to produce food to meet demands because there is a fertilizer shortage impacting world supply, with a majority of farmers predicting a 30% hike in food prices compared to 2021. 

And add to that a recent study by the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University indicating that 63% of Christian pastors do not have a biblical worldview. These issues are just the tip of the iceberg and why the words of Jeremiah seemed to leap off the page this time around. As we consider these things we are observing, in order to make sense of it all, we must have an eternal perspective. And in order to do that, our eyes have to turn back to Israel. 

As I was reading through Jeremiah again, what stands out is Jeremiah’s purpose of encouraging repentance and faith by showing God’s faithfulness to His promises to Israel in the form of both discipline and restoration. In Jeremiah 29:4-10, the Lord is speaking to the exiles who have gone into Babylonian captivity because of their disobedience, idolatry, and rejection of God’s commands. 

Jeremiah’s counsel to his Jewish people in Babylon is to understand they are going to be there a long time (70 years, 29:10). And while they are in Babylon, they are to build houses, get married, have children, plant gardens, and eat the produce. And pray for the welfare of Babylon, for as Babylon propers, so will you. Live your lives trusting God. God will deliver them out of the Babylonian captivity.

That is the near prophecy. 

The far prophecy is looking toward a day that has not yet occurred but is on the horizon.

Jeremiah 30:3 says,  

For behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, ‘that I will bring back from captivity My people Israel and Judah,’ says the Lord. ‘And I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall possess it.’ ”

This verse is a theme that carries through chapter 33. It is a promise of God’s restoration, not just from Babylon, but has in view a regathering of the whole nation to their own land in a final regathering never to be removed again (Jer. 16:15). Not just a return in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, but looking forward to the prophecy given in 30:4-9. 

Jeremiah 30:7 speaks of a time of tremendous difficulty for Israel: 

Alas! For that day is great, so that none is like it;
and it is the time of Jacob’s trouble, but he shall be saved out of it.

This great difficulty is set in the context of Israel’s final restoration; it is best equated with the time of tribulation (vv. 8-9), just before the return of the Messiah. 

Verse 9 says, “They shall serve the Lord their God and David their king, whom I will raise up for them.”  This David is the Messiah, the greater David in David’s dynasty. Messiah ultimately fulfills the promise of 2 Samuel 7:16.  He is the great king who is Israel’s hope.  There has not been a king from the lineage of David who has held the scepter since the Babylonian captivity.  Even Zerubbabel of David’s line never claimed to be king (cp. Hag.2:2).

While judgment based on the holiness of God is one of the themes that carry through the book, a parallel theme is a call to repentance and restoration (30:3, 7, 11, 16-24).  The phrase “days are coming” looks forward to the reign of the Messiah on earth in the millennial kingdom. 

If you look at the events that are taking place in the world today as we run up to the time of the tribulation, and you are concerned about Jesus’ promise to return for His bride before that great and terrible day of the Lord, consider this, that the Lord will always be faithful to His covenant with Israel, his chosen people, who are His inheritance (Jer. 10:16; 12:14-15; 31:35-37; 33:14-21; 51:5). God is the Lord the God of Israel (11:3; 19:3; 24:5) and of the nations (5:15; 10:6-7; 18:7-10; 25:17-28; chapters 46-51). 

If God is faithful to Israel through all they have been through and all that is coming, He will be faithful to His bride. He promised in the tradition of the Jewish wedding proposal of the first century that He was going to prepare a place for us, and He will come again as a bridegroom and receive us to Himself (John 14:1-3). And so we wait as a bride for our bridegroom to come. How do we wait?  Sanctified. Set apart. “You are bought with a price, therefore, glorify God in your body” (1 Cor. 6:19-20). 

I wonder what Jeremiah would have thought about this marriage covenant since he wrote out the contract prophetically some 2,600 years ago (Jer. 31:31-37).