JEREMIAH CHAPTER 33: I know what people are saying about your falling but I am making a new plan and promise for you, a promise of eternal happiness.
- Vicent Nemeyimana
- January 7, 2015
- Word of Life
This chapter is part of the four chapters we earlier considered as a book of consolation. It is exactly a continuation of the preceding chapter and the message came to Jeremiah when he was still confined in the King’s palace. The Lord started by introducing Himself, who He was and what He was capable of (1-2). God doesn’t introduce Himself as humans do when they want people to recognize how strong they are, but as a confirmation of what people should believe about Him. Whether we know Him or not, He remains God and makes no loss. But what if we misquote Him? What if we fail to recognize His strength? We would be the ones to lose. For such reason and His love for us, He makes it a point to remind us who He is and what He is capable of doing for us.
After His introduction, God advises Judah specifically Jeremiah to pray and get know more than is visible. Before Jeremiah sets in with the prayer, the Lord continues to reveal part of what is hidden: Houses and palaces had been destroyed by dwellers of Judah and Jerusalem to obtain items to fight against or wall off the invading Babylonians but this was useless as it always had been said that fighting against Babylon would bring more harm to the city (They would fight against the enemy only to discover their own houses filling up with bodies of their own people) (3-5).
However, while the above predicament was inescapable, the Lord would bring back His people to their own land after cleansing them and pardoning their sin (s). This promise applied to all the 12 tribes of Israel. While all the evidence showed Jerusalem as a desolate place with no peace and residence for even animals, things would be exactly the opposite when the right time comes and people would sing praises to God because of what He will have done there (6-13). Yeah, everyone can tell a collapsing tycoon, a failing marriage or relationship by observing what is visible to their eyes but there is always a hidden agenda of God’s restoration if we trust him. And while it may be evident by all signs that we are down, God can make us have good times again.
It is important to note that part of that big promise has not yet been realized which makes us believe to see it in the end times or the second coming of Jesus. Verses 14-18 depict Jesus coming from the family of David and being a representative of God’s righteousness and through him the whole of Israel and Judah would be saved. However, we all know that even during Christ’s time here on earth this salvation from oppression by Israel’s enemies didn’t come true. Jesus was born when Israel was under Roman rule and he himself faced the roughness of then kings and emperors, the reason he escaped to Egypt. This vividly tells us that the full salvation of God’s people will happen at the second coming of Jesus.
God went ahead and proved how serious He was with what He promised. In the example of His covenant with day and night, God showed that His covenant would come true just as that with day and night works. Even for those who don’t believe in God, they somehow know that it is a must a day must give to a night. By comparing His promise of restoring Israel and the world to unending happiness via their righteous king who will talk for them and lead the house of priesthood, God convinced even those with little faith or no faith at all in what He was saying that time would make everything come to pass (19-22). God asks Jeremiah what was being talked about Israel and Judah on the streets (not because He didn’t know but to confirm to the prophet and us reading that what happens or what is talked about God’s people on the streets and everywhere is received rightly in God’s ear and He has a plan about it).
Anyway, it is later revealed that people in the nation and around it were all talking about how God had deserted His people and they were a rotten nation with no one caring (verses 23-24). The Lord ends up His message challenging the world and all those who said that He no longer cared about Judah or Israel by reminding them how the night and day, heaven and earth remain in covenant with Him and in the same way He will always be in covenant with the house of David and indeed good times and eternal success will come to His people according to His promise (25-26).
Our today’s focus is verse 24, “Jeremiah, have you heard what the people are saying? They say, ‘The Lord turned away from the two families of Israel and Judah that He chose’. Now they don’t think of my people as a nation anymore”. This verse solely makes the chapter be part of book of consolation. Here God chats with Jeremiah on friendly basis what rumors were being spread about God’s people. It just reminds me those days when everyone condemned us but God offered us mercy and grace. Yeah, the above verse clearly indicates that our God is already aware of the hell we are passing through and He has a plan to make us happy again. You may be having difficult times, people may be talking how your marriage or business is falling, and people might be celebrating the challenges that are harassing you but the Lord never left your side and He is closely part of all events that are happening and He will change the story for you. Please, trust in this eternal grace and love.
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