WEEKLY SUNDAY SCHOOL LESSON

An international Sunday school lesson commentary

For Sunday May 16, 2021

 

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PREACHING DOOM

(Jeremiah meets with King Zedekiah)

(Jeremiah 38:14-28)

 

   The prophet Jeremiah prophesied to the nation of Judah from 627 to circa 580 B.C., which was approximately 100 years after the death of Isaiah. Five kings ruled over Judah during this time, with King Josiah being the first of those five. Unfortunately, the four kings that followed him were exceedingly wicked, and the king in this passage, Jehoiachin, was counted among them.

    Jehoiachin was removed from the throne of Judah by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, in 597 B.C., and was subsequently taken into captivity. He was replaced by the “puppet king”, or, “vassal”, Mattaniah, Jehoiachin’s uncle, whom Nebuchadnezzar renamed “Zedekiah” (2 Kings 24:16-17).

    Zedekiah vacillated between serving Babylon and, at one and the same time, rebelling against her, much to the displeasure of King Nebuchadnezzar. He ruled in Judah for the final decade of its existence, before Jerusalem was finally destroyed in 586 B.C. by the Babylonians, just as the prophet Isaiah had earlier foretold (2 Kings 20:16-18).

    Jeremiah had often warned Judah, in both word and deed, about their coming destruction because of their idolatry and sorted other disobediences and sins against GOD. He illustrated time and time again, his prophesies from GOD, with symbolic demonstrations, even using his own body. Sadly, his messages, like the messages of other prophets before and after him, went largely unheeded because they were either misunderstood, or just simply dismissed as rhetoric, and sometimes, even as being treasonous against Israel itself.

    Zedekiah’s officials, who took much exception to Jeremiah’s seemingly demoralizing preaching against Judah, received little opposition from their king, and here in the first half of this chapter of the book of Jeremiah (Vs.1-7), they were able to throw the prophet into an empty “cistern” located in the prison yard. There was no water in the cistern, however there was a thick layer of mud at the bottom of it, and Jeremiah sank slowly down into it.

    However, as GOD would have it, an important palace official, an Ethiopian by the name of Ebed-melech (Ee-bed-mee-lek), got word of what had happened to Jeremiah. And so, he rushed to the palace and convinced Zedekiah to have Jeremiah taken out of the cistern dungeon in which he had been unjustifiably placed. Jeremiah was then returned to the “Courtyard of the Guard”, the palace prison, where he would remain for some time.

    Taking up at verse 14 we see a now troubled King Zedekiah sending for the prophet Jeremiah, summoning him from prison to come to the third entrance gate of the LORD’s Temple. There Zedekiah tells Jeremiah that he needed to ask him a question, and he demanded that Jeremiah answers truthfully. Jeremiah responded that “If I tell you the truth you will kill me. And if I give you advice, you won’t listen to me anyway” (v.15).  King Zedekiah then swears by GOD to Jeremiah that he would not kill, nor turn him over to the men who wanted him dead (v.16).

    And so we see, Zedekiah was not only afraid of the Babylonians, but he was also leary of his own officials, and this is why he sought Jeremiah in secret, to inquire as to what he should do to protect himself from all possible peril, both interior, and, exterior threats.

    However, in verse 17 we see the prophet Jeremiah deliver to the king, a message of pending doom. Here he tells Zedekiah that: “The LORD GOD Almighty, the GOD of Israel, says: If you surrender to Babylon, you and your family will live, and the city will not be burned. But if you refuse to surrender, you will not escape! This city will be handed over to the Babylonians, and they will burn it to the ground” (Vs.17-18).  

    We are sorely mistaken if we assume that the priorities of “GOD” and “nation” are always the same. In fact, nowadays they rarely are, because we live our lives so far apart from GOD’s Will for us. In this passage, the community leader’s (officials) complaint that Jeremiah’s preaching was “weakening the morale of the people” may have been a legitimate argument, however, this did not make Jeremiah a traitor.

    To speak against one’s country, when that country is clearly operating far out of the Will of GOD and Justice, can never be a bad thing. Jeremiah, just as true Christians should today, put GOD’s Word and values first, and he felt that if those who called themselves by GOD’s name, “followers of CHRIST” (a Christian nation) would do the same, in the end, all would be well with them.

    When we put GOD first, and our family and nation a distant second, the two will never conflict. We must be faithful to GOD first, and then only good things can follow. And as I often say, “The leaders of men, who wish to be effective in a positive way, must first, be a follower of GOD. And we as Christians have an obligation to prove to the world, through our behavior, that Christianity really does produce the best men and women.

 

A Sunday school lesson by,

Larry D. Alexander

 

 

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