Jeremiah 22:1-10
English Standard Version

22 Thus says the LORD: “Go down to the house of the king of Judah and speak there this word, 2 and say, ‘Hear the word of the LORD, O king of Judah, who sits on the throne of David, you, and your servants, and your people who enter these gates. 3 Thus says the LORD: Do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless, and the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place. 4 For if you will indeed obey this word, then there shall enter the gates of this house kings who sit on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their servants and their people. 5 But if you will not obey these words, I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that this house shall become a desolation. 6 For thus says the LORD concerning the house of the king of Judah:

“‘You are like Gilead to me,
    like the summit of Lebanon,
yet surely I will make you a desert,
    an uninhabited city.
7 I will prepare destroyers against you,
    each with his weapons,
and they shall cut down your choicest cedars
    and cast them into the fire.

8 “‘And many nations will pass by this city, and every man will say to his neighbor, “Why has the LORD dealt thus with this great city?” 9 And they will answer, “Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD their God and worshiped other gods and served them.”’”

10 Weep not for him who is dead,
    nor grieve for him,
but weep bitterly for him who goes away,
    for he shall return no more
    to see his native land.

A continuation from yesterday's journal article as the chapter division split's Jeremiah's prophecy to the house of David (the royal family).  This part of the message is specifically for the current king and his household.  In fact, the LORD has Jeremiah go to the king's house to deliver this message.  The content of this part of the message is much the same--the king is to execute justice for all the people, but to take special care to do justice for those who could be easily victimized.  He is to punish those who victimize others, especially those who would shed innocent blood.  If the king would be careful to do all these things, then the LORD promises that He will extend his reign and give him peace and prosperity, but if he does not, then the king's house will become a house of desolation.

Though the LORD loves the king and his family like the people love the choices parts of the Land, the LORD is willing to make the king and his house the proverbial wasteland and desert.  He will send the destroyers after them--their lineage and position will not save them.  The richness of the Land will be explanted by those who conquer them so that they will cut down the cedar and use them for simple firewood.

Jeremiah tells the king not to weep for the dead, but for the exiles, because every single exile who goes away will die before the LORD allows a new generation to return.  Seventy years will pass before this period of exile is over.  There is nothing more than could be done for the dead, but the exiles would have to live with the feeling of being abandoned, helpless and hopeless for the rest of their lives.

Jeremiah 21:11-14
English Standard Version

Message to the House of David
11 “And to the house of the king of Judah say, ‘Hear the word of the LORD, 12 O house of David! Thus says the LORD:

“‘Execute justice in the morning,
    and deliver from the hand of the oppressor
    him who has been robbed,
lest my wrath go forth like fire,
    and burn with none to quench it,
    because of your evil deeds.’”

13 “Behold, I am against you, O inhabitant of the valley,
    O rock of the plain,
declares the LORD;
you who say, ‘Who shall come down against us,
    or who shall enter our habitations?’
14 I will punish you according to the fruit of your deeds,
declares the LORD;
    I will kindle a fire in her forest,
    and it shall devour all that is around her.”

God now has a special message to the royal family.  They were the ones that were to shepherd God's flock (along with the priests and the prophets, but they had responsibilities to execute the LORD's Law and justice.  In fact that is is where the LORD starts His message to them.  They are to execute justice not just early in the day, but early in their lives.  The phrase "in the morning" may not just refer to a 24-hour day, but may refer metaphorically to the early part of one's life--morning being early in life, afternoon being the middle years and evening being the years when a person is elderly and looking forward to death which would metaphorically be the night time.  The king is supposed to stop the victimization of the people by the robbers.  Instead they are facilitating it for their own profit and robbing people themselves.

For this and more (for it was the kings that helped turn the hearts of the people to idols), the LORD says that He is now against the house of David.  They thought that they would always have the LORD's protection and favor because of their father David, but that favoritism has come to an end.  They will be judged according to their deeds--not the deeds of David.  The LORD lets them know that there will be nowhere for them to run.  They will not be able to escape or hide for them judgment as David fled and hid from Saul in the wilderness and in the caves.  They cannot even run into the forest to hide them, because the LORD is going to send His fire to consume it.  Every hiding place will be exposed and vulnerable.  The Land will give up all the people great and small to the Babylonians for either execution or exile.

Jeremiah 21:1-10
English Standard Version

Jerusalem Will Fall to Nebuchadnezzar
21 This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, when King Zedekiah sent to him Pashhur the son of Malchiah and Zephaniah the priest, the son of Maaseiah, saying, 2 “Inquire of the LORD for us, for Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon is making war against us. Perhaps the LORD will deal with us according to all his wonderful deeds and will make him withdraw from us.”

3 Then Jeremiah said to them: “Thus you shall say to Zedekiah, 4 ‘Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Behold, I will turn back the weapons of war that are in your hands and with which you are fighting against the king of Babylon and against the Chaldeans who are besieging you outside the walls. And I will bring them together into the midst of this city. 5 I myself will fight against you with outstretched hand and strong arm, in anger and in fury and in great wrath. 6 And I will strike down the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast. They shall die of a great pestilence. 7 Afterward, declares the LORD, I will give Zedekiah king of Judah and his servants and the people in this city who survive the pestilence, sword, and famine into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and into the hand of their enemies, into the hand of those who seek their lives. He shall strike them down with the edge of the sword. He shall not pity them or spare them or have compassion.’

8 “And to this people you shall say: ‘Thus says the LORD: Behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death. 9 He who stays in this city shall die by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence, but he who goes out and surrenders to the Chaldeans who are besieging you shall live and shall have his life as a prize of war. 10 For I have set my face against this city for harm and not for good, declares the LORD: it shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.’

I'm really not sure why the king of Judah is acting surprised that things are happening just like the LORD said they would.  Nebuchadnezzar (the king of Babylon) is coming to make war with them, just like the LORD said.  All of a sudden that they are seeing things happen that people said would never happen, they want to inquire of the LORD by way of the prophet Jeremiah (the same one that they have ridiculed and persecuted).

The king of Judah and his servants get the opposite message they expect.  The LORD says that He will not allow them to be successful if they go to war with Babylon.  They are there accomplishing His plans and purposes and to fight against them is to try to fight against the LORD.  He will cause pestilence to come upon the people to so that they will not just be fighting against a human enemy, but God will bring Nature to bear against them.  They will also face a great famine.  All this will put them in a weakened state and make it easier for Babylon to defeat them.

The LORD says that He is giving them a choice that will be the difference between life and death.  If they trust in the fortifications of the city to protect them, they will die.  Those who stay in the city will die of disease, famine or by the sword when the city is attacked and taken by the Babylonians.  Their other choice is to save their lives by surrendering to the Babylonians and be taken as prisoners of war.  The LORD promises if they surrender, they will live; if they resist, they will die.  This is not what the king or his servants wanted to hear.  Jerusalem would be given into the hands of the king of Babylon, and it would be destroyed with fire.  There is nothing that the king or the people could do to stop it at this point.

Jeremiah 20
English Standard Version

Jeremiah Persecuted by Pashhur
20 Now Pashhur the priest, the son of Immer, who was chief officer in the house of the LORD, heard Jeremiah prophesying these things. 2 Then Pashhur beat Jeremiah the prophet, and put him in the stocks that were in the upper Benjamin Gate of the house of the LORD. 3 The next day, when Pashhur released Jeremiah from the stocks, Jeremiah said to him, “The LORD does not call your name Pashhur, but Terror on Every Side. 4 For thus says the LORD: Behold, I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends. They shall fall by the sword of their enemies while you look on. And I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon. He shall carry them captive to Babylon, and shall strike them down with the sword. 5 Moreover, I will give all the wealth of the city, all its gains, all its prized belongings, and all the treasures of the kings of Judah into the hand of their enemies, who shall plunder them and seize them and carry them to Babylon. 6 And you, Pashhur, and all who dwell in your house, shall go into captivity. To Babylon you shall go, and there you shall die, and there you shall be buried, you and all your friends, to whom you have prophesied falsely.”

7 O LORD, you have deceived me,
    and I was deceived;
you are stronger than I,
    and you have prevailed.
I have become a laughingstock all the day;
    everyone mocks me.
8 For whenever I speak, I cry out,
    I shout, “Violence and destruction!”
For the word of the LORD has become for me
    a reproach and derision all day long.
9 If I say, “I will not mention him,
    or speak any more in his name,”
there is in my heart as it were a burning fire
    shut up in my bones,
and I am weary with holding it in,
    and I cannot.
10 For I hear many whispering.
    Terror is on every side!
“Denounce him! Let us denounce him!”
    say all my close friends,
    watching for my fall.
“Perhaps he will be deceived;
    then we can overcome him
    and take our revenge on him.”
11 But the LORD is with me as a dread warrior;
    therefore my persecutors will stumble;
    they will not overcome me.
They will be greatly shamed,
    for they will not succeed.
Their eternal dishonor
    will never be forgotten.
12 O LORD of hosts, who tests the righteous,
    who sees the heart and the mind,
let me see your vengeance upon them,
    for to you have I committed my cause.

13 Sing to the LORD;
    praise the LORD!
For he has delivered the life of the needy
    from the hand of evildoers.

14 Cursed be the day
    on which I was born!
The day when my mother bore me,
    let it not be blessed!
15 Cursed be the man who brought the news to my father,
“A son is born to you,”
    making him very glad.
16 Let that man be like the cities
    that the LORD overthrew without pity;
let him hear a cry in the morning
    and an alarm at noon,
17 because he did not kill me in the womb;
    so my mother would have been my grave,
    and her womb forever great.
18 Why did I come out from the womb
    to see toil and sorrow,
    and spend my days in shame?

Jeremiah being a priest would have been under the authority of the high priest.  It would seem that this man Pashhur who was persecuting Jeremiah was not the high priest but instead a leader among the priests (remember they were divided into different "orders" at the time of David).  This priest saw Jeremiah prophesying in the Temple and was displeased with the message that he brought, so he beat him and put him in stocks publicly above the Benjamin Gate (one of the gates of the Temple).  Once Jeremiah was set free, he prophesied against Pashhur saying that he would be seen as a terror on the people and would be taken into captivity and die in captivity.  He would have to witness everyone knew be killed or captured and the Temple and the city he loved be destroyed by the Babylonians.  All the wealth of the kings and even the wealth of the Temple would be unable to keep him from the LORD's judgment.

Pashhur is rebuked for the false prophecy that he offered saying that what Jeremiah said through the Word of the LORD would not come to pass.  He game people false hope when they needed to repent.  That is why people would denounce him when judgment finally came upon them.  They will cry out that they never should have believed Pashhur.  

Jeremiah 19
English Standard Version

The Broken Flask
19 Thus says the LORD “Go, buy a potter's earthenware 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 at the entry of the Potsherd Gate, and proclaim there the words that I tell you. 3 You shall say, ‘Hear the word of the LORD, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I am bringing such disaster upon this place that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle. 4 Because the people have forsaken me and have profaned this place by making offerings in it to other gods whom neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah have known; and because they have filled this place with the blood of innocents, 5 and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or decree, nor did it come into my mind— 6 therefore, behold, days are coming, declares the LORD, when this place shall no more be called Topheth, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. 7 And in this place I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and will cause their people to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies for food to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the earth. 8 And I will make this city a horror, a thing to be hissed at. Everyone who passes by it will be horrified and will hiss because of all its wounds. 9 And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and everyone shall eat the flesh of his neighbor in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them.’

10 “Then you shall break the flask in the sight of the men who go with you, 11 and shall say to them, ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts: So will I break this people and this city, as one breaks a potter's vessel, so that it can never be mended. Men shall bury in Topheth because there will be no place else to bury. 12 Thus will I do to this place, declares the LORD, and to its inhabitants, making this city like Topheth. 13 The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah—all the houses on whose roofs offerings have been offered to all the host of heaven, and drink offerings have been poured out to other gods—shall be defiled like the place of Topheth.’”

14 Then Jeremiah came from Topheth, where the LORD had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the court of the LORD's house and said to all the people: 15 “Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, behold, I am bringing upon this city and upon all its towns all the disaster that I have pronounced against it, because they have stiffened their neck, refusing to hear my words.”

God tells Jeremiah to prepare a speech with a visual aid.  He is to buy an earthenware flask from the potter (maybe the very same potter he had been watching make something--maybe even the same vessel he saw the potter make), and take it with him to the gate called the Potsherd Gate (I assume a place where they threw away broken pottery that was of no value, especially that which had become unclean).  He was to gather the political, civil, and religious leaders (the elders of Judah and Benjamin and the elders of the priests who were over the tribe of Levi) and was to give them a message from the LORD that the very place where he stood to give them that speech was going to be a place that would be renamed the Valley of Slaughter because of all those that would die there.

He also told them that Jerusalem would be besieged and there would be no food to the point where people would turn to cannibalism (extremely detestable to the Jewish people) as the only thing left for men to eat would be the corpses of those who had died and their family and neighbors.  This is how far the judgment of the LORD would go.  He would take them to the place where they would see how depraved they really were.  Jerusalem would become a place that people would "hiss at" when they saw it or spoke of it (it would be a vile place in people's minds and not a beautiful place known for the LORD who lived there among His people in His holy Temple).

In the sight of all the leaders, Jeremiah was to break the flask so that it would be beyond human repair and say, "This is how the LORD is going to break you."  The judgment was coming and was sure.  Why?  Because the people had turned to other gods and worshiped them.  They made sacrifices to the Baals and the stars of the heavens.  They even convinced themselves that this is what the LORD wanted them to do, but the LORD said that such a thought had never even entered His mind.  Such thoughts were not from Him.  They had defiled the Land that the LORD had given to them.

Though this message was at first given to a small group of leaders, Jeremiah goes back to the Temple in front of the whole congregation and shares the same message with all of them so that no one can say that the LORD did not warn them.  We know that the leaders are going to fail in warning the people because they do not believe the message themselves, so the message was given directly to the people.  However, the people did not repent, just as their leaders did not repent.  They refused to hear the word of the LORD spoken through the prophet Jeremiah.

Jeremiah 18
English Standard Version

The Potter and the Clay
18 The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: 2 “Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will let you hear my words.” 3 So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was working at his wheel. 4 And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do.

5 Then the word of the LORD came to me: 6 “O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter has done? declares the LORD. Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. 7 If at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, 8 and if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I intended to do to it. 9 And if at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, 10 and if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will relent of the good that I had intended to do to it. 11 Now, therefore, say to the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: ‘Thus says the LORD, Behold, I am shaping disaster against you and devising a plan against you. Return, every one from his evil way, and amend your ways and your deeds.’

12 “But they say, ‘That is in vain! We will follow our own plans, and will every one act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart.’

13 “Therefore thus says the LORD:
Ask among the nations,
    Who has heard the like of this?
The virgin Israel
    has done a very horrible thing.
14 Does the snow of Lebanon leave
    the crags of Sirion?
Do the mountain waters run dry,
    the cold flowing streams?
15 But my people have forgotten me;
    they make offerings to false gods;
they made them stumble in their ways,
    in the ancient roads,
and to walk into side roads,
    not the highway,
16 making their land a horror,
    a thing to be hissed at forever.
Everyone who passes by it is horrified
    and shakes his head.
17 Like the east wind I will scatter them
    before the enemy.
I will show them my back, not my face,
    in the day of their calamity.”

18 Then they said, “Come, let us make plots against Jeremiah, for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, let us strike him with the tongue, and let us not pay attention to any of his words.”

19 Hear me, O LORD,
    and listen to the voice of my adversaries.
20 Should good be repaid with evil?
    Yet they have dug a pit for my life.
Remember how I stood before you
    to speak good for them,
    to turn away your wrath from them.
21 Therefore deliver up their children to famine;
    give them over to the power of the sword;
let their wives become childless and widowed.
    May their men meet death by pestilence,
    their youths be struck down by the sword in battle.
22 May a cry be heard from their houses,
    when you bring the plunderer suddenly upon them!
For they have dug a pit to take me
    and laid snares for my feet.
23 Yet you, O LORD, know
    all their plotting to kill me.
Forgive not their iniquity,
    nor blot out their sin from your sight.
Let them be overthrown before you;
    deal with them in the time of your anger.

The LORD has a message here to teach Jeremiah and the people about His sovereignty and that He has a plan to mold and fashion them into something wonderful.  However, if they somehow refuse to take that shape of what He originally wants to mold them into, He can choose to make them into something else--something completely different.  The thing is, the clay has no say in what the potter forms it into.  The clay is not really actively resisting here (we can't fight against God as much as the world and the devil want us to think we can), it's just that the original image was marred in some way and the potter wanted to make something that was going to be a good reflection of him and his talent.  He doesn't make bad art.  Remember, we are His workmanship, and we are a reflection of Him since we are His handiwork.  In a similar way, children are a reflection of their parents and parents get both praise when their child does something good and criticism when their child does something wrong.  We don't have the option to just start over and remake our children though (I bet sometimes some of us wish we could), however, God does have the ability to do exactly that and for us to be "born again" and to make us completely new.

The LORD can establish nations and cause them to cease to exist any time He wants.  He can start to punish a nation and then if it repents and turns from its evil ways, He can relent and build them back up again.  No one has any right to question His decision as He is forming and making and sculpting what seems best to Him.  It would be wrong for the clay to say to the potter, "Why did you make this way?  I didn't want to be this kind of vessel.  I wanted to be something different."  Paul comes back to this idea in the book of Romans.  Paul takes it to the level of a "what if" (notice he doesn't say that it's actually the way that it is) that the LORD has every right to make vessels (people) whose sole purpose would to be vessels of His wrath and that they are predestined for hellfire and destruction.  Hypothetically, the LORD would be completely just in doing so and we would not be able to complain about that.  Let's not argue about double-predestination now though, but it fits with the whole thing of what if God decides to destroy a people that is really, really bad and He chose to never send a missionary to them to share the gospel with them.  Would He be just in doing so?  Jeremiah says "Yes."  We also see the idea of the book of Jonah here that Nineveh was terribly wicked, but repented and the LORD saved the judgment meant for them for a future generation..

With all that in mind, the LORD has a plan to fashion Israel (and specifically Jerusalem) into something for HIs glory and good pleasure, but to do that He needs to crush and destroy this marred version of it and start over again.  No one should think that just because the LORD allowed many to be killed and the walled cities to be destroyed and the fertile land to lie fallow so that the Land became desert and wilderness instead of vineyards and groves of trees that the LORD's blessing had forever been removed.  It does no good to try to fight against the Potter's hands, and it will only make the process harder and longer.

The people of Israel and Judah (the people that should be the people of God) have abandoned Him to serve other gods.  It should be as impossible for that to happen as it is for the snow to leave the mountains or for Lebanon to not be known for its cedars.  There are just things that are your identity that should never change.  It should really perplexing to people to see "the people of the LORD" worshiping other gods or acting like the pagan nations around them that did not have the Law or the Prophets.

They have received the curses of the covenant and Jeremiah was sent to tell the people to repent that the LORD might relent.  However, instead of listening to the LORD's message, they decide they need to kill the messenger.  They will do the same thing to Jesus and Jesus will cite this to say this is the same thing they did to Jeremiah and all the other prophets.  They attacked him physically, but they also spoke evil things against him.  Jeremiah asks for them to be repaid for their actions (I think he missed the message that the LORD wants them to repent and would be willing to relent from any judgment they deserved if they did).  However, the LORD is just and it is right to ask for Him to do justly and take vengeance for you, because we should not take vengeance for ourselves.  David did this many times, but he also cried out for mercy when he was the one who was wicked and was "guilty as sin."  We must all fall on the LORD's mercy at some point because we all sin and are deserving of physical and spiritual death, but we definitely want to feel like justice has been done for the innocent (or sometimes not so innocent) victims, especially when we are the ones who feel we have been victimized.

Jeremiah prays for all kinds of things to happen to those who are doing and saying evil things against him, yet they are the very things that the LORD has promised to do to them.  In a sense, Jeremiah, like Jonah is saying, "God, please don't let them repent and escape your judgment."  For Jeremiah, the people did not repent and were judged, but for Jonah the people of Nineveh did repent, and that made Jonah angry.  We need to be careful that we accept the LORD's plan even when it is not what we personally want.  If the LORD wishes to save people that were His enemies, that is something that should be celebrated.

Jeremiah 17:19-27
English Standard Version

Keep the Sabbath Holy
19 Thus said the LORD to me: “Go and stand in the People's Gate, by which the kings of Judah enter and by which they go out, and in all the gates of Jerusalem, 20 and say: ‘Hear the word of the LORD, you kings of Judah, and all Judah, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, who enter by these gates. 21 Thus says the LORD: Take care for the sake of your lives, and do not bear a burden on the Sabbath day or bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem. 22 And do not carry a burden out of your houses on the Sabbath or do any work, but keep the Sabbath day holy, as I commanded your fathers. 23 Yet they did not listen or incline their ear, but stiffened their neck, that they might not hear and receive instruction.

24 “‘But if you listen to me, declares the LORD, and bring in no burden by the gates of this city on the Sabbath day, but keep the Sabbath day holy and do no work on it, 25 then there shall enter by the gates of this city kings and princes who sit on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their officials, the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And this city shall be inhabited forever. 26 And people shall come from the cities of Judah and the places around Jerusalem, from the land of Benjamin, from the Shephelah, from the hill country, and from the Negeb, bringing burnt offerings and sacrifices, grain offerings and frankincense, and bringing thank offerings to the house of the LORD. 27 But if you do not listen to me, to keep the Sabbath day holy, and not to bear a burden and enter by the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day, then I will kindle a fire in its gates, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem and shall not be quenched.’”

Jeremiah is go out in front of the gate (presumably where everyone gathers to do business), in the hearing of all the people and leaders of the city and remind them that the Sabbath day, the seventh day that we call Saturday, is to be a day of rest that is holy unto the LORD.  The Jewish people were commanded to do no work on the Sabbath day, as apparently they were failing to keep the Sabbath and this was one of the high crimes of the Law that was worthy of death.  Jeremiah pleads with the people for the sake of their own lives to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.

The LORD promises that if they will renew their covenant with Him and keep the Sabbath day, there will be many more kings of Israel and Judah that come in and out through that very gate.  The LORD will continue to protects the inhabitants of Jerusalem which bears His Name and they will live there forever.  He is going to do this eventually in the New Jerusalem, but He was going to give them a taste of that here and now.  The Temple will continue to be there and all of the Twelve Tribes will be united together and come tot he Temple to bring their sacrifices and burnt offerings, their grain offerings and their offerings of frankincense as they bring their thank offerings to the LORD in His house.

However, if they do not listen to the LORD and do not obey Him in all things (the Sabbath day is the easiest barometer of how seriously the people take everything else) and they continue to work on the Sabbath and keep the gates open for business when they are to close them and let no resident or traveler gather there to do business, then fire will come from the LORD to burn up the gates and devour the paneled houses (called palaces) in Jerusalem---the people of Jerusalem in general lived in luxury compared to other parts of the country.  This fire will not be able to be quenched because it is the fire of the LORD's zealous judgment  Today is set before the choice of obedience that leads to life and blessing or rebellion that leads to a fiery death and destruction.  Both were to take place in the here and now, but both were to point forward to something about the eternal life in store for those who were either obedient or disobedient.  God has prepared a place that we call "heaven" for those He loves and those that love Him because He first loved us.  He has also prepared a place for the devil and his angels and all of those who chose to be part of the kingdom of darkness and live in rebellion against the LORD and the kingdom of the Son of God.  You can choose which kingdom you want to be a part of and which master you want to serve, but you cannot change your citizenship after your death.  "Choose you this day whom you will serve" was the call of Joshua to the people as they settled into the Land of Canaan.  It seems they have forgotten their promise as they swore along with Joshua, "As for me and my house, we will serve the LORD."  God is calling this generation to another decision point--will they serve Him and show that by keeping the Sabbaths, or will they serve other gods and show that by acting like the Gentiles so that the Sabbath day is just another ordinary day to them? We may not specifically see this commandment repeated in the New Testament, but we see it lived out by Jesus and the Apostles and the early Church.  Gentiles were told they didn't have to participate in the feasts and festivals of the Jewish calendar which meant nothing to them, but the Sabbath day started at the time of creation and was given to all men.  It has taken on additional meaning as history has progressed not only to remind us that God finished His work of creation in six literal days (something we need to be reminded of today) and that with a mighty hand an an outstretched arm, He redeemed His people out of the land of Egypt (something Israel could celebrate, but the rest of the world couldn't, but that work of making them a nation was "finished" as well) and then the finished work of Jesus's substitutionary atonement which was accomplished during what we call Passion Week, and He "rested" in the grave on the Sabbath day to rise victorious on the first day of the week (Sunday), and the hope that we have given to us in the book of Hebrews of a better day of Sabbath rest that is being prepared for us in the LORD's Kingdom when He will say one last time "It is finished" because everything He set out to do to redeem a people to Himself and sanctify them and glorify them and make them completely into His image will be completed and all the blessings of the covenant will be given to them.  We look both backwards and forwards as we remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy and we tell the story of Creation, Redemption, Regeneration, Reconciliation, Resurrection, and the Return and Reign of Jesus. (there are many other things I can think of that this celebrates, but these were all the words with "R" that I could think of)..  Do you celebrate the LORD's Sabbath and keep it holy? Are you surprised to hear that it was a death-penalty offense just like murder, adultery, blasphemy, idolatry, sorcery, witchcraft, divination, and human trafficking (among others)? Are you surprised to hear it's the main reason given by the LORD in this book of prophecy for why His people must go into Exile and it is why the number of days is set to 70 years (there was a Sabbath year that they did not keep as well as a Sabbath day).  The LORD's Sabbaths are important because they are a way for His people to tell His gospel story through how they keep their calendar.  What is the reason for almost every Sabbath day or holy day (we get the world holiday from this) in the Bible?  It's because God did something or is going to do something or both related to salvation and we are to remember to tell the story from generation to generation. Is that what you do when you gather together to worship the LORD (I know most of us don't gather on the Sabbath day, but do we celebrate these things and tell this story)?  Maybe that's food for thought as we were to be ambassadors with a specific message, lifestyle and culture to spread if we are truly the people of God, and the Sabbath day is one of the primary ways for us to do that.