Jeremiah’s message contains prophesies of both “doom” and “hope” for the people of Judah (Stanley, p. 448). “Doom” because the people of Judah will have to face Yahweh’s punishment for their unfaithfulness against the Lord their God—they turn away from the Lord as to worship idols and other gods and they have done a lot of social injustices to the poor and needy in their land (Stanley, p. 447). “Hope” because Yahweh will remember his covenant made with their forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and he promises to restore them to their land and renew his covenant and make a new one with them found in Jeremiah 31:31-34 (Bandstra, p. 333).
Jeremiah speaks against the people of Judah for their sins of idolatry and social injustices which are displeasing to the Lord (1:16). They will have to face consequences for their transgressions. The Lord is going to judge them heavily. Foreign armies are going to be sent to their land to punish them (1:14-15; 4:27). They will be driven out of his sight from Jerusalem, implying to their exile (7:15); People will be killed and the streets of their holy city will be quiet and abandoned, and the land will become a waste (7:32-34). They will fall into the darkness of their path and disaster will come upon them (23:12). The wrath of the Lord will not cease to burst upon the wicked’s head until he completes his plan (23:19-20).
However, Jeremiah believes that
the Lord will forgive his people and give them hope after all of the judgements
and punishments he has brought upon Judah. Jeremiah insists that the Lord’s
intention is to humble the people of Judah, not to destroy them so they will
repent and renew their vow and commitment to his covenant (Stanley, p. 448). Jeremiah
prophesies the joyful return of the exiles though after a period of time of
disaster and calamity. Out of his everlasting love and his faithfulness to his
people, the Lord promises that the remnant will come back to Judah and he will “raise
up a for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king
and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.”
(23:5 NRSV). He will build them back up; they will see no more mourning,
sadness and helplessness, but will be dancing for joy and hope and peace
(31:1-6). He will gather and bring them back to their land from the north and
all parts of the earth. He will fully restore them (31:16-17). He also assures
that Jerusalem will be rebuilt and enlarged and it will not be destroyed again
(31:38-40). Interestingly enough, Jeremiah buys a piece of land from his cousin
with his own money (seventeen shekels of silver) during the time Jerusalem is
under the Babylonian siege (32:2,9). This indicates that Jeremiah obeys God and
believes in his promise of restoration of his people, especially of Jerusalem–
their most holy city. Verse 15 of chapter 32 again guarantees the return and
the restoration of the people of Judah to its core.
If I am to preach, I will preach both “doom” and “hope” message because this is a balance way to help people understand their real circumstances in which they could see that they need help from God to get out and God would be presented in a timely way to rescue them and also restore them to their fullness. I think this is a good message. But people just do not want to hear the first part (the “doom”), and they just want to listen to the better part (the “hope”).
*
Bibliography:
Stanley, Christopher D. The
Hebrew Bible: A Comparative Approach. Minneapolis (Fortress Press, 2009)
Bandstra, Barry L. Reading the
Old Testament: An Introduction to the Hebrew Bible (4th edition, 2009)
No comments:
Post a Comment