Bible in 90 Days - Day 54 (Jeremiah 1:1-10:13)

Guide us, O God,

by your Word and Spirit,

that in your light we may see light,

in your truth find freedom,

and in your will discover your peace,

through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

Jeremiah was a prophet to the southern kingdom of Judah. He began to prophesy in the 13^th year of Josiah. Remember that Josiah reigned 31 years, and he was the last faithful king of Judah. Jeremiah prophesied through the fall of Jerusalem, so he saw all of the rest of Judah’s unfaithful kings and the Babylonian exile. (Babylon conquered Assyria during this time as well.)

Jeremiah 2:13 is such a vivid image of forsaking God. Living water is fresh, flowing water. It is what you want in water. A cistern merely gathers and stores water, so it is not fresh. To forsake living water for a cistern is crazy, and to forsake living water for a broken cistern is self-destructive. 2:25 makes the people’s love of false gods sound like an addiction.

Although judgment is a big them, judgment is never the final word with the prophets. The prophets, Jeremiah included, call the people to repent. The ESV study notes say there are over 100 calls to repent in the book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah 3 is a good example. There is judgment, but the chapter ends with a call to repent. Chapter 4 begins with God’s promise of forgiveness.

Jeremiah 4:23 is the only verse in the Bible that repeats the “formless and empty” wording exactly from Genesis 1:23. There is an undoing of creation here. Light disappears, the land is unstable, the birds, plants and people are gone. God’s people have rejected his plan. In 5:30-31 even the social order of godly rule is gone. The three groups in charge of representing God as leaders are prophets, priests, and kings. Here 2 of the 3 are implicated.

By the time I got to 8:18-22 I was ready to feel with the prophet. “Since my people are crushed, I am crushed; I mourn, and horror grips me.” I could use some of those blessings that are interspersed in Isaiah!

There is hope because God is who he is. There is even a hint of it in 9:7. God will refine and test his people.