Jeremiah 27:17
Do not listen to them. Serve the king of Babylon and live! Why should this city become a ruin?
Sermons
Divine Judgments not to be ResistedA.F. Muir Jeremiah 27:1-22














A conference of ambassadors from neighboring nations had been held at Zedekiah's court to consider plans of revolt against Nebuchadnezzar. The king himself and a patriotic party were bent upon resistance. This movement Jeremiah checked at its very outset by his symbolical warning.

I. GOD IS RULER OF ALL THE KINGDOMS OF THE EARTH. He made them, and controls their destinies. Of the earth he says, "I have given it unto whom it seemed meet unto me." His control over human interests, possessions, and destinies is absolute and unlimited.

II. EVEN THE UNGODLY MAY BE INSTRUMENTS OF HIS PURPOSES. "Nebuchadnezzar, my servant," - a remarkable title when applied to a heathen prince. The character of the authorities, the agents, and the instrumentalities by which we are opposed is not in itself a reason for resisting them if they are evidently of Divine appointment. In such a case we should be fighting against God. Moral evil is ever to be resisted and witnessed against, but that which God appoints must be acknowledged and submitted to.

III. IN SUCH CASES CIRCUMSTANCES WILL CLEARLY SHOW WHETHER THE APPOINTMENT IS OF GOD OR NOT, AND NOW WE MUST BE GUIDED IN OUR CONDUCT. The advice of the prophet is not to be interpreted as an expression of mere political prudence. It was the moral significance of Nebuchadnezzar's supremacy to which he appealed. In default of revelation our own conscience and common sense must be our guides.

1. In cases of unmistakable Divine dispensations the law of submission is clearly taught. Of this class is the rule of submission to the powers that be; of cheerful contentment with one's lot in life, so far as it seems beyond our own legitimate control or to be providentially arranged.

2. The ordinary miscellaneous trials and difficulties of life are not to be regarded in this way. Where there is not witness of conscience enjoining submission, energetic effort must be made. The Bible is no book of fatalism. It inculcates self-help, manly fortitude, and believing, intelligent enterprise.

IV. GUIDANCE AND INSTRUCTION MAY BE GRANTED TO MEN EVEN WHILST UNDER DIVINE DISCIPLE.

1. Injunctions. To be punished does not mean to be cast off; quite the contrary. And therefore, if there be any gracious purpose in the dispensation, it is well that it should be explained. False prophets have foretold favorable turns of fortune with mischievous effect. These must be contradicted, and their tendency expend. The Bible is full of instruction to the perplexed in all ages, and the Spirit of God still speaks to the hearts of his children.

2. Signs. Sometimes these will be of one kind, sometimes of another. Here a crucial test was proposed, viz. the challenge to the false prophets to bring back the vessels of the temple from Babylon. If God heard their prayer, then it would appear that their advice was sound. Signs will never be wanting to those who earnestly seek to know God's will

3. These are to be sought through prayer and waiting upon God. - M.

When Jeremiah had made an end of speaking all that the Lord had commanded him, the people took him, saying, Thou shalt surely die.
I. THE TRUE PROPHET HAS A STERN MESSAGE TO DELIVER (4-7). If they ally themselves with Egypt, the Temple will be made desolate, as Shiloh had been destroyed by the Assyrians at the deportation of Israel after the fall of Samaria, Jerusalem will become a curse to all nations (will be recognised by all nations as having fallen by the curse of God). To prophesy smooth things in a sinful world is to be false to God. How often does even our blessed Lord denounce sin, and remind men of the wrath of God for it! (Matthew 11:21-24; Matthew 12:41, 42; Matthew 23:31-38, &c.)

II. THE TRUE PROPHET MAY NOT "DIMINISH A WORD" OF GOD'S MESSAGE, HOWEVER UNPOPULAR, OR UNPLEASANT, OR PERSONAL.

1. This message referred to the public policy of the nation. The morality of a nation as imperative as that of an individual

2. Other messages assail the sins of classes, from the king to the humblest citizen.

III. THE TRUE PROPHET WILL SPEAK FEARLESSLY.

IV. THE TRUE PROPHET IS PROMISED THE SUPPORT OF GOD.

V. THE TRUE PROPHET NEVER WAS AND NEVER CAN BE POPULAR, BUT MUST RAISE UP ENEMIES AGAINST HIMSELF.

IV. THE TRUE PROPHET WILL SPEAK PEACE AS WELL AS WRATH IF MEN REPENT.

(J. Cunningham Geikie, D. D.)

"The Lord sent me to prophesy against this house." In this apology of the prophet thus answering for himself with a heroic spirit, five noble virtues, fit for a martyr, are by an expositor observed.

1. His prudence in alleging his Divine mission.

2. His charity in exhorting his enemies to repent.

3. His humility in saying, "Behold I am in your hand."

4. His magnanimity and freedom of speech in telling them that God would revenge his death.

5. His spiritual security and fearlessness of death in so good a cause and with so good a conscience.

(John Trapp.)

One thousand eight hundred years ago an aged saint was being led into Rome by ten rough Roman soldiers, to be thrown to the wild beasts in the amphitheatre. Can you imagine anything more dreary and deplorable? Was he unhappy? Did he count cruelty and martyrdom as evil? No. In one of the seven letters that he wrote on his way, he says: "Come fire and iron, come rattling of wild beasts, cutting and mangling and wrenching of my bones, come hacking of my limbs, come crushing of my whole body, come cruel tortures of the devil to assail me! Only be it mine to attain to Jesus Christ! What are those words of St. Ignatius but an echo of the apostle's, "What things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss that I may win Christ"? How well the early Christians understood these things by which we opportunists, cringing cowards, effeminate time-servers, as most of us are in this soft. sensuous, hypocritical age, have so utterly forgotten!

(Dean Farrar.).

People
Ammonites, Jeconiah, Jehoiachin, Jehoiakim, Jeremiah, Josiah, Nebuchadnezzar, Zedekiah, Zidon
Places
Ammon, Babylon, Jerusalem, Moab, Sidon, Tyre
Topics
Attention, Babylon, Death, Desolate, Desolation, Hearken, Laid, Listen, Ruin, Servants, Serve, Town, Waste, Wherefore, Yourselves
Outline
1. By the type of bonds and yokes he prophesies the subduing of the neighbor kings
8. He exhorts them to yield, and not to believe the false prophets.
12. The like he does to Zedekiah.
19. He foretells the remnant of the vessels shall be carried to Babylon,

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Jeremiah 27:6-22

     5305   empires

Jeremiah 27:14-17

     5165   listening

Jeremiah 27:14-18

     7774   prophets, false

Library
Jeremiah
The interest of the book of Jeremiah is unique. On the one hand, it is our most reliable and elaborate source for the long period of history which it covers; on the other, it presents us with prophecy in its most intensely human phase, manifesting itself through a strangely attractive personality that was subject to like doubts and passions with ourselves. At his call, in 626 B.C., he was young and inexperienced, i. 6, so that he cannot have been born earlier than 650. The political and religious
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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