Jeremiah 19 FSI - HEAR, O EARTH

> [!title|noicon] **Jeremiah 19 Notes** > [[Jeremiah 18 FSI|<Prev]]   [[Jeremiah 20 FSI|Next>]] > [[Jeremiah 19|Verse list view]] > [Jeremiah 19:1](Jeremiah%2019.md#^1) - [2](Jeremiah%2019.md#^2) note > > God is commanding Jeremiah to get a potter's bottle made of clay and to take the ancients, that is, the elders of the people and of the priests, to the valley of the son of Hinnom to deliver God's message to them. Normally the ancients or the elders are those who are the most responsible and wise, they are the most experienced, of the citizens and priests. When the Bible speaks of the elders it is normally referring to those with wisdom who lead the people. > > Now in this chapter God points to a particular area of rebellion by Israel -- something that happened in this valley of the son of Hinnom, which is also called Tophet. This valley was right outside the gates of Jerusalem and became notorious paricularly in the days of King Ahaz, the father of Hezekiah, and in the days of Manasseh the son of Hezekiah. They were probably the most wicked of the kings that ruled Judah (even though Hezekiah himself was one of the finest kings). > > So in [2 Chronicles 33:1-6](2%20Chronicles%2033.md) we read about the evil of Manasseh causing his children to pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom along with other acts of satanic wickedness. That means that he instituted a program of human sacrifice of their own children. This was about 40-60 years before Jeremiah is declaring the Word of God here in chapter 19. Therefore, anyone who would have been 60 or more years would have been totally aware of and familiar with the sins of Manasseh. > > So now, God is having Jeremiah call these elders, these ancients who were alive during the days of Manasseh when they were burning children in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to declare this word to them in the very location where this had happened. > > Now, you can rest assured that when they followed this horrible practice, it was a big deal. In their corrupt thinking they believed the only way they could be blessed of their god, who ultimately was Satan at that point, not God Himself, was through this practice. It wasn't just some incidental thing, it was happening right in the heart of Jerusalem near the temple, and it may have been witnessed by thousands of Israelites. > > Now these men had the Word of God. But they had a dark rationale for sacrificing their children in the fire. For example, wasn't Abraham commanded by God to sacrifice his only son as a test of his faith? And what was the consequence of his intention to follow through with God's command? In [Genesis 22:10-18](Genesis%2022.md) we see that God declared with an oath that tremendous blessings would come upon Abraham and his seed. It was never God's purpose that Abraham actually follow through with this, it was a test of his faith and served as a picture of the fact that Christ, the only begotten Son of God, had to be sacrificed on our behalf. > > So the theologians in the days of Ahaz and Manasseh could very well misread the situation concerning Abraham in their quest for some great security with God, believing that true faith could be exercised in sacrificing their children. Not only that, but human sacrifice was very popular within the pagan religions and cultures also, as the darkness of sin twists the minds of people into thinking this might somehow incur the favor and blessing of their false gods. So you see how just this kind of detour from the Truth can quickly lead to the most horrendous beliefs and practices imaginable. They reasoned that this is the greatest sacrifice that one could possibly make that would surely be pleasing to God. > > What these theologians did was essentially pick and choose what they found from the Bible to design their own kind of a gospel that was most pleasing to themselves. And they felt they had biblical validation. This is no different than theologians during the church age who come up with doctrines based on some verses, they reach into the Word of God and find numerous statements that seem to clearly indicate that if they do this or if do that they are safe and secure with God. But the whole thing is vanity. > > Now here is Jeremiah, coming at this late date when God's wrath is upon Jerusalem and Judah, bringing these elderly people to where these dreadful events had happened. And he's going to demonstrate in a very definite way the fact that Jerusalem is under the wrath of God and that there is no remedy. He's going to take this bottle made of clay and he's going to break it in their sight in the valley of the son of Hinnom to illustrate how God is going to irreparably break them ([v11](Jeremiah%2019.md#^11)). And this is God's plan that judgment is going to come upon Jerusalem, and it thus illustrates also His judgment upon the churches and congregations at the end of time. ^jer19-1-2 > [Jeremiah 19:3](Jeremiah%2019.md#^3), [4](Jeremiah%2019.md#^4), [5](Jeremiah%2019.md#^5) note > > Here is the indictment of God through the message Jeremiah is bringing to the elders of Judah, to those who have witnessed all of the massive wickedness and sin of Judah even to the point of committing human sacrifice with their own children. And the situation is no different today. When one comes with the true Gospel they must remind the Christian world that they have held doctrines that did not come from the Bible and that have brought them under the wrath of God. They have effectively become estranged from God and have burned incense (a figure of offering prayer) to other, false gods. And in so doing, as they involve their children they, too, are offering sacrifice of their own flesh and blood to those other gods. ^jer19-3-5 > [Jeremiah 19:6](Jeremiah%2019.md#^6), [7](Jeremiah%2019.md#^7), [8](Jeremiah%2019.md#^8) note > > So the valley of the son of Hinnom, which, remember, is in Jerusalem (which points to the churches and congregations in our day) and is where they committed these abominations, will become the valley of slaughter and death. And we see in verse 8, as we read previously in [Jeremiah 18:16](Jeremiah%2018.md#^16), that those who pass by will be so astonished that they will hiss at them, that is, they will become a spectacle of complete derision. ^jer19-6-8 > [Jeremiah 19:9](Jeremiah%2019.md#^9) note > > To eat the flesh of children emphasizes that there is a total (spiritual) famine unto the insanity of cannibalism. In [Deuteronomy 28:53](Deuteronomy%2028.md#^53), [54](Deuteronomy%2028.md#^54), [55](Deuteronomy%2028.md#^55), [56](Deuteronomy%2028.md#^56), [57](Deuteronomy%2028.md#^57) we find the same, most horrible language of the judgment that comes upon those who rebel against God, and it's even worse than sacrificing their children in the fire to speak of eating them. It's incomprehensibly difficult to even read and think about such terrible language. > > Now, there is a spiritual meaning to all of this. Every true believer is sustained spiritually by eating the flesh of a child, the Son of God. In [John 6:53](John%206.md#^53), [54](John%206.md#^54), [55](John%206.md#^55), [56](John%206.md#^56), [57](John%206.md#^57), [58](John%206.md#^58) we read that we must eat the flesh of the Son of Man (Christ) and drink His blood. He is the Bread of Life. And Christ is speaking entirely spiritually, of course. We don't physically eat and drink of his body and blood. It points to the fact that He gave His life for our sins through which we receive eternal life, so we feed upon Him, spiritually speaking. So He sustains us, we have derived Life from the fact that He gave His. Another way of looking at this is that the priests ate of the sacrifice in the service of the temple. And, as believers, we are kings and priests in the kingdom of God so that we feed upon the sacrifice that was made for us in the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's all spiritual. > > But those who offered their own children in the fire as a sacrifice to God are relying upon their own works in so doing to deliver them from the wrath of God. They believed those sacrifices were their security to secure the blessing of God, they thought they were giving up their greatest sacrifice to God. And this is true of any wrong, false doctrine that they have come up with that will find them under the wrath of God. So God is equating any false teaching and doctrine with sacrificing their children in the fire -- where they will then feed upon their own sacrifices in their straitness and trouble because that's all they have. They do not have Christ to feed upon because they rejected Him in favor of eating their own gospel. > > A similar idea is found in Exodus 32 where the congregation of Israel had made a golden calf to worship while Moses was with God in the mount, when God gave him the 2 tables of the Law. Once Moses saw the golden calf, he broke the 2 tables of the Law, indicating that Israel had broken the Law of God. Then he burned the golden calf, ground it to powder, scattered the remnants in the water and made the congregation to *drink* of it ([Ex 32:20](Exodus%2032.md#^20)). > > So, if you are not saved and you have set up your own kind of gospel where you trust in your own theological rules that please yourself, even if you wrongly believe you can prove them from the Bible, where will you turn for spiritual nourishment and strength when the wrath of God comes upon you? For the true believer, their spiritual strength comes from Christ. But anyone with their own doctrines and theology are going to turn in vain to those, which will not save them. And that is represented here as eating their own sons and daughters because that's what they had offered as their sacrifice. That whole thing is vanity and emptiness. ^jer19-9 > [Jeremiah 19:10](Jeremiah%2019.md#^10) - [11](Jeremiah%2019.md#^11) note > > God is giving a dramatic picture -- and this illustrates how the Bible itself is written -- of how He will break apart Jerusalem, which represents the churches and congregations in our day. That is where the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, also called Tophet, is located. > > We find parallel language again in [Isaiah 30:12](Isaiah%2030.md#^12), [13](Isaiah%2030.md#^13), [14](Isaiah%2030.md#^14) where God declares that He will break them into small pieces for despising His Word in favor of their own doctrines. And again, this is speaking of Judah, they are His people as a visible representation of the kingdom of God, but they had deeply rebelled against Him (see [verses 8-11](Isaiah%2030.md) how they would not hear God's Word but promoted their own words). And so they were to be totally broken so there wasn't a sherd left to take fire from the hearth or water from the pit. > > So God is saying here in Jeremiah 19 that He will do to Judah and Jerusalem and to the inhabitants thereof. Just as no one can put this vessel back together again -- it has been broken into tiny pieces -- so will they be irreparably broken and never put back together again. The end is here, it has become a place of slaughter, they are under the wrath of God and will be [slaughtered](Jeremiah%2019.md#^6). ^jer19-10-11 > [Jeremiah 19:12](Jeremiah%2019.md#^12) note > > What again is Tophet? It is the place where they burned their children, where they slaughtered them in sacrifice to their false gods as their gospel. And now it has become a place where God will slaughter them in judgment so that the whole valley will be filled with the dead. ^jer19-12 > [Jeremiah 19:13](Jeremiah%2019.md#^13) note > > The roofs of the houses are where we're to be sending out the Gospel. It's there that we're to be worshiping God. But God says that they are worshiping and burning *incense* (that is, offering their *prayers* - [Rev 8:3](Revelation%208.md#^3), [4](Revelation%208.md#^4)) and pouring out their drink offerings to their false gods, to the host of heaven. And that's exactly what happens in the churches when they have their own kind of authority and their own kind of a gospel in place of the Word of God. They are no longer praying to and worshiping the God of the Bible, they are praying to and worshiping the gods of their own minds. ^jer19-13 > [Jeremiah 19:14](Jeremiah%2019.md#^14) - [15](Jeremiah%2019.md#^15) note > > Now Jeremiah is making public proclamation to all of the people from the court of the LORD's house in the temple area. Previously he had been speaking to the elders and ancients of the people in Tophet, in the Valley of the son of Hinnom. And remember, Jeremiah stood mostly alone here, he didn't have many on his side. But this is the Word that God had him bring. > > God is going to bring all of the evil and destruction upon them that He has declared against them because of their stubborn rebellion. And this will come upon them *that they will not hear* His Words. They could hear the words physically but not understand them spiritually, they could not recognize them as Truth. And so they thought Jeremiah was crazy, they thought he was a kook and completely disregarded the warnings that God spoke through him. ^jer19-14-15 Tags: #Old_Testament #Jeremiah #Gods_judgment_on_His_people #FSI