Bible-Reading.com
  1. Sat: Psalms 97-103
  2. Sun: Leviticus 22-23
  3. Mon: Luke 21-22
Tuesday · Week 30
The Early Prophets

Jeremiah 11-12

Week 30 · about 9 min
  1. Wed: 2 Kings 5-8
  2. Thu: Philemon
  3. Fri: Daniel 9-10

Judah breaks the covenant, and Jeremiah learns that men from his own hometown are plotting to kill him.

If the Footmen Tire You

If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee, then how canst thou contend with horses? and if in the land of peace, wherein thou trustedst, they wearied thee, then how wilt thou do in the swelling of Jordan?

Jeremiah 12:5 (KJV)

Jeremiah didn’t know his own neighbors in Anathoth were planning to kill him. He says he was “like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter.” Then he asks God the old question: “Wherefore doth the way of the wicked prosper?” God’s answer isn’t what you’d expect. He doesn’t comfort Jeremiah. He tells him that if racing men has worn him out, he’ll have to race horses next. It’s going to get harder. God was preparing him instead of babying him. Sometimes the smaller struggles are training for bigger ones.

Reflect: What might God be training you for through the struggles you’re facing now?

Jeremiah 11

1This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD:

2“Listen to the words of this covenant and tell them to the men of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem.

3You must tell them that this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Cursed is the man who does not obey the words of this covenant,

4which I commanded your forefathers when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the iron furnace, saying, ‘Obey Me, and do everything I command you, and you will be My people, and I will be your God.’

5This was in order to establish the oath I swore to your forefathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, as it is to this day.” “Amen, LORD,” I answered.

6Then the LORD said to me, “Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying: Hear the words of this covenant and carry them out.

7For from the time I brought your fathers out of the land of Egypt until today, I strongly warned them again and again, saying, ‘Obey My voice.’

8Yet they would not obey or incline their ears, but each one followed the stubbornness of his evil heart. So I brought on them all the curses of this covenant I had commanded them to follow but they did not keep.”

9And the LORD told me, “There is a conspiracy among the men of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem.

10They have returned to the sins of their forefathers who refused to obey My words. They have followed other gods to serve them. The house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken the covenant I made with their fathers.

11Therefore this is what the LORD says: ‘I am about to bring upon them a disaster that they cannot escape. They will cry out to Me, but I will not listen to them.

12Then the cities of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem will go and cry out to the gods to which they have been burning incense, but these gods certainly will not save them in their time of disaster.

13Your gods are indeed as numerous as your cities, O Judah; the altars of shame you have set up—the altars to burn incense to Baal—are as many as the streets of Jerusalem.’

14As for you, do not pray for these people. Do not raise up a cry or a prayer on their behalf, for I will not be listening when they call out to Me in their time of disaster.

15What right has My beloved in My house, having carried out so many evil schemes? Can consecrated meat avert your doom, so that you can rejoice?

16The LORD once called you a flourishing olive tree, beautiful with well-formed fruit. But with a mighty roar He will set it on fire, and its branches will be consumed.

17The LORD of Hosts, who planted you, has decreed disaster against you on account of the evil that the house of Israel and the house of Judah have brought upon themselves, provoking Me to anger by burning incense to Baal.”

18And the LORD informed me, so I knew. Then You showed me their deeds.

19For I was like a gentle lamb led to slaughter; I did not know that they had plotted against me: “Let us destroy the tree with its fruit; let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be remembered no more.”

20O LORD of Hosts, who judges righteously, who examines the heart and mind, let me see Your vengeance upon them, for to You I have committed my cause.

21Therefore this is what the LORD says concerning the people of Anathoth who are seeking your life and saying, “You must not prophesy in the name of the LORD, or you will die by our hand.”

22So this is what the LORD of Hosts says: “I will punish them. Their young men will die by the sword, their sons and daughters by famine.

23There will be no remnant, for I will bring disaster on the people of Anathoth in the year of their punishment.”

Jeremiah 12

1Righteous are You, O LORD, when I plead before You. Yet about Your judgments I wish to contend with You: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?

2You planted them, and they have taken root. They have grown and produced fruit. You are ever on their lips, but far from their hearts.

3But You know me, O LORD; You see me and test my heart toward You. Drag away the wicked like sheep to the slaughter and set them apart for the day of carnage.

4How long will the land mourn and the grass of every field be withered? Because of the evil of its residents, the animals and birds have been swept away, for the people have said, “He cannot see what our end will be.”

5“If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in a peaceful land, how will you do in the thickets of the Jordan?

6Even your brothers— your own father’s household— even they have betrayed you; even they have cried aloud against you. Do not trust them, though they speak well of you.

7I have forsaken My house; I have abandoned My inheritance. I have given the love of My life into the hands of her enemies.

8My inheritance has become to Me like a lion in the forest. She has roared against Me; therefore I hate her.

9Is not My inheritance to Me like a speckled bird of prey with other birds of prey circling against her? Go, gather all the beasts of the field; bring them to devour her.

10Many shepherds have destroyed My vineyard; they have trampled My plot of ground. They have turned My pleasant field into a desolate wasteland.

11They have made it a desolation; desolate before Me, it mourns. All the land is laid waste, but no man takes it to heart.

12Over all the barren heights in the wilderness the destroyers have come, for the sword of the LORD devours from one end of the earth to the other. No flesh has peace.

13They have sown wheat but harvested thorns. They have exhausted themselves to no avail. Bear the shame of your harvest because of the fierce anger of the LORD.”

14This is what the LORD says: “As for all My evil neighbors who attack the inheritance that I bequeathed to My people Israel, I am about to uproot them from their land, and I will uproot the house of Judah from among them.

15But after I have uprooted them, I will once again have compassion on them and return each one to his inheritance and to his land.

16And if they will diligently learn the ways of My people and swear by My name, saying, ‘As surely as the LORD lives’—just as they once taught My people to swear by Baal—then they will be established among My people.

17But if they will not obey, then I will uproot that nation; I will uproot it and destroy it, declares the LORD.”

Berean Standard Bible (BSB). The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain.