Bible

Understanding

Made Easy

Jeremiah

I. JEREMIAH IS CALLED TO BE A PROPHET

In Jeremiah 1, God told Jeremiah at a young age that He would be a prophet.
Remember, a prophet was a preacher God sent to tell the people His Word in the Old Testament days.
In fact, before Jeremiah was born, God chose Him as a preacher (Jeremiah 1:1-7).
This shows us that God has a purpose for all of our lives even before we are born.
No life is a meaningless life, because we were made to do something for God.
Our lives are to bring glory to God (Matthew 5:16).
This means we are to do all we can to make God look good while we live.
We do this by living right, treating others right, and volunteering to work with the people of the church.
For some men, this means they will preach like Jeremiah did!
God also told Jeremiah not to fear the Jewish people that he was sent to preach to.
There will always be rebellious people that we will meet in our lives, but we are not to be scared of them (Matthew 10:28).
A lot people do not want to hear about God today or anything He has to say.
We must continue to tell people about God, how Jesus can save them, and all the things the Bible teaches us as to how we are to live righteously; even if people don’t want to hear it or we lose friends because this makes us not popular.
Jeremiah had a tough job.
He was sent to tell the Jewish people of God’s judgment against the Southern Kingdom of Judah, because they would not stop worshipping their idols.
He would use the nations from the north to punish them.
This means the Babylonians and their allies would come and conquer the Southern Kingdom of Judah (Jeremiah 1:15).

II. GOD IS UPSET WITH THE IDOLATRY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE

In Jeremiah 2, God tells the Jewish people how upset He was because of their idol worship and sins.
Many religions of today have literal idols in the form of statues, such as Buddhism.
Christians cannot be involved in these types of activities, because they are sinful (1 Corinthians 6:9-10).
Another kind of idolatry today is greed for material things (Colossians 3:5).
Thus, overly chasing money and material things are a sin in God’s sight.
This is because they become more important than being a Christian.
They take priority over God.
Gambling is a type of idolatry because it is a love of money (1 Timothy 6:9-10).
Another thing that God pointed out through Jeremiah is that the religious leaders of the Jews misled them into sin (Jeremiah 2:8).
Today, we call these types of people “false teachers.”
They lie about what God said and didn’t say.
So, they can cause a lot of people to do things God would not approve of.
The only way to tell them apart from true, sincere Bible teachers and preachers is to study the Bible yourself to see if they are telling the truth (Acts 17:11).
As Christians, we all have to do this to protect ourselves from being led into sin and separation from God (1 Peter 3:12; Isaiah 59:2).

III. GOD TRIES TO GIVE THE JEWISH PEOPLE A SECOND CHANCE

In Jeremiah 3, although the Jewish people were very sinful in God’s eyes, God was a God of second chances to them.
He commanded them to repent .
In God’s eyes, the Jewish people committed spiritual adultery (idolatry) many times with many different (false gods), but God was still willing to take the Jews back if they repented.
He considered them worshipping idols like a man cheating on his wife!
He does the same thing for Christians when we sin, but come back to Him in repentance (1 John 1:8-9; Acts 8:22).
Remember, the Jewish people were in 2 separate kingdoms.
These 2 kingdoms were the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
In Jeremiah 3, God says that He divorced the Northern Kingdom due to their spiritual adultery of idolatry.
This means that God let them go and allowed them to be conquered by the Assyrians and taken into captivity.
Even though the Southern Kingdom of Judah saw God divorce the Northern Kingdom because of their idol worship, they never repented of their own idol worship.
As the old saying goes, the Jewish people in the Southern Kingdom played “monkey see, monkey do” by doing the same thing as the Northern Kingdom.
Another prophecy from God that Jeremiah told us was the Northern Kingdom of Israel and Southern Kingdom of Judah would be one people again (Jeremiah 3:17-18).
This means that hundreds of years later, many of the Jewish people from both kingdoms would become Christians and be a part of the Churches of Christ.
This happened in Acts 2 when Jewish people from all over the world were gathered together and were saved by the preaching of the Apostle Peter.
Three thousand souls of the Jewish people became saved, Christians that day in Acts 2 which was called Pentecost Day.
However, Jeremiah also said that non-Jewish people would also become a part of the Church of Christ as well
In Jeremiah 4, God was offering mercy to the Jewish people.
He was telling the Jews of Judah that if they would repent, then He would not send the Babylonians to kill them and take them into captivity.
It is the same today with those who are not Christians.
God’s anger awaits those that will not believe and obey the Words of the New Testament, which tell us that Jesus is the Savior (Acts 4:12; John 14:6).
If a person does not repent of his sins and accept Jesus Christ as the Son of God and His Savior before it is too late, then God will judge him or her to eternal punishment (Luke 13:3, 5; Acts 2:38).
The good thing about God is that He told the Jews of Judah ahead of time that if they repented, then He would call off the Babylonian invasion.
For us today, God has not sent Jesus as Judge, because He is spreading the good news of Jesus’ salvation throughout the world and giving people time to repent so they can be saved (2 Peter 3).
God will call off eternal punishment for all people who believe in and obey Jesus before they die (Romans 6:23).
Repentance is one part of God’s plan of salvation (Romans 10:14, 17; Mark 16:15-16; Acts 2:38; Luke 13:3, 5; Romans 10:9,10; Acts 8:37; Matthew 10:32; Acts 22:16; Revelation 2:10; Matthew 7:21).
All people must choose to be saved before they die, because when the dead rise again, there will be no more chances for any one to be saved.
The wicked are going to eternal punishment and the righteous folks, which are Christians, will go on to eternal life in heaven (Romans 8:1; John 5:28-29).

IV. GOD CHALLENGES JEREMIAH TO FIND A RIGHTEOUS MAN IN JUDAH

In Jeremiah 5-6, God challenges Jeremiah to find a righteous man in all of Jerusalem (Jeremiah 5:1).
Unfortunately, God tells him that one cannot be found.
Even the religious leaders were sinful and lie to the people (Jeremiah 5:31).
God would have saved the city from the Babylonians if one righteous person could have been found.
God is a fair God even though He was going to punish Judah, because He gave them time to repent (Jeremiah 6:8-10).
If they would have repented, then God would have called off the Babylonian invasion.

V. GOD CALLS THE JEWISH PEOPLE TO REPENTANCE:

In Jeremiah 7-9: God was commanding Jeremiah to go and preach to the Jewish people of Judah in order to get them to repent.
The people had become so corrupt that they were sacrificing their children to false gods and even set up idols in the Temple of God!
God used two examples of how He judged people in the past in order to convince the Jews of Judah to repent.
First, He reminded them that in the past, the Jews of Shiloh had been judged and defeated by their enemies because of their sins.
Shiloh was the original place where the Tabernacle of God stood in the days of Joshua, which was hundreds of years before the time of Jeremiah (Joshua 18:1-10).
The Tabernacle was the House of God at the time (i.e. the place of worship).
Second, God reminded them that their sister nation, the Northern Kingdom of Israel, had already been defeated and taken into captivity because of their sins.
Remember, it is easier to learn from the mistakes of others instead of making the same mistakes ourselves.
In other words, let’s learn our lessons the easy way, which is to listen to the Word of God and avoid the sins of the Bible characters.
God can punish us for our sins too if He wants, because we will not repent when we do wrong (Hebrews 12).
In Jeremiah 8, God continues to tell the people about their sins, refusal to repent, and the coming Babylonian invasion as punishment for their stubbornness.
They would be powerless in stopping the Babylonians.
He even tells them where they would come to Jerusalem which was from the north in the region of Dan.
Even knowing ahead of time who the enemy was and where he was coming from could not give the Jews of the Southern Kingdom any advantage in fighting off the enemy, because God was giving the enemy power to defeat the Southern Kingdom of Judah no matter what!
In Jeremiah 9, God is angry with the idol worship of the Jewish people.
He was also upset that they were mistreating each other.
Both in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible, the Lord has always wanted children of God to love their neighbor as themselves.
God tells the Jewish people again about His judgment of destruction upon them by the Babylonians (Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 22:39; Romans 13:9; James 2:8).
Furthermore, God was not just punishing the Jews for their sins, but the non-Jewish nations as well (Jeremiah 9:25-26).

VI. GOD TELLS THE PEOPLE NOT TO BE LIKE THE WORLD

In Jeremiah 10, God tells the Jewish people not to be like the heathen people of the earth.
“Heathen” meant the non-Jewish people who did not obey God and worshipped idols.
This is the same thing we must do today as Christians.
We must be different than everyone else..
We should not act like non-Christian people.
Instead of letting the sinful world influence us, we are supposed to be the influence of the sinful world (Matthew 5:16; 28:18-20).
Jeremiah 10:23 shows us that we cannot trust our own wisdom as to whether something is right or wrong (Jeremiah 10:23).
We must always make our every day decisions using the Word of God as our guide, because whatever comes out of the mouth of God is pure and righteous (1 John 1:5).
God will never lead us wrong.

VII. GOD WILL JUDGE JUDAH'S ENEMIES

In Jeremiah 11:21-23, we find a very sad story.
It talks about some of the Jewish people that Jeremiah preached to wanted to kill him, but instead, God was going to wipe out the men of Anathoth instead.
Remember, if people tried to stop an Old Testament prophet from preaching, they were fighting against God.
These men were preaching the Word of God and when people tried to stop this, they were fighting God, Himself!
The same thing is true to today.
People fight against God’s preachers because they hate the Word of God coming from them.
The preacher must still tell the truth even if no one wants to hear it.
Unfortunately, Christians will have enemies automatically.
This is seen when we’re trying to be true Christians by obeying Jesus where people will hate us for no good reason at all (John 15:20).
Instead of hurting our enemies, God wants us to pray for them instead (Matthew 5:44).
Also, we cannot give up being a Christian just because it becomes unpopular to do so.
We are to remain faithful Christians all our lives to have eternal life and joy in heaven (Revelation 2:10; 14:21).
Unfortunately, the Lord will take vengeance of His children’s enemies if these enemies do not repent before it is everlastingly too late (Romans 12:19).

VIII. GOD WILL HAVE MERCY ON JUDAH

In Jeremiah 12:14-15 God tells us He would not punish the Jewish people forever.
Instead, He would allow them to be released from the Babylonians and come back to their homeland of Judah.
However, God would punish the people who mistreated the Jewish people.
This teaches us about mercy.
Mercy means to forgive those who do wrong.
God would forgive the Jewish people and give them another chance after the Babylonians released them.
God does the same thing for Christians too.
Sometimes He does become angry with us, punishes us, but He forgives those who seek forgiveness with all their heart (Acts 8:22; 1 John 1:9; Hebrews 12).

IX. JEREMIAH FURTHER EXPOSES THE IDOLATRY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE

In Jeremiah 13, God further tells the Jewish people of the South Kingdom of Judah how He is upset with their idolatry and tells them that they are going into Babylonian captivity for their sins.
One sign that He gives to the prophet, Isaiah, was to take a linen girdle (i.e. belt to hold their long flowing robes) and hide it in a rock.
Then, Isaiah came back to this rock and it was ruined.
Thus, God was going to ruin the pride of the Jewish people in the same way due to their sin.
God uses the word “pride” in the sense that the wicked will not humble themselves in submission to the authority of God.
In other words, God is saying a prideful person is someone who does not feel the need to obey God so he or she does not do so.
Sometimes, we try to make evil things seem right in our mind.
So, we will make excuses to make them seem like it is right.
This is a big word called “Self-Justification.”
However, we cannot give God excuses for things we know are wrong.
They are wrong no matter what.
Instead of making up excuses, we should just repent, confess our fault to God, and ask Him to forgive us so He forgives us immediately (Acts 8:22; 1 John 1:7-10).

X. THE COMING DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM AT THE HANDS OF THE BABYLONIANS IF THEY DON'T REPENT

God tells the Jewish people to give Him the glory (Jeremiah 13:16).
Now this is more than praise of the lips as modern day Christians believe.
Instead, we glorify God, which means to place Him in a position of honor in our lives by obeying Him-not just singing praise and saying kind words!
One good thing that we continue to see as a pattern of God’s behavior is that God repeatedly continues to give the Jewish people a second chance to repent.
Remember, repentance would have called off the Babylonian invasion!
God is extremely merciful. It is man that is stubborn.
There is no telling how many times God has shown Christians mercy today when we sin, because we sin so often (1 John 1:8).
Praise and thank God!

XI. JEREMIAH'S INTERCESSORY PRAYER DOES NOT WORK

In Jeremiah 14, Jeremiah tries to pray a prayer of intervention for the Jewish people of Judah, but God would not listen to Jeremiah.
This means he was trying to get the Lord to forgive the Jewish people, but God was too upset to do so at the time.
He was going to punish the people for their sins.
Remember, God tried for hundreds of years to turn the people around so He could forgive them, but they would still worship idols and treat each other badly.
So, God was going to take a drastic measure of punishment to change them for the better.
Sometimes, today, He punishes us to do the same thing.
He tries to get us to see that our suffering is something we created ourselves and His punishment is designed to make us start living righteously again (Hebrews 12).
Here is God’s punishment for the Jewish people:
God promised to withhold the rain, cause pests to invade the land, and cause a famine in the land because of the sins of the people.
This was part of the covenant that He made with the Jewish people for when they came into the land of Canaan while Moses was still their leader hundreds of years prior to Jeremiah's time.
God’s Word was only coming true.
He told them they would be cursed if they did not obey the Law of Moses (Leviticus 26:14-46) (Nave, 1995).
God will only hear the prayer of a repentant person, which makes him/her righteous (1 Peter 3:12).

XII. GOD FORETELLS THE PUNISHMENT OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE

In Jeremiah 15, God talks more about the punishment that He was going put on the Jewish people in the Southern Kingdom of Judah, because they would not repent of their sins.
However, Jeremiah is promised deliverance from his enemies, which were his own people persecuting him due to his preaching the Word of God to them about God’s judgment to come.
God promised to rescue Jeremiah out of the hands of his Jewish enemies.
Thus, people will hate you and me for telling the truth!
Jesus was hated and abused for telling the truth which tells all Christians that this can also happen to us (John 15:20; 1 Peter 4:16; Revelation 2:8-11).
However, we are to still tell the truth no matter what.
It is better to have Jesus as a friend than anyone else!

XIII. THE BABYLONIAN CONQUEST WOULD COME DURING JEREMIAH'S TIME

In Jeremiah 16, God foretold that their destruction at the hands of the Babylonians would be so bad that the dead bodies would not even be buried.
Again, this is due to the idolatry and sins of the people as punishment from God!
The mercy of God is also demonstrated, because He again tells Jeremiah that He will deliver them from the captivity of the Babylonians one day and bring them back to Judah.
The horrifying part about this is that Jeremiah is bluntly told that this conquest by Babylon would happen while Jeremiah was alive.
God’s punishment was coming soon!
We know, as Christians, that when God the Father is ready to send Jesus, the saved will go on to eternal life, but the ungodly will go on to eternal punishment.
Christians do not know ahead of time when the Second Coming of Jesus will happen like Jeremiah knew of the judgement day for the Jewish people of Judah.
Since we have no idea when Jesus is coming back to judge us all, it is best to keep believing in Jesus as the Son of God, which means our Lord ad Savior, at all times and obeying at all times (2 Peter 3).
Furthermore, He is coming back as Judge of all mankind (Matthew 7:21-23; John 5:28-29; 2 Corinthians 5:10; Matthew 25:31-46; Revelation 20:12-15).

XIV. JEREMIAH FORETELLS THE GENTILES ACCEPTANCE BY GOD

Jeremiah 16:19 is a prophecy foretelling the coming of the Gentiles to God.
They too would be saved in the Christian era, which occurred centuries later.

XV. WE MUST TRUST GOD AND NOT MAN

Regarding Jeremiah 17, it teaches all children of God to trust in God and not man.
It also tells us that God is our hope when evil days come.
This means that He is our refuge when we need protection.
He is where we run when we need help.
Remember, if God decides to put a hedge of protection around any one, no one can get through it including Satan (Job 1:6-11).

XVI. GOD IS OUR REFUGE

In Jeremiah 17, God teaches all children of God to trust in Him and not man.
It also tells us that God is our hope when we have hard days.
This means that He is our refuge when we need protection.
Refuge means a place we run to when we need help.
To trust Him means to believe that He will help us.
Remember, if God decides to put a fence of protection around any one, no one can get through it including Satan (Job 1:6-11).

XVII. GOD WAS ANGRY THAT THE SABBATH DAY WAS NOT KEPT HOLY

Furthermore, God was angry with the Jewish people for not keeping the Sabbath Day holy!
God commanded them to repent of this evil and He would have spared them from Babylonian captivity.
Though the Sabbath is not the day of worship like it was for the Jewish people, Christians must remember to keep our day of worship holy, which is Sunday.
After Jesus died and rose again, His New Testament that He gave us made Sunday the day of worship and not Saturday (Jeremiah 31:31-34; Colossians 2:14; Hebrews 1:1-3; 8:1-13),
We still keep the Lord’s Day, Sunday, holy by worshipping God in the assembly (Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2).
He is obviously upset when we purposely miss worship service as Christians (Hebrews 10:25).

XVII. JEREMIAH'S IMPRECATORY PRAYER

Unfortunately, Jeremiah 18 is called an imprecatory prayer.
This is where Jeremiah wants his Jewish enemies destroyed, because they started to persecute him.
God does not want us to do this.
This is why it is better to follow Jesus instead of Jeremiah this time.
Instead of praying that God would destroy our enemies, we are to love them, forgive them, and ask God to forgive them (Matthew 5:44; 6:15; Luke 23:34).
On a positive note, God demonstrates that He is in control of all nations and decides whether to bless them or punish them according to their deeds!
The mercy of God is that if a country will repent, he will not punish them.
God again instructs Jeremiah to tell the people to repent and again talks about His displeasure with their idolatry.

XVIII. THE SMASHING OF THE CLAY JAR

In chapter 19, God instructs Jeremiah to announce His coming judgment on Judah and Jeremiah obeys the Lord.
He tells Jeremiah to smash a clay jar to symbolize how the Babylonians would defeat the Southern Kingdom of Judah!

XIX. JEREMIAH'S SUFFERING

In chapter 20, Jeremiah ended up suffering for preaching God’s Word.
He was smacked by Pashur, who was a high official in the Temple of the Lord.
Pashur was a false prophet and he put Jeremiah in the stocks, which was a restraining device and a public humiliation.
Thanks be to God, Jeremiah had the faith to know that his enemies would not win and that God would deliver him.
Even though he was in the stocks, Jeremiah continues to preach God’s Word in truth by telling Pashur that the Babylonians will capture Judah and even take Pashur into captivity.
Unfortunately, Jeremiah was really depressed and even wished that he was never born.
Christians are told to pray and our peace will come from God (Philippians 4:6-7).
God tells us to be joyful in our afflictions (James 1:2-3).
There is a reason why we should be joyful-all of God’s people that have stood up for righteousness have been mistreated and this is a sign that the devil sees Jesus in us causing him to attack (Matthew 5:12).
Thus, if we stay faithful to Jesus to the end of our lives, despite the persecution, then we will have everlasting life and joy in heaven (Revelation 2:10).

XX. JEREMIAH TELLS THE JEWISH PEOPLE OF JUDAH TO SURRENDER TO THE BABYLONIANS SO THEY CAN SURVIVE

In Jeremiah 21, even the king of Judah, Zedekiah, inquired of Jeremiah about the Babylonians.
Jeremiah told him the truth that God was going to fight against them through the Babylonians.
He warned the king that those who refuse to leave the land of Judah would be killed, but those who surrendered and went with the Babylonians would live!

XXI. JEREMIAH TELLS THE KING TO LEAD RIGHTEOUSLY

In Jeremiah 22, God wants the king of Judah to lead the country in the right way.
He wants the king to make sure that people get the justice they deserve, which means they should be treated fairly by the law.
He wants the king to make sure people do not take advantage of the poor people in the land.
He also wants the king to make sure that if someone is being taken advantage of that the king fights for them to stop people from mistreating them.
If the king and the people would do these things, then God would call off the Babylonian invasion and not allow the Southern Kingdom of Judah to be defeated.
Instead, they would have peace in the land.
God wants the same thing today.
He wants our government to be righteous to its people and for the people to obey the laws of the land as long as they do not conflict with the Bible (Romans 13:1-5; Acts 5:29).

XXII. THE FALSE TEACHERS WILL BE PUNISHED

In Jeremiah 23, God says that He will punish the religious leaders of the Jewish people for leading them astray from Him.
There were false prophets (i.e. preachers) in Judah that would act as if they were God’s workers, but were truly liars instead.
This is no different today.
False preachers exist today and will go to eternal punishment (Revelation 20:10).
Thus, all Christians have to study the Bible behind a teacher to see if the words that the person is teaching is true (Acts 17:10-12).
The hope in this chapter is that God promises to bring the Jews back from Babylonian captivity and place righteous leaders among them.
Furthermore, the greatest hope is that Jesus was foretold to come into the world as God’s true King (Jeremiah 23:5-6)

XXIII. GOD WILL HAVE MERCY ON THOSE WHO REPENT IN BABYLON BUT DESTROY ALL OTHERS

In Jeremiah 24, the Jewish people of Judah were conquered by the Babylonians.
Some of them were forced to go and live in Babylon.
The first time they were conquered was when Jehoakim was king of Judah.
(2 Chronicles 36:4-8).
The second time they were conquered by Babylon was when Jehoiachin was their king (2 Kings 24).
Later on in Bible history, Zedekiah was their king.
While he was king, the Babylonians would conquer Judah and completely destroy it forever. Zedekiah’s story is in 2 Kings 25.
Historically then, this prophecy in Jeremiah 24 is right after the Babylonians took Jehoiachin away and before Zedekiah was taken away.
The Jewish people living in Judah at the time of Jeremiah 24 would suffer plagues at the hand of God and be taken into Babylonian captivity as well.
The good part about this chapter is that God foretells the return of the Jewish people who were obedient and went to Babylon without fighting the Babylonians or running away would be able to return to their homeland one day.
This was God’s mercy for those who repent of their sins!
God will always forgive children of God who will repent (i.e. change) after they do wrong while confessing their sins and asking for forgiveness (Acts 8:22, 1 John 1:7-10).

XXIV. JEREMIAH FORETELLS THE PUNISHMENT OF JUDAH AT THE HANDS OF THE BABYLONIANS FOR 70 YEARS

In Jeremiah 25, Jeremiah is foretelling of the Babylonian captivity for the Jews of Judah.
This would be a 70 year punishment for the rebellious people of Judah.

XXV. JEREMIAH PREACHED REPENTANCE TO THE PEOPLE FOR TWENTY YEARS UNSUCCESSFULLY

What is sad is that Jeremiah revealed to the Jews of Judah that he had preached to them for at least 20 years and they still did not repent.
Likewise, people can be stubborn even in the church of today, but God still has the minister preach to them over an extended period of time to try and change them (2 Timothy 4:2).

XXVI. JEREMIAH'S LIFE IS THREATENED DUE TO HIS PREACHING OF GOD'S WORD

God goes on to say that He will also punish Babylon and many other nations because of their sins.
This is how it will be at the Judgment day.
No matter where the people are from, they will have to answer for their deeds if they are living wickedly (Revelation 20:11-15)
In chapter 26, the people and King of Judah, Jehoiakim, want Jeremiah dead for prophesying of the coming destruction of Jerusalem.
King Jehoiakim succeeded in killing, Uriah, which was another good prophet in Judah.
Uriah fled to Egypt for his life, but King Jehoikim had him taken out of Egypt and killed for foretelling of the destruction of Jerusalem.
The people obviously did not repent when Jeremiah preached his sermon unto them.
It is a blessing that he was not killed.
Surprisingly, the religious leaders spared his life.

XXVII. ANY NATION DEFYING BABYLON WILL BE PUNISHED

In Jeremiah 27, King Zedekiah of the Southern Kingdom of Judah is already under the Babylonians.
Jeremiah warns him to obey the Babylonians instead of rebel against them.
Remember, not all of the Jewish people of Judah were taken to Babylon at once.
Some were conquered and taken to Babylon while others were allowed by the Babylonians to stay in the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
Any way, God would have the Babylonians kill the rebels, a famine overtake the land, and pests obviously plague the land, since the Jewish people would rebel against Babylon.
In fact, God is saying that Babylon would be an empire in control of many other nations as well.
These would also be put under the power of Babylon by God!
God was saying that if any nation defied Babylon, then He would judge them

XXVIII. HANANIAH IS SLAIN BY GOD

In chapter 28, Hananiah, the false prophet, told the people that their Babylonian captivity would last only 2 years; when in fact, we already know that God said it would last 70 years.
As a result of his false teaching, Hananiah died that same year as a punishment from God.

XXIX. GOD TELLS THE CAPTURED JEWS TO NOT LISTEN TO THEIR FALSE PROPHETS

In chapter 29, God sends a message to the Jewish people who are already in captivity in Babylon.
He tells them to obey the Babylonians and then He would allow them to go back to there homeland after 70 years.
He tells them that they should not believe the false prophets who tell them not to obey the Babylonians.
He said He would kill these false prophets who lie.
Even in this message to the captured Jewish people, God gives them hope by letting them know that one day they shall return to Judah!
Even today, sometimes, God does punish us for our sins in order to make us begin living righteously again (Hebrews 12).
Perhaps, some of God’s punishments have been taken off of the back of Christians because we immediately repented at the moment we knew that we have done something wrong (Acts 8:22;1 John 1:9)?

XXX. THE COMING OF JESUS

Moving on, in chapter 30, we find out that God again tells the Jewish people that He will release them from the Babylonians.
They were captured by the Babylonians as punishment for their sins.
Jeremiah 30 also talks about the coming of Jesus.
Jeremiah 30:9 reads, “But they shall serve the LORD their God, and David their king, whom I will raise up unto them.”
David had been dead for centuries when Jeremiah was speaking these Words from God.
Thus, the only way that David could be their king in a future sense would be through his Son.
We know that this is talking about the Messiah; the Savior of the Jewish people and the world being Jesus Christ (Luke 1:32-33).
Also, when God raises someone up, then they are invincible.
That is, even though Jesus gave up His earthly life, He was not defeated.
This is because He rose from the dead and is now King of Kings and Lord of Lords because God the Father made Him so (1 Timothy 6:13-16).
Jeremiah 30:2 teaches us about how we received the Bible, because Jeremiah was told to write down the Word of God.
Thus, this is one verse that shows us that the Word of God came directly from God and was recorded by His chosen prophets (2 Timothy 3:16).

XXXI. THE PROPHECY OF THE NEW COVENANT (I.E. THE NEW TESTAMENT)

Jeremiah 31 tells us that God was going to make a new covenant with the people of God.
This means that God was going to take away the Old Testament as that we must obey and have us obey the New Testament instead.
This New Testament started when Jesus died on the cross hundreds of years after Jeremiah died (Colossians 2:14; Hebrews 12:24).
The New Testament was given to us by Jesus
We must believe it to be saved.
It tells us that Jesus is the Son of God and we must obey Him to be saved (John 3:16; Matthew 11:29).

XXXII. THE SIEGE OF JERUSALEM AND THE PROMISE OF GOD TO BRING THEM BACK TO JUDAH

In chapter 32, we begin to see God’s prophecy coming true that if King Zedekiah and the people of Judah rebelled against Babylon that Babylon would destroy them and take them into captivity.
Because he was angry and did not want to hear the truth, King Zedekiah of Jerusalem had Jeremiah put in prison for telling him God’s Word.
That Word was that the Jews would not defeat the Babylonians.
Also at this time, the Babylonian army had surrounded Jerusalem.
This called a “siege” against the city.
What was good about Jeremiah that Christians should imitate is that he remained in prayer with God and praised the Lord in that prayer even though he was suffering in the prison.
He did not get mad at God because he was in prison.
He loved God any way.
Christians must have joy all the time and it is obvious that we should praise God no matter what we are going through (Philippians 4:4; James 1:2-4; Acts 16:25).
In Jeremiah 32:40, God does give the Jewish people some good news after the bad news.
He would have mercy on them and allow them to come back to their homeland of Judah again.

XXXIII. GOD WILL RESTORE ISRAEL FROM CAPTIVITY AND PROPHECIES OF THE MESSIAH

In chapter 33, again, God says that He will release the Jewish people from Babylonian captivity.
Most importantly, God promises to send the Messiah, which means the Lord and Savior.
King David would be His ancestor (Jeremiah 33:7, 15-17).
God told Jeremiah all of these things while he was still locked in prison.
God used Babylon to punish the Jewish people.
However, He promises to forgive them of their sins and wicked deeds against Him (Jeremiah 33:8).
Jeremiah 33:7 tells us that God would forgive both the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah for their sins (Jeremiah 33:7).
This would happen hundreds of years later when God created a new nation called the Churches of Christ (Romans 16:16; 1 Peter 2:9; Ephesians 5:23; Colossians 1:13)
He would give both Jewish people and non-Jewish people the chance to become Christians and be saved (Galatians 3:28).

XXXIV. KING ZEDEKIAH WILL BE TAKEN INTO BABYLONIAN CAPTIVITY

In chapter 34, Jeremiah is told to go and tell King Zedekiah of Judah that Babylon will destroy them and this message was to be delivered during the siege of Jerusalem by Babylon.
Not only will the city be destroyed, but King Zedekiah, Himself, would be taken into captivity.

XXXV. THE WORD OF GOD IS BURNED

In Jeremiah 36, God told Jeremiah to write down all the Words that He told him over the years about the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
God made this scroll to show the children of Israel that he was going to judge them, but wanted them to repent of their sins so He could forgive them.
Baruch was Jeremiah’s scribe, which means he wrote down all the things Jeremiah said.
Jehudi read the scroll, which was the Word of God, to the government officials.
However, king Jehoiakim hated the Word of God and burned it in the fire.
He did not believe that Babylon was going to conquer Judah as the Lord said!
King Jehoiakim wanted to arrest Jeremiah and Baruch, but the Lord hid them.
God had Jeremiah make another scroll with the Word of God since the first one was destroyed.
God announced that King Jehoiakim and his servants would be punished for their evil deeds.
So much so, the punishment included the death of Jehoiakim and that he would not have any descendants on the throne any more.
This shows us that men who hate and reject God’s Word are capable of any evil.
This is obvious, because Jehoiakim wanted to arrest Jeremiah and Baruch for no reason at all!
This also shows a great principle to keep in mind-no one can stop the Word of God from being recorded (Jeremiah’s Words are part of the Bible) or published through preaching!
Many have tried to stop the spread of the Gospel of salvation in Jesus Christ, but have failed miserably for nearly 2,000 years to this date!

XXXVI. JEREMIAH IS IMPRISONED

In chapter 37, Nebuchadnezzar King of the Babylonians had already conquered Judah and had taken the king of Judah, Jehoiachin), to Babylon with other Jewish people he captured in war.
Then, he made Zedekiah king of the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
Thus, the Jewish people are under Babylonian control in this chapter of the Bible.
Remember, in the past, Jeremiah was told this would happen and had already told the Jewish people this would happen before it occurred.
God brought the Babylonians and made them successful in conquering the Southern Kingdom of Judah because of their sins.
Unfortunately, in this chapter, Jeremiah was thrown in prison and accused of being a traitor on the side of Babylon.
While he was still in the prison, King Zedekiah came to Jeremiah to seek a Word from the Lord.
Jeremiah stuck to the truth and told the king that the nation would be conquered again.
The people thought they were safe because they made friends with the Egyptians who sent an army to Jerusalem that ran off the Babylonians.
But God told them, through Jeremiah, that Egypt would abandon them and Babylon would come back to re-conquer the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
Again, this applies to modern-day Christians showing us that we have to trust God and not man!
People will abandon you, but if you are faithful to God, He will never abandon you (Hebrews 13:5).

XXXVII. JEREMIAH IS THROWN INTO A MUDDY DUNGEON

In chapter 38, Jeremiah is thrown into a muddy dungeon without food.
A kind Ethiopian talked King Zedekiah into taking him out.
Jeremiah tells King Zedekiah to surrender to the Babylonians and the city will be saved.
Jeremiah was freed from the dungeon, but remained a prisoner in the court of the prison.
Jeremiah told the truth despite all of this harsh treatment.
We must do the same no matter if people mistreat us or not.

XXXVIII. JERUSALEM IS CONQUERED

In Jeremiah 39, we see one of the saddest stories in the Bible.
King Zedekiah of the Southern Kingdom of Judah did not listen to the Word of God that he should surrender.
Since he did not obey God, the Lord allowed the Babylonians to conquer the city
This time, they burned the city and the Temple.
They took King Zedekiah captive, killed his sons, and blinded him.
Jerusalem’s security walls were broken down.
The Jewish people were taken off to Babylon in captivity except for the poor.
The great hope in this is that the Lord caused Jeremiah to be freed from the prison and to live in Judah instead of Babylonian captivity.
Even more, the Ethiopian who begged for Jeremiah’s release and helped deliver him from the dungeon, God caused to not lose his life when the Babylonians invaded Jerusalem!
This is the mercy of God shown to the faithfully obedient.
Faith delivers from God’s wrath!

XXXIX. GEDALIAH IS ASSASINATED

The background of chapter 40 is where Zedekiah and the Jewish people of Judah have already been taken into Babylon.
However, God allowed a small group of them to be left behind in Judah; including Jeremiah.
Gedaliah is a Jewish person that was appointed ruler over Judah by the Babylonians.
Gedaliah is told of a plot to assassinate him by a Jewish person named Ishmael.
One of Gedaliah’s men offers to kill Ishmael, but Gedaliah believes that the story is a lie told about Ishmael.
Unfortunately, Ishmael and ten men would be successful in assassinating Gedaliah in chapter 41.
Ishmael took captive the people of Mizpah, which was Gedaliah’s town.
Ishmael carried all of these people captive to the land of Ammon.
Johanan raised an army that fought victoriously against Ishmael and freed the captives, but Ishmael escaped.
Johanan and the people wanted to flee into Egypt and not go back to Judah.
In Jeremiah chapter 42, God bluntly tells the remnant not to flee into Egypt.
If they did, then the sword, famine, and pestilence would follow them there.
God’s power extends even across borders!
All Christians must remember that Jesus has authority over heaven and earth in totality (Matthew 28:18).
No nation is beyond His or the Father’s power!
Unfortunately, in chapter 43, Johanan and the remnant of the Jews did not believe the Word of the Lord and feared that the Babylonians would instead kill them and take them into captivity if they stayed in Judah.
They disobeyed and fled to Egypt anyway.
God reveals to the Jewish people who fled into Egypt that He would use Babylon to destroy Egypt as well.
Also, in chapter 44, the Jews that fled to Egypt made it known that they would not stop worshipping idols.
God told them, through Jeremiah, that He would judge them with the sword and famine in Egypt.
He gave them a sign that His Word would come true and that sign was that the Pharaoh of Egypt would be defeated.
The mercy in this judgment was that God declared He would save a remnant from this small group of Jewish people in Egypt.
In other words, a small number of the refugees in Egypt would survive His judgment and return to Judah.

XL. BARUCH RECEIVES GOD'S COMPASSION

In Jeremiah 45, God’s Word goes back in time to the time of King Jehoiakim.
This was before the Babylonians invaded Judah.
God made a sweet promise to Jeremiah’s scribe, Baruch, which was that He would keep Baruch alive throughout the Babylonian invasion.
This teaches us something about Christians as well.
God can reward the righteous even when He is punishing others around them.
Christians should be excited about this as we know there will be a final judgment of all mankind when Jesus comes back the Second time (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18; Matthew 25:31-46).
He will punish wicked people in hell while rewarding righteous Christians with eternal life in heaven (John 3:16; 14:2).

XLI. GOD PRONOUNCES JUDGMENT ON EGYPT AND THE PROPHECY OF THE CHURCH OF CHRIST

God said He was going to judge Egypt and every one that trusts in them, which means the Jewish people who fled there in order to get away from Babylon.
Remember, God did not want them to run from Babylon but to surrender instead.
They disobeyed God by going to Egypt.
So God was going to punish both Egypt and the Jewish people of Judah for their sins.
Even though God was going to punish the Jewish people, He would not do it forever.
He foretold the future by talking about gathering all the Jewish people who were scattered every where in the world (Jeremiah 46:27-28).
God was really talking about what He planned to do thousands of years later, which is today!
He was telling them that He was going to make them a part of the church of Christ one day.
Remember, the Christian church is a holy nation (1 Peter 2:9).
Obviously, this is again talking about spiritual Israel which is the church (Acts 2).
However, before He did that, He was going to let Babylon defeat them and capture them for 70 years as punishment for their sins.
He would then bring them back to their homeland of the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
But the ultimate fulfillment of the prophecy is to be released from the captivity of sin and eternal death (Romans 3:23; 6:23; Luke 4:18) (Coffman, 1999).

XLII. GOD PRONOUNCES JUDGMENT ON THE PHILISTINES

Moving on, God pronounced His judgment on the Philistines due to their sins.
They were the enemies of the Jewish people for many centuries (Jeremiah 47).
The Babylonians will conquer them.
This shows us that God punishes all for their sins.
The way we avoid being punished on the judgment day to come is to have Jesus as our Savior (John 3:16).

XLIII. GOD PRONOUNCES JUDGMENT ON MOAB

In chapter 48, God pronounces His judgment on the land of Moab.
Just like the Egypt and the Philistines, the Moabites will be conquered and taken into Babylonian captivity.

XLIV. GOD PRONOUNCES JUDGMENT AGAINST OTHER NATIONS

The Ammonites, inhabitants of Edom, Damascus (i.e. Syria), those of the tribe of Kedar, and Elam will have the same fate (Jeremiah 49).
God’s judgment over the nations shows that He is in control of the whole world and is judging the deeds that go on in every nation on the planet (Matthew 28:18; Revelation 20:12).

XLV. GOD PRONOUNCES JUDGMENT AGAINST BABYLON

In Jeremiah 50-51, God pronounces His judgment against the great Babylon that was only His tool to judge Judah and the nations around them.
Babylon will be conquered, which we know was through the Medes and Persians later on in the Bible.
The Persians and their allies would surely conquer Babylon!
Babylon is being judged because of their own sins against God as is the case with any nation that He judges!

XLVI. JEREMIAH IS CAPTURED

Jeremiah 52 is the last chapter in the book of Jeremiah.
It talks about King Zedekiah’s rebellion against Babylon.
He was the king of the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
It also talks about this last king of Judah’s sinful reign.
This chapter tells us about the fulfillment of God’s Word that Zedekiah and Judah would not succeed in a rebellion against Babylon and they surely did not win.
They were defeated and taken captive into Babylon as a judgment from God for their sins.
The Babylonians burned the city of Jerusalem in Judah, which included the Temple.
The poorest people of the land were left in Jerusalem to work the fields and vineyards under Babylonian rule.
The Babylonians not only burned the Temple, but they looted it as well.
This means they stole all of its treasures.
This teaches that God only puts up with evil so long.
He tells us to repent (i.e. change), but if we do not, then He will judge us.
However, our judgment will be denial of entrance into heaven and to go to eternal punishment if we do not repent of our sins.