Devotional Commentary:  Jeremiah 4

Think about it, when there is a good instrument, the product is good. This seems to be the basic mathematics behind verses 1-2 but seemingly more are to it. Jeremiah is not focusing on ethnic Israel or ethnic Judah per se. Look at the logic starting out with Israel that should return, put away the detested things and make a covenant “in truth, in justice and in righteousness” and this will result that the nations will bless themselves in Him (verse 2c). Christians are faithful but does that mean other nations bless themselves in Him without being faithful? They also become faithful and then bless Him because they also became “in Him”. The other view is that spiritual Israel is not ethnic Israel but all nations and this Israel that Jeremiah is talking to, should include all of the faithful remnant among all nations of the world and if they return then all nations will bless themselves in Him. This is a slight nuance difference and Judaism may not be happy with this interpretation. All Jews were circumcised but they lacked circumcision of the heart and thus were spiritually uncircumcised (verse 4) “remove the foreskin of your heart”. This was always the true circumcision that the Lord was longing for. The outward action was just a signal of the inward action. It was not a guarantee of some sort when you had outward circumcision. God wants them to change or otherwise the fire of hell will come and utterly destroy them due to their sins. The meaning is that if they do not circumcise their hearts and believe in God and renounce sins, they will burn in the total exterminating hell to come after the 1000 years still ahead of all of us. People are going to burn because of their unrepented, unforgiven deeds written up in books, if faithful investigated in the Investigative Judgment since 1844 and if not faithful investigated by the saints during the 1000 years before the hell event. God then announces the arrival of Nebuchadnezzar in future through Jeremiah. Due to Judah’s evil they are going to blow a trumpet, a signal of an announcement and then cry aloud to assemble (verse 5a-d). The Lord is not looking for hiding only. He wants a spiritual event and wants them to “lift up a standard towards Zion, seek refuge do not stand” (verse 6a-b). This is not earthly Zion since how can there be refuge in an earthly fortress? This is heavenly Zion where our true refuge is. It is out of Zion that salvation comes and judgment. God is sending out of Zion Nebuchadnezzar “evil from the North and great destruction” (verse 6c-d). The cities will be without inhabitant (verse 7). They will put on sackcloth and wail and lament due to the anger of the Lord (verse 8). At that day the heart of the king, princes and priests will fail (verse 9). Jesus also predicted that at the end of time due to the Little Time of Trouble coming in our times, people will die of heart-attacks. Jeremiah’s reaction came in verse 10: “And I said: Ah Lord Yahweh, surely you have utterly cut[of Egyptian origin sw3 rather than 7^th century CE Arabic origin of the root meaning; thus ‘cutting of head, throat, limbs or tree’ rather than the unbiblical meaning ‘deceive’ from the Arabic] off to this people and to Jerusalem!” Jeremiah knew nothing about 7^th century CE Arabic but he knew Egyptian and since he travelled to Egypt. Many in his days were travelling back and forth from and to Egypt and they picked up many loanwords. The Byzantine period Codex Alexandrinus Greek translators in the time of Constantine were so shocked in the meaning of the verse that they changed the text to read “They said” so that the blame went to God not from the prophet Jeremiah but from the bad people. The problem with our Bible translations here is the superimposition of late semantics (Arabic to explain Hebrew of Jeremiah) over an old root nearly a millennium earlier whereas a contemporary language (Late Egyptian) in Jeremiah’s time had the answer to what it means. The prophets of the Bible never blamed God. This is a gross error on the part of translators to the Bible. Every time this happened the root of the problem is the same: 7^th century Arabic is used to explain difficult Hebrew words ending up in a complete anti-God understanding of the sentence in the Bible. This is the weakness of our Hebrew Dictionaries today. We know the Egyptian is the true meaning of the word rather than Arabic since the verse continues to tell us that: “to say, peace shall be to you and the sword touched unto the life/soul”. To the remnant of God “in the direction of the daughter of My people” (verse 11) shall come “in that time = baeth hahi” in 586, nearly 39 years later, “a wind too strong for this” meaning Nebuchadnezzar (verse 12). When Jeremiah saw the vision of fast approach (verse 13) he said: “Woe to us for we are ruined”. Jeremiah started to preach and plea for conversion: “Wash your heart from evil” (verse 14). The Holy Spirit does this. Jeremiah is not only seeing the future of Judah in the times of Nebuchadnezzar but from later verses down in this chapter he also saw our own times. He wanted them to proclaim in Dan, Mount Ephraim and in Jerusalem that “besiegers come from a far country” (verse 16c). They surround them (verse 17a) because of their rebellion against the Lord (verse 17b). The Lord is speaking from verse 18. Their evil brought this upon them, says the Lord (verse 18). God is in anguish because of His remnant for He says “My soul, my soul! I [the Lord] am in anguish! Oh my heart. My heart is pounding in me I cannot be silent”  (verse 19). The Lord heard the sound of trumpet which means war is close (verse 19f-g) and here we have the theology of God Who does not want evil to come over His remnant. The Lord is asking an ad-matay question which is the question asked between angels in Daniel 8:13with the 2300 years prophecy: “How long?” (verse 21). The Lord’s remnant are foolish “they knew Me not”. This phrase shows us that it is not Jeremiah but the Lord speaking from verses 18-22. It says in verse 17 that the Lord is speaking. Then Jeremiah had a vision of greater proportions of the Second Coming of Christ from verses 23-26. He saw the earth was formless and void (like before Creation). There was no light, mountains quake (verse 24), no people were on earth (since Christ took the remnant and faithful after Resurrection to heaven the bad people died and only Satan is left here). “I looked and behold there was no man” (verse 25). Everything was a wilderness (verse 26) “before the Lord before His fierce anger” (verse 26c) at His Second Coming with the evil. At start of the Millennium “says the Lord the whole land shall be a desolation” (verse 27) and the Lord will hold His executive powers back “and I will not make complete destruction” (verse 27c). The time of the Hell is after the Millennium and then is complete destruction. This is not. The Lord has purposed this and will not change His mind (verse 28c-d). Then Jeremiah’s mind went back to the time before the Second Coming of the Lord when the remnant at the end time will still be on earth and he saw a vision of what will happen then in the Little Time of Trouble before the door of Mercy closes. At the sound of military people fled the cities and migrated (verse 29). It is the greatest migration in history since “every city is forsaken”. Christ said that at the end-time the remnant will leave the cities. Preterists interpreted Christ’s words to mean the war of the Romans around 70 AD. Not so. It is in the context of end-time events. The desolate evil wants to negotiate with evil: fashion dressing (verse 30b); decorations (verse 30c); eye-paint to attract the lovers (verse 30d) it will not help: “They seek your life”. Ellen White’s counsels against excessive make-up and ornaments from these verses are in good standing with Jeremiah’s negative view of these actions. The licentious fool is participating in these actions. Jeremiah then heard the remnant cry “cry of the daughter of Zion” (verse 31c) and the anguish like a woman in labor and she says: “Woe is me, for I faint before murderers” (verse 31e). Jeremiah and God know that just when the night is at its darkest in history, the Morning of His Second Coming will take place.