Jeremiah 32:16-35--Jeremiah Prays for Understanding

Jeremiah 32:16-35
English Standard Version

Jeremiah Prays for Understanding
16 “After I had given the deed of purchase to Baruch the son of Neriah, I prayed to the LORD, saying: 17 ‘Ah, Lord God! It is you who have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm! Nothing is too hard for you. 18 You show steadfast love to thousands, but you repay the guilt of fathers to their children after them, O great and mighty God, whose name is the LORD of hosts, 19 great in counsel and mighty in deed, whose eyes are open to all the ways of the children of man, rewarding each one according to his ways and according to the fruit of his deeds. 20 You have shown signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, and to this day in Israel and among all mankind, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day. 21 You brought your people Israel out of the land of Egypt with signs and wonders, with a strong hand and outstretched arm, and with great terror. 22 And you gave them this land, which you swore to their fathers to give them, a land flowing with milk and honey. 23 And they entered and took possession of it. But they did not obey your voice or walk in your law. They did nothing of all you commanded them to do. Therefore you have made all this disaster come upon them. 24 Behold, the siege mounds have come up to the city to take it, and because of sword and famine and pestilence the city is given into the hands of the Chaldeans who are fighting against it. What you spoke has come to pass, and behold, you see it. 25 Yet you, O Lord God, have said to me, “Buy the field for money and get witnesses”—though the city is given into the hands of the Chaldeans.’”

26 The word of the LORD came to Jeremiah: 27 “Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh. Is anything too hard for me? 28 Therefore, thus says the LORD: Behold, I am giving this city into the hands of the Chaldeans and into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he shall capture it. 29 The Chaldeans who are fighting against this city shall come and set this city on fire and burn it, with the houses on whose roofs offerings have been made to Baal and drink offerings have been poured out to other gods, to provoke me to anger. 30 For the children of Israel and the children of Judah have done nothing but evil in my sight from their youth. The children of Israel have done nothing but provoke me to anger by the work of their hands, declares the LORD. 31 This city has aroused my anger and wrath, from the day it was built to this day, so that I will remove it from my sight 32 because of all the evil of the children of Israel and the children of Judah that they did to provoke me to anger—their kings and their officials, their priests and their prophets, the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 33 They have turned to me their back and not their face. And though I have taught them persistently, they have not listened to receive instruction. 34 They set up their abominations in the house that is called by my name, to defile it. 35 They built the high places of Baal in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, to offer up their sons and daughters to Molech, though I did not command them, nor did it enter into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.

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You may recognize part of Jeremiah's prayer as songs of adoration that you have sung, possibly never knowing they are penned by Jeremiah thousands of years ago.  Let's examine some of the things Jeremiah adores about the LORD before he makes his request for understanding.  First, the LORD is the maker of heaven and earth and all that is in them.  With a might hand and an outstretched arm (normally a phrase we think of when referring to the power He used to redeem Israel from their slavery in Egypt by way of the Ten Plagues), and it was by the word of His mouth that everything came from nothing.  "Without Him was not anything made that was made."  Next, He is merciful to those He loves.  He forgives our iniquity, yet He is also just and will not let the wicked go unpunished.  He will pour out His blessings for a thousand generations, yet He will only visit the sins of the father to the third or fourth generation (sin has generational consequences, but the LORD is quick to forgive and to break the cycle of sin and start fresh and start blessing a family once again if they turn back to Him).  He is great and mighty, the Lord of Angel Armies, the LORD over all of the stars of the heavens.  He commands all the forces of the heavens

As we already discussed, He saved His people out of Egypt and made them a nation unto Himself with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.  He worked great signs and wonders for the whole world to see and understand who He is and how much He loved His people.  He chose a name for Himself when Moses asked who should he tell Pharaoh that represented.  He said, "I AM who I AM.  Tell him that I AM has sent you."  We often translate this name as LORD in most places thereafter in the Old Testament.  We will see Jesus use this name for Himself several times in the New Testament with His "I AM" statements that He makes (mostly in the book of John), when He responds to the guards coming to arrest Him in the Garden and He says "I AM" and they fall over like dead men, and He says, "Before Abraham was, I AM."  The Jews understood all of these statements to be Jesus claiming this identity as His own and often sought to kill Him for making such claims to deity, so do not let anyone tell you that Jesus did not claim to be God--He also says very clearly that anyone who has seen Him has seen the Father and that "I and the Father are one."

The LORD didn't just deliver His people from something; He delivered them to something--a Land flowing with milk and honey.  The Promised Land that we know call the land of Judea and Samaria, the land of Israel, the biblical land of Canaan.  The LORD defeated the peoples that lived in that land and gave it as an eternal inheritance to His people.  However, even with the Law and the LORD's constant presence, it was not enough for the people to be transformed and made into the image of God.  They were still living like their sinful father Adam.  They did all kinds of wicked things and turned towards all kinds of idols.  Now Jeremiah sees that this siege is the culmination of many years of rebellion against the LORD.  We might say "The chickens have come home to roost."  The LORD has been patient with His people for many, many years, but it is time for Him to correct them for their good and His glory.

​Jeremiah concludes the first part of his prayer with a statement of submission that whatever the LORD decrees, prophesies and ordains is right.  Jeremiah doesn't need to understand it to submit to it.  That takes a lot of faith.  However, that doesn't stop Jeremiah from admitting that he doesn't understand and asking for additional understanding.  That leads us into the second part of his prayer.  Buying a piece of land that you know you will never get to enjoy right before the city is overrun by enemy forces to be destroyed and burned with fire doesn't make much sense at all.  Jeremiah was a little too focused on the present to see that the LORD was giving people hope for the future.

The LORD comes to Jeremiah and speaks to Him asking rhetorically, "Is anything too hard for Me?"  Yes, the LORD was giving this city in the hands of the Chaldeans, the Babylonians, and Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon.  Yes, they are going to burn everything with fire and destroy all the houses where people have been making offerings to their idols an their rooftops (the roofs were flat and the highest point they could get to in their house, and people believed they needed to be higher in elevation to get closer to the gods).  The LORD speaks of Israel and Judah like He spoke of the people from before the Flood.  They are continually doing what is evil.  There is no longer any distinction between the nations of the world and the people that were called by His Name.  In fact, in many cases, the children of Israel and Judah are acting worse than their pagan, Gentile neighbors.

Every official and leader had been corrupted.  The prophets, priests, kings, Levites, and all the government officials.  All of them are leading people into sin instead of keeping people from sin.  They are trying to suppress the Word of the LORD instead of helping to spread it.  They are persecuting the LORD's prophets and putting them to death.  They have turned their back on the LORD and abandoned Him.  He had not abandoned them.  The LORD offered them help and salvation if they would only repent and turn away from their wickedness and idolatry, but they rejected the LORD's message and His messengers and instead tried to turn to other nations like Egypt and Syria for assistance (always to their detriment).  No man or nation can ever provide the kind of help or salvation that can only come from the mighty hand and outstretched arm of the LORD.

The kings, priests and prophets have made the Temple into an abomination.  They filled it with all kinds of idols from other nations and promoted the worship of these false gods above the worship of the LORD.  They have defiled it.  They have also built altars to Baal and Molech all around the land.  This is contrary to the LORD's will because He knows it will bring harm to His people.

Though Jeremiah has prayed for understanding concerning the deed that he purchased, notice that the LORD never really speaks to that issue directly.  Jeremiah thinks he knows the history of the people, but the LORD reveals that it's actually much worse than even Jeremiah thinks.  However, there is more to the LORD's answer--a message of hope--that we will look at next time.