Jeremiah 22:11-30--Message to the Sons of Josiah

Jeremiah 22:11-30
English Standard Version

Message to the Sons of Josiah
11 For thus says the LORD concerning Shallum the son of Josiah, king of Judah, who reigned instead of Josiah his father, and who went away from this place: “He shall return here no more, 12 but in the place where they have carried him captive, there shall he die, and he shall never see this land again.”

13 “Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness,
    and his upper rooms by injustice,
who makes his neighbor serve him for nothing
    and does not give him his wages,
14 who says, ‘I will build myself a great house
    with spacious upper rooms,’
who cuts out windows for it,
    paneling it with cedar
    and painting it with vermilion.
15 Do you think you are a king
    because you compete in cedar?
Did not your father eat and drink
    and do justice and righteousness?
    Then it was well with him.
16 He judged the cause of the poor and needy;
    then it was well.
Is not this to know me?
    declares the LORD.
17 But you have eyes and heart
    only for your dishonest gain,
for shedding innocent blood,
    and for practicing oppression and violence.”

18 Therefore thus says the LORD concerning Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah:

“They shall not lament for him, saying,
    ‘Ah, my brother!’ or ‘Ah, sister!’
They shall not lament for him, saying,
    ‘Ah, lord!’ or ‘Ah, his majesty!’
19 With the burial of a donkey he shall be buried,
    dragged and dumped beyond the gates of Jerusalem.”

20 “Go up to Lebanon, and cry out,
    and lift up your voice in Bashan;
cry out from Abarim,
    for all your lovers are destroyed.
21 I spoke to you in your prosperity,
    but you said, ‘I will not listen.’
This has been your way from your youth,
    that you have not obeyed my voice.
22 The wind shall shepherd all your shepherds,
    and your lovers shall go into captivity;
then you will be ashamed and confounded
    because of all your evil.
23 O inhabitant of Lebanon,
    nested among the cedars,
how you will be pitied when pangs come upon you,
    pain as of a woman in labor!”

24 “As I live, declares the LORD, though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, were the signet ring on my right hand, yet I would tear you off 25 and give you into the hand of those who seek your life, into the hand of those of whom you are afraid, even into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and into the hand of the Chaldeans. 26 I will hurl you and the mother who bore you into another country, where you were not born, and there you shall die. 27 But to the land to which they will long to return, there they shall not return.”

28 Is this man Coniah a despised, broken pot,
    a vessel no one cares for?
Why are he and his children hurled and cast
    into a land that they do not know?
29 O land, land, land,
    hear the word of the LORD!
30 Thus says the LORD:
“Write this man down as childless,
    a man who shall not succeed in his days,
for none of his offspring shall succeed
    in sitting on the throne of David
    and ruling again in Judah.”

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Jeremiah now has a message specifically for Shallum and the other sons of Josiah.  Shallum  tried to take the throne from his father, Josiah, and was forced into exile.  The LORD says that Shallum will never see the Land again, and he will die in exile in the country where he is hiding.

Then the LORD gives some guidelines to all the other sons of Josiah not to walk in their brother's footsteps.  No one should try to establish his house (take the throne) through acts of unrighteousness like murder and rebellion.  They are to tell the truth and are to pay their laborers their wages they are due.  Just because they live in a palace does not make them a king.  They have to have a heart to lead and govern the people, to protect the innocent, and to faithfully execute the Law of the LORD.  The riches of this generation did not save them from calamity and catastrophe.  The LORD is not impressed by our wealth or the size of the house that we live in.  He wants our hearts.

No one will lament the passing of these men who live in palaces.  They will receive the same funeral rites as a donkey and there will be no one left to mourn or weep for them.  This judgment that is coming will spread as far as Lebanon where the kings built their cedar palaces like Solomon before them did.  They will not be safe there either.  The LORD tried to warn them, but they would not listen to Him.  Any of them who try to flee will die.  Any who try to fight will die.  Those who surrender will live, but will be taken into captivity and will never see the Holy Land again, but their children and grandchildren might.

​Jehoiakim, the current king, will have the throne taken away from him, and he will be given into the hands of the Babylonians.  He and his mother will be taken back to Babylon to be paraded about as a sign of how Babylon had won and Judah had been conquered.  The LORD promises that he too will never return to the Land.

That leaves his son Coniah.  The LORD says that he is as worthless as a broken piece of pottery.  He and his children will also be forced into exile and though he may have children, none of them will ever sit on the throne, so it will be as if he had no children to be in his bloodline.  This is an important prophecy--no one from this line will ever sit on the throne of David ever again!  How then could Jesus be the rightful king who will sit on the throne of David if Joseph of Nazareth was from this exact line? Because Jesus is not the son of Joseph!  He is only the son of Mary.   I've written about this already, but where it looks like the LORD has broken His covenant with David, He has not.  Jesus, the Son of David, will sit on the throne of His father David and His throne will be established with all righteousness, and He will reign forever and ever!