LESSONS FROM JEREMIAH – PART 31 – A DISOBEDIENT NATION BECOMES THE GENERATION OF GOD’S WRATH: PART 31 - Jeremiah 7:27-29
CHAPTER 7
[A]. YOUR PART IS TO SPEAK FAITHFULLY; THEIR PART IS TO OBEY
{{Jeremiah 7:27 “You shall speak all these words to them, BUT THEY WILL NOT LISTEN TO YOU, and you shall call to them, BUT THEY WILL NOT ANSWER YOU,”}}
Verse 27 uses parallelism again. Speak – not listen; call – not answer. The LORD commanded Jeremiah to speak to the people and this is not the first time. This verse following is the first time the Lord commanded – {{Jeremiah 1:17 “Now, gird up your loins, and arise, AND SPEAK TO THEM ALL THAT I COMMAND YOU. Do not be dismayed before them, lest I dismay you before them.”}} Previously God told Jeremiah the people would not listen to him, (listen to the LORD) but the longsuffering God sent message after message to the people.
We might reflect on this matter of unbelief found entrenched in human beings. Unbelief is one of the pivotal sins of people, and actually is the motivating factor for all other sins. If one does not believe in God, then you have made all absolutes void, and become a free agent to do what you like being subject only to the law of the land. With everything else you can apply the rule, “Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow you die.” (Luke 12:19)
Unbelief means rejection of any godly restraints because ultimate truth is rejected and the Lord said, “I am the TRUTH,” so it means rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Every person ever born who is unsaved, will appear at the great white throne where unbelief will condemn every one of them. {{2 Thessalonians 2:12 “in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.”}}
The Lord encountered the same thing with the people and this is recorded – {{Matthew 13:14-15 “In their case the prophecy of Isaiah is being fulfilled which says, ‘You will keep on HEARING but will not understand, and you will keep on SEEING, but will not perceive, for the heart of this people has become dull and with their ears they scarcely hear, and they have closed their eyes lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart and return, and I should heal them,’”}}
It is a terrible thing when one does not hear the word of the Lord, and especially bad when he des not want to hear the words of the Lord. Such a one has blocked the ears as the unbelieving Jews did before they stoned Stephen, and they have shut their eyes so that redeeming words and the light of God can not enter. Deaf ears and blind eyes will condemn a person.
Who is responsible for this dullness of hearing and of sight? Has God done it so they can not be saved? Has Satan done it so they can not respond to the truth? Have the people themselves done this so that their consciences are not roused or their hearts convicted of the truth? Verse 15 just above suggests this comes from the people themselves as an active part of their will. Of course Satan is still active in trying to hide the word or destroy it or to confuse it.
God does not make their eyes blind nor their ears deaf. The Lord wants no one to perish. The following verse is recorded in the New Testament but this is the consistent God we are talking about – {{1 Timothy 2:3-4 “This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour who DESIRES ALL MEN TO BE SAVED and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”}}
There was no revival in Jeremiah’s time except what was surrounding King Josiah but that was very short lived and his sons continued the wickedness. Jeremiah preached without results, reminiscent of Noah. God instructed him many times to speak to the people and all the prophet had to do was to be faithfully committed to God’s word. On the other hand, the people had no excuse, and when they were carried away in judgement and killed, they could not blame God. they will stand alone in their own condemnation. Even in the time of Lamentations, the people blamed God for their predicament.
[B]. THE DISOBEDIENT NATION IS EXPOSED FOR THEIR ABUSE OF THE TRUTH
{{Jeremiah 7:28 “and you shall say to them, ‘THIS IS THE NATION THAT DID NOT OBEY the voice of the LORD their God or accept correction. Truth has perished and has been cut off from their mouth.’”}}
Jeremiah was told what message he had to deliver from the LORD to the nation, even though God prepared him that they would not believe or listen to him. Isaiah also faced that same problem from a sinful nation – {{Isaiah 59:12-15 “Our transgressions are multiplied before You, and our sins testify against us for our transgressions are with us and we know our iniquities: transgressing and denying the LORD, and turning away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving in and uttering from the heart lying words. JUSTICE IS TURNED BACK AND RIGHTEOUSNESS STANDS FAR AWAY FOR TRUTH HAS STUMBLED IN THE STREET, and uprightness cannot enter. Yes, TRUTH IS LACKING and he who turns aside from evil makes himself a prey. Now the LORD saw, and it was displeasing in His sight that THERE WAS NO JUSTICE.”}}
Truth has perished in the streets. Where was the justice? When a nation is in decline as all our nations are today, especially the one that was the bastion of truth and justice, the USA, the most notable casualties are truth and justice. I don’t need to elaborate to you the injustice of the American Justice system and the great distortion of truth and the promotion of lies in the USA as the world sees in 2024. Justice and truth have been slain. The Australian Government, so godless, is devoid of truth and honest justice.
In the streets people are denied truth and justice, and themselves are untruthful and unjust. God does not tolerate that for long and takes action. In Judah’s case it was the Babylonian army who came to trample them – {{Isaiah 10:6 “I send it against a godless nation and commission it against the people of My fury to capture booty and to seize plunder and to TRAMPLE THEM DOWN LIKE MUD IN THE STREETS,”}} but in the case of modern nations in 2024, it will be the great Tribulation that is coming because of the accumulated wickedness of the world and the great denial of truth and justice. Truth is slain by humanism, socialism, evolution, climate change propaganda, lying politicians, pharmaceutical companies, and big tech companies and so many more aspects in this fallen world.
The opening of Jeremiah 7:28 is in the past tense. “This is the nation that DID NOT obey.” Sadly disobedience, ungodliness, rebellion, apostasy and idolatry was all Israel and Judah had to show at the decline of their nationhood. From that point onwards until 1948 Israel had never been a nation in its own right but was under foreign powers and persecuted all through the world.
The world will pay heavily for the persecution of the Jews as this verse says – {{Zechariah 12:2-3 “Behold, I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that causes reeling to all the peoples around; and when the siege is against Jerusalem, it will also be against Judah. “And it will come about in that day that I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples; all who lift it will be severely injured. And all the nations of the earth will be gathered against it.”}}
The promise God gave Abraham is forever – {{Genesis 12:3 “I WILL BLESS THOSE WHO BLESS YOU AND THE ONE WHO CURSES YOU I WILL CURSE. In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed,”}}. Be warned all who seek to come against Israel whether it be Hamas or Iran or the United Nations.
[C]. REJECTED AND FORSAKEN SO LOSE YOUR HAIR ON THE BARE HEIGHTS
{{Jeremiah 7:29 “Cut off your hair and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on the bare heights, for THE LORD HAS REJECTED AND FORSAKEN the generation of His wrath.”}}
I think this verse is suggestive that Jeremiah wrote down all his prophecy possibly after the fall of Jerusalem. If that is not true, then the prophet writes early – chronologically – in his ministry. Because of the verses following until the end of the chapter, it seems correct that these verses are prophetic as to the judgement that was coming. How frustrating it must have been when neither the king, nor elders, not the religious leaders, nor the people, took any notice at all when Jeremiah proclaimed the word of the LORD.
What about our generation when it is told of the necessity of repentance and what should follow – this was told to Jesus’ generation -
{{Matthew 3:7-8 When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to FLEE FROM THE WRATH TO COME? Therefore bring forth fruit in keeping with repentance,”}}. Indeed, the wrath to come did come in about 40 years in A.D. 70. That was spoken to the stiff-necked, hard-hearted Pharisees and Sadducees, and probably to the scribes as well.
Luke adds a little extra declaring these words were spoken to the multitudes, for Jesus knew the hypocrisy that existed among the people – {{Luke 3:7 “He therefore began saying to the MULTITUDES who were going out to be baptised by him, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to FLEE FROM THE WRATH TO COME?”}}
Faithful proclaimers of the bible today are telling and writing about the wrath to hit this world after Jesus returns to take the Church home in the Rapture. That wrath is the Tribulation that comes because of refusal to repent – the same reason for Noah’s flood, for Sodom and Gomorrah, for Israel by the Assyrians, for Judah by the Babylonians, for Israel in A.D. 70 by the Romans, and for the world immediately after the Rapture, judgement directly from God. As Enoch was removed before judgement, so too the Church will be removed before judgement.
If anything, mankind is very consistent. As a whole it does not know how to repent, sin making him incapable, to come in humility to God. It’s the same error that is repeated over and over. God does not want to move in judgement but man gives Him no option. The holiness of God must be “appeased” or satisfied and that happens either through the cross, or through a righteous judgement. Man rejects the cross and embraces the option of God’s judgement.
Nevertheless this small verse for 6000 years has operated on the face of the earth – {{2 Peter 3:9 “The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, NOT WISHING FOR ANY TO PERISH BUT FOR ALL TO COME TO REPENTANCE,”}}. If only the world would do that – come to repentance.
HOWEVER the verse following after in Peter begins with a BUT. If man does not respond, the BUT comes into play. {{2 Peter 3:10 “BUT the day of the Lord will come like a thief in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up.”}}. “BUT THE DAY OF THE LORD” – there is so much written on the DAY of the LORD in the Old Testament that will happen straight after the Rapture beginning with Revelation chapter 6. It will be horrendous and it is not allegorical like the false application that Augustine proclaimed. It will come literally on the earth.
Churches must preach repentance. Preach about sin and repentance. Too many do not do that. They are afraid and therefore are false prophets. The mega churches are the worst.
CUT OFF THE HAIR
This word here for hair is “nezer” and means crown. The order was to cut off the crown. This comment must be connected with the Nazirite and the vow taken by Nazirites, though Jeremiah is not speaking to Nazirites. {{Numbers 6:5 “All the days of his vow of separation no razor shall pass over his head. He shall be holy until the days are fulfilled for which he separated himself to the LORD. HE SHALL LET THE LOCKS OF HAIR ON HIS HEAD GROW LONG.”}}. The long hair was the sign of the vow and the vow was very serious.
The Naririte could not break the vow even if his father or mother died. If he went near a dead body he would be unclean and then would have to cut his hair. {{Numbers 6:7 “He shall not make himself unclean for his father or for his mother, for his brother or for his sister, when they die, because his separation to God is on his head.”}}
If the situation happened that a person suddenly died in a Nazirite’s presence, (in the presence of death), then the following would be demanded – {{Numbers 6:9 “but if a man dies very suddenly beside him and he defiles his dedicated head of hair, THEN HE SHALL SHAVE HIS HEAD on the day when he becomes clean. He shall shave it on the seventh day.”}}
When Jerusalem was to come under judgement, then there was to be death so taking the example of the Nazirite, then the long hair was to be cut off. Not just long hair but shaving bald. Jeremiah uses this command to affirm that death is coming, not so much to address the Nazirite but to paint this picture of destruction. The cutting of the hair was a sign of mourning – {{Micah 1:16 “Make yourself bald and cut off your hair, because of the children of your delight; extend your baldness like the eagle, for they will go from you into exile.”}} That was to be done in sorrow or mourning.
Sorrow and mourning was to come on Judah and we see that in Lamentations. Refer to my series in Lamentations.
The AV/KJV renders the verse in this way – {{“Cut off thine hair, O Jerusalem, and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on high places; for the LORD hath rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.”}} The insertion of “O Jerusalem” is explained by Ellicott – [[“O Jerusalem” - The italics show that the words are not in the Hebrew, but the insertion of some such words was rendered necessary by the fact that the verb “cut off” is in the feminine. Those who heard or read the words of the prophet, who so often spoke of “the daughter of Zion” (Jeremiah 6:2), of “the daughter of his people” (Jeremiah 6:14; Jeremiah 8:11), of “the betrothed of Jehovah” (Jeremiah 2, 3), would be at no loss to understand his meaning.”}}
The lamentations were to be taken to the bare heights, or high peaks or high places. Judah was full of high places where the pagan deities were worshipped. Countless times in Kings and Chronicles you have this expression “high places” as in this example – {{1 Kings 14:22-24 “JUDAH DID EVIL IN THE SIGHT OF THE LORD, and they provoked Him to jealousy more than all that their fathers had done with the sins which they committed, for THEY ALSO BUILT FOR THEMSELVES HIGH PLACES and sacred pillars and Asherim on every high hill and beneath every luxuriant tree. There were also male cult prostitutes in the land. They did according to all the abominations of the nations which the LORD dispossessed before the sons of Israel.”}}
These high places were blots of wickedness, satanic rituals of paganism. Australia is the same with the adoption of Aboriginal spiritism and satanic culture being forced on to people. It is like creating high places right through the nation and forcing people’s acceptance.
Jeremiah 7:29 ends with “the generation of His wrath.” That generation of which Jeremiah was part was the generation of wrath because God had had enough and His wrath fell through the hand of Babylon. I believe we are living today in the generation of His wrath because this generation is just so close to the Rapture and Tribulation. There is no time to play around. We must be diligent for the Lord because the time is so close to being up. Many religious centres should stop playing church.
In the next message we will look into the pagan practices more in the following Jeremiah verses.
