Call to Commitment

  

Chapter 21

 

God is Jerusalem’s enemy

      1.      The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD when King Zedekiah sent to him Pashhur the son of Melchiah, and Zephaniah the son of Maaseiah, the priest, saying, 

      2.      "Please inquire of the LORD for us, for Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon makes war against us. Perhaps the LORD will deal with us according to all His wonderful works, that the king may go away from us." 

      3.      Then Jeremiah said to them, "Thus you shall say to Zedekiah, 

 4.      'Thus says the LORD God of Israel: "Behold, I will turn back the weapons of war that are in your hands, with which you fight against the king of Babylon and the Chaldeans who besiege you outside the walls; and I will assemble them in the midst of this city. 

 5.      I Myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and with a strong arm, even in anger and fury and great wrath. 

 6.      I will strike the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast; they shall die of a great pestilence. 

 7.   And afterward," says the LORD, "I will deliver Zedekiah king of Judah, his servants and the people, and such as are left in this city from the pestilence and the sword and the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of those who seek their life; and he shall strike them with the edge of the sword. He shall not spare them, or have pity or mercy." ' 

 Chapter 21 is a comparatively short lesson in our study of Jeremiah. I remind you of what we saw from the very beginning of this book; that is, that Jeremiah did not organize his book chronologically. What we find in this chapter, relates to what is in chapter 37 and 38. There these same two priests, Pashhur, the son of Melchiah (38:1) and Zephaniah, the son of Maaseiah (37:3), are mentioned. Jeremiah’s message is identical here in verse 9, with chapter 38:2.

 In the two cases of these priests, we do not have the biblical introduction of father and son, as is common throughout the Scriptures. The priests are presented by their orders. In the last chapter, Pashhur was called the son of Immer, meaning that he belonged, by ancestry, to the 16^th order of priests, that of Immer. Immediately, we recognize that this is a different Pashhur, who belonged to the fifth order of Melchiah. Zephaniah, the son of Maaseiah, belonged to the twenty-fourth order (see the orders in 1 Chr.24:7-18). 

 

Jeremiah 20

 Pashhur’s persecution and fate

      1.     Now Pashhur the son of Immer, the priest who was also chief governor in the house of the LORD, heard that Jeremiah prophesied these things. 

      2.    Then Pashhur struck Jeremiah the prophet, and put him in the stocks that were in the high gate of Benjamin, which was by the house of the LORD. 

 3.      And it happened on the next day that Pashhur brought Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then Jeremiah said to him, "The LORD has not called your name Pashhur, but Magor-Missabib. 

 4.      For thus says the LORD: 'Behold, I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends; and they shall fall by the sword of their enemies, and your eyes shall see it. I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall carry them captive to Babylon and slay them with the sword. 

 5.      Moreover I will deliver all the wealth of this city, all its produce, and all its precious things; all the treasures of the kings of Judah I will give into the hand of their enemies, who will plunder them, seize them, and carry them to Babylon. 

 6.      And you, Pashhur, and all who dwell in your house, shall go into captivity. You shall go to Babylon, and there you shall die, and be buried there, you and all your friends, to whom you have prophesied lies.' " 

 Because the numbers of the priesthood grew, so that it was impossible that they could all serve in the temple at once, David divided them into 24 orders. We can study the orders in 1 Chronicles 24. Each priest descended from Aaron. The first two sons of Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, were killed for kindling false fire before the Lord, and so only Eleazar and Ithamar were left. Sixteen orders descended from Eleazar and eight from Ithamar. Each order served in turn for a week in the temple and these orders continued in the New Testament. Zachariah, the father of John the Baptist was of the eighth order… that of Abijah (Lk.1:5; 1 Chr.24:10).

 The priest, Pashhur, in this chapter, descended from Immer of the sixteenth division. We should also understand his rank, which was among the top in the priesthood. The Hebrew word, nagid, was the highest of the two and indicated the high priest, translated ruler in 1 Chronicles 9:11, as well as Nehemiah 11:11.  The second belonged to Pashhur, that of the pachid (Hebrew), or deputy to the high priest, translated chief governor in NKJV.

 Pashur was informed of the prophecy given by Jeremiah in chapter 19. NKJV says that Pashur struck Jeremiah (3), but the Hebrew better indicates that he had him beaten, and put him in stocks, imprisoned at the Benjamin Gate, near the temple. Even though on the following day he released him, Jeremiah prophesied the consequences of this act: The Lord has not called your name Pashhur, but Magor-Missabib, meaning terror on every side (3). Men may follow him, because of his high office, but God’s purpose for him would prevail. His unjustified act against God’s minister changed his destiny into one of fearful danger. He had brought it on himself, and it would extend to his followers. Enemy swords would kill them and Pashur would witness it, when God turned Israel over to Babylon (4). 

  Chapter 19

 God’s use of parables

       1.      Thus says the LORD: "Go and get a potter's earthen flask, and take some of the elders of the people and some of the elders of the priests. 

        2.      And go out to the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, which is by the entry of the Potsherd Gate; and proclaim there the words that I will tell you, 

 God gives parables or illustrations to Jeremiah, using them as visual object lessons, to impress upon the people, the judgments that He will bring upon them. They begin in chapter one with an almond branch, followed by a boiling pot. He continues chapter after chapter, with illustration after illustration, in the last chapter using a potter and his clay. Now we have before us an earthen flask, which is broken in verse 10. This kind of delivery of a message is common in the prophets and shows us something of the Lord’s method in teaching.

 I am going to take the time and space to show a very important fact, concerning parables. Jesus answered a devious question concerning paying tribute to Caesar by holding up a denarius and asking about the image on it. He said that because Caesar’s image was on it, the people owed him tribute. In the same way, people owe God their lives, because His image is upon them and they are created for His pleasure: “God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them” (Ge.1:27).

 Israel’s heart progressively hardened, generation after generation, so that by the time of the coming of Christ, it had reached a pinnacle of sedition against the Kingdom of God, prompting Him to lay the composite guilt of the ages upon them: “Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt… that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation” (Mt.23:32, 35-36). Then they fell to the lowest possible level of depravation, crucifying their Messiah and bringing an awful curse upon themselves that continued over two millennium: “His blood be on us, and on our children” (Mt.27:25).