In these studies in the second half of the book of Jeremiah,  we will see God’s word coming through Jeremiah and being rejected again and again. We will see the difficulties of Jeremiah but also the way he is saved through it all. Jeremiah is God’s reporter on the spot, in the midst of one of the most tumultuous periods in Israel’s history.

For those who may wish to ‘study’ this chapter, and the particular theme, as with studies elsewhere, each passage has a four-Part approach to help you take in and think further about what you have read on the main Bible page.

To the Exiles (1)

Jer 44:1-14

This word came to Jeremiah concerning all the Jews living in Lower Egypt—in Migdol, Tahpanhes and Memphis—and in Upper Egypt: ² “This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: You saw the great disaster I brought on Jerusalem and on all the towns of Judah. Today they lie deserted and in ruins ³ because of the evil they have done. They aroused my anger by burning incense to and worshiping other gods that neither they nor you nor your ancestors ever knew. ⁴ Again and again I sent my servants the prophets, who said, ‘Do not do this detestable thing that I hate!’ ⁵ But they did not listen or pay attention; they did not turn from their wickedness or stop burning incense to other gods. ⁶ Therefore, my fierce anger was poured out; it raged against the towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem and made them the desolate ruins they are today.

⁷ “Now this is what the Lord God Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Why bring such great disaster on yourselves by cutting off from Judah the men and women, the children and infants, and so leave yourselves without a remnant? ⁸ Why arouse my anger with what your hands have made, burning incense to other gods in Egypt, where you have come to live? You will destroy yourselves and make yourselves a curse and an object of reproach among all the nations on earth. ⁹ Have you forgotten the wickedness committed by your ancestors and by the kings and queens of Judah and the wickedness committed by you and your wives in the land of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem? ¹⁰ To this day they have not humbled themselves or shown reverence, nor have they followed my law and the decrees I set before you and your ancestors.

¹¹ “Therefore this is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: I am determined to bring disaster on you and to destroy all Judah. ¹² I will take away the remnant of Judah who were determined to go to Egypt to settle there. They will all perish in Egypt; they will fall by the sword or die from famine. From the least to the greatest, they will die by sword or famine. They will become a curse and an object of horror, a curse and an object of reproach. ¹³ I will punish those who live in Egypt with the sword, famine and plague, as I punished Jerusalem. ¹⁴ None of the remnant of Judah who have gone to live in Egypt will escape or survive to return to the land of Judah, to which they long to return and live; none will return except a few fugitives.”

A. Find Out

1. To where had the Jews spread? v.1
2. What example does the Lord put before them? v.2
3. What had been the main sin of Israel? v.3,5b
4. What were they doing now? v.8
5. What were they NOT doing? v.10
6. What was the Lord therefore going to do? v.11-14

B. Think:

1. Why had Israel in the past had no excuse and not been able to say, “But we didn’t know!”?
2. How should the consequences of Israel’s past sin been etched on the minds of the remnant?
3. How, in your own words, had Judah’s remnant become in Egypt?

C. Comment:

As we said yesterday, merely because the Jews are out of their land, it doesn’t mean they are out of God’s sight.  Just as God’s word had come again and again to Israel and Judah in the land, so it now comes to the remnant in Egypt.

The Lord could never be accused of ignoring His people there in Egypt. He warns and warns them again. His longing is that they repent and return to Him and to their own land,  but they will have none of it. The Lord reminds them of the clearly visible consequences of their own people’s foolishness; a desolate land, deserted and in ruins, all because the people turned to idols and forsook the One Holy God.

And now as He looks on His people, the Lord sees this people becoming just like the Egyptians. This holy people have become idol worshippers again.  They have become just like their neighbours, the Egyptians. There is now nothing to differentiate them from these unbelieving, godless pagans.

D. Application:

1. Do we learn from history, from our past mistakes and the mistakes of our family or nation?
2. Thank the Lord for His mercy that reached out again and again to His people, and still reaches out to us today.

To the Exiles (2)

Jer 44:15-23

¹⁵ Then all the men who knew that their wives were burning incense to other gods, along with all the women who were present—a large assembly—and all the people living in Lower and Upper Egypt, said to Jeremiah, ¹⁶ “We will not listen to the message you have spoken to us in the name of the Lord! ¹⁷ We will certainly do everything we said we would: We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven and will pour out drink offerings to her just as we and our ancestors, our kings and our officials did in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. At that time we had plenty of food and were well off and suffered no harm. ¹⁸ But ever since we stopped burning incense to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have had nothing and have been perishing by sword and famine.”

¹⁹ The women added, “When we burned incense to the Queen of Heaven and poured out drink offerings to her, did not our husbands know that we were making cakes impressed with her image and pouring out drink offerings to her?”

²⁰ Then Jeremiah said to all the people, both men and women, who were answering him, ²¹ “Did not the Lord remember and call to mind the incense burned in the towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem by you and your ancestors, your kings and your officials and the people of the land? ²² When the Lord could no longer endure your wicked actions and the detestable things you did, your land became a curse and a desolate waste without inhabitants, as it is today. ²³ Because you have burned incense and have sinned against the Lord and have not obeyed him or followed his law or his decrees or his stipulations, this disaster has come upon you, as you now see.”

A. Find Out

1. Who responded to Jeremiah? v.15
2. What did they say they would NOT do? v.16
3. What did they say they would do? v.17
4. What had happened when they had stopped? v.18
5. How do the women spread or share their guilt? v.19
6. When had the Lord acted against them? v.22

B. Think:

1. How would you describe these men and women?
2. How are they an example of twisted thinking?
3. How does Jeremiah infer that the Lord hadn’t acted hastily in respect of them?

C. Comment:

We have in this passage a clear illustration of the rebellion and twisted thinking of sinful men.  That they are sinful is very obvious. First of all they are worshipping idols. They are godless. This is their first sin.  Within that the men were not taking the lead they should have been taking and were following the wrong behaviour of their wives without correcting them.  Next they refuse to listen to God’s word. They refuse to accept the truth. That is the second sin of these people.

Following this we now see how they justify themselves by twisted thinking. They saw it as blessing coming when they sacrificed to an idol, which stopped when they stopped sacrificing..

Jeremiah indicates that the Lord had held back judgement  and given them time to repent before He had moved against them. Their “blessing” had stopped, not because they stopped sacrificing but because God brought judgement on their sin!  THAT had been the truth! Godless people set their hearts against God and then justify their actions by crooked thinking.  The mind of an unrepentant sinner is deceived and confused.  Sin produces stupidity!

D. Application:

1. Do we allow activities into our lives that God forbids?
2. Do we refuse to listen to God and go on to justify ourselves with crooked thinking?

To the Exiles (3)

Jer 44:24-30

²⁴ Then Jeremiah said to all the people, including the women, “Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah in Egypt. ²⁵ This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: You and your wives have done what you said you would do when you promised, ‘We will certainly carry out the vows we made to burn incense and pour out drink offerings to the Queen of Heaven.’

“Go ahead then, do what you promised! Keep your vows! ²⁶ But hear the word of the Lord, all you Jews living in Egypt: ‘I swear by my great name,’ says the Lord, ‘that no one from Judah living anywhere in Egypt will ever again invoke my name or swear, “As surely as the Sovereign Lord lives.” ²⁷ For I am watching over them for harm, not for good; the Jews in Egypt will perish by sword and famine until they are all destroyed. ²⁸ Those who escape the sword and return to the land of Judah from Egypt will be very few. Then the whole remnant of Judah who came to live in Egypt will know whose word will stand—mine or theirs.

²⁹ “‘This will be the sign to you that I will punish you in this place,’ declares the Lord, ‘so that you will know that my threats of harm against you will surely stand.’ ³⁰ This is what the Lord says: ‘I am going to deliver Pharaoh Hophra king of Egypt into the hands of his enemies who want to kill him, just as I gave Zedekiah king of Judah into the hands of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, the enemy who wanted to kill him.’”

A. Find Out

1. To whom did Jeremiah speak? v.24
2. What vow did he first mention? v.25
3. What was his second vow? v.26
4. What would the Lord do with them? v.27
5. How many would escape? v.28
6. How would the Lord do it? v.29, 30

B. Think:

1. What sort of vows do people make today?
2. What does the vow of the people of Judah show about them?
3. What does the Lord’s vow show about the way He feels about this situation?

C. Comment:

This is one of those passages in Scripture which bring a sense of immense seriousness. The Lord is pronouncing the death penalty on this foolish people. The reasons for it are obvious.

These people, both men and women, have vowed (made a solemn commitment) to worship idols, to worship demons. They are utterly committed to sin, to rebelling against God and giving themselves over to Satan.  For them there was only a future of evil, and that while they still carried the name ‘Israel’, the people of God.

We should always remember that everybody has to die sometime. The fact that it may be sooner than later should not horrify us.  God knows those who will repent and those who will not, and He alone can decide when their life should end.

So often when a person gives himself over to evil in this manner, the Lord knows there is no hope (although NO ONE is beyond His salvation), and the sooner might as well be instead of the later. He, in His perfect wisdom, has the right to choose when.

D. Application:

1. Do we understand the awfulness of sin and the hardness that settles in the heart of some people?
2. Are we able to accept the Lordship of Christ when it comes to deciding who dies when?