Jeremiah 9:12-26--Jeremiah Grieves for His People

Jeremiah 9:12-26
English Standard Version
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12 Who is the man so wise that he can understand this? To whom has the mouth of the LORD spoken, that he may declare it? Why is the land ruined and laid waste like a wilderness, so that no one passes through? 13 And the LORD says: “Because they have forsaken my law that I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice or walked in accord with it, 14 but have stubbornly followed their own hearts and have gone after the Baals, as their fathers taught them. 15 Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will feed this people with bitter food, and give them poisonous water to drink. 16 I will scatter them among the nations whom neither they nor their fathers have known, and I will send the sword after them, until I have consumed them.”

17 Thus says the LORD of hosts:
“Consider, and call for the mourning women to come;
    send for the skillful women to come;
18 let them make haste and raise a wailing over us,
    that our eyes may run down with tears
    and our eyelids flow with water.
19 For a sound of wailing is heard from Zion:
    ‘How we are ruined!
    We are utterly shamed,
because we have left the land,
    because they have cast down our dwellings.’”

20 Hear, O women, the word of the LORD,
    and let your ear receive the word of his mouth;
teach to your daughters a lament,
    and each to her neighbor a dirge.
21 For death has come up into our windows;
    it has entered our palaces,
cutting off the children from the streets
    and the young men from the squares.
22 Speak: “Thus declares the LORD,
‘The dead bodies of men shall fall
    like dung upon the open field,
like sheaves after the reaper,
    and none shall gather them.’”

23 Thus says the LORD: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, 24 but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.”

25 “Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will punish all those who are circumcised merely in the flesh— 26 Egypt, Judah, Edom, the sons of Ammon, Moab, and all who dwell in the desert who cut the corners of their hair, for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.”

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The LORD is going to remove the blessings of the Mosaic Covenant and add to the people the curses of the Mosaic Covenant because they have broken that covenant over and over again, and taught their children to break it as well.  They have turned to other gods like the Baals.  They have engaged in detestable practices that they call "worship," but the LORD calls abominations.  The Land will become a wilderness and will not produce crops for them.  The food they have to eat will be bitter and the water they have to drink will not be clean and pure.  They will have to flee to other parts of the world and be subjugated to nations that they don't even know yet.  They are concerned with nations like Egypt and Assyria, but the LORD is going to give control over them to nations like Greece and Rome that they know nothing about.

There were professional mourners at that time that would come and wail and mourn, even for people they did not know.  It was assumed if you had more mourners at your funeral that you knew more people and were more important because many people were upset by your death.  It was quite the spectacle.  Jeremiah calls for an all-call for these professional mourners, for there will be much to mourn and many will die.  They will mourn the loss of Jerusalem, the Temple, the Land, and the people.  Not even the children will be spared as there will be dead children n the streets that they will weep over.  The bodies of the men who have fallen will not be buried--they will just be left in the field to decompose and be food for the unclean animals.

Many thought they were wise enough to know all the secrets of the LORD, but none were wise enough to know this without the special revelation that the LORD had given to Jeremiah.  The day is coming when circumcision in the flesh will not save anyone from the LORD's judgment.  The LORD will have a remnant from many of the Gentile nations but He will also see the hearts of the people of Israel and Judah and will see which of them have circumcised their hearts and which have simply had their bodies marked with the sign of the covenant that they had no intention to keep.  This idea of circumcision of the heart will be carried forward in the book of Jeremiah and even into the New Testament to say that the LORD is looking for people's who have been born again and have had changed hearts, spirits, and minds.  Their will and desire has changed.  They are a different kind of "plant" producing a different kind of "fruit."  The LORD is not concerned with mere external appearances.  Circumcision was supposed to remind a man of his identity before God and man, but it become something cultural (just part of being "Jewish" even if you were secular, irreligious or even pagan in your beliefs).  That was not its intent.  God will see the heart and everything that is hidden.  It will all be laid open and bear and may will say "Lord, Lord" on that day, but He will say "Depart from Me you who practice lawlessness.  I never knew you."