Old Testament Core Seminar

Class 21“Jeremiah & Lamentations”

Old Testament Overview 1

Introduction

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• Jeremiah and Lamentations were both by Jeremiah. • All 39 books of the OT come together to tell one story. Context:• The historical context is both complex and easy. – The Babylonians are threatening the Southern Kingdom,

Judah. – As the book progresses, Judah is invaded. – By the time the book closes the people of Judah have been

led away in three waves of exile (in 605, 597, and 586 BC). – After the last wave, the Babylonians razed the city of

Jerusalem to the ground, including Solomon’s great temple. (2 Kings 22-25 and 2 Chronicles 34-36).

• Jeremiah himself lived and prophesied through all of this.

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• Why did God allow this to happen? • The covenant people have been involved in idolatry for decades.

– Worshiping every strange deity from Baal to Molech to “the queen of heaven,”

– Engaging in such acts of “worship” as temple prostitution and child sacrifice.

• Plus open dishonesty, corruption, injustice, adultery, oppression of the helpless, slander, and so on.

• They’d been sent prophets for a long time without repenting.• The people have made shipwreck of the covenant. • Now Jeremiah is announcing the covenant curses that were

written Deuteronomy 27 and 28. • Jeremiah prophecies this destruction, and God’s new way

forward to complete His plan of redemption.

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Theme:• Jeremiah is a big book - no short theme statement can do justice.

– The old covenant has failed because the people were not able to keep it due to their sinful hearts.

– Therefore a new covenant is needed which will involve new hearts for the people of God.

• This focuses on 2 things: the covenant & the hearts of the people.

• Jeremiah questions is, “Why is the covenant broken?”• Early in his book he shows it’s not the covenant’s fault. The

problem lies with the people. • They have not been unable to keep it … • Because they’re hearts are too in love with their sins. • And they are unable to change their own hearts. • The first 28 chapters Jeremiah is very pessimistic. it’s looking

hopeless.

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• The only possible solution is if God changes their hearts and makes them fit, from the inside out, to participate again in the covenant.

• The book is structured in five basic pieces. – The first 29 chapters prophesy God’s judgment against His people. – The break in chapters 30-33 presents a beautiful description of God’s

ultimate solution to this problem: new hearts. – Chapters 34-45 shift back to prophesy the final destruction of Jerusalem. – Chapters 46-51 address the wickedness of the nations, including the

invading Babylonians– Chapter 52 recounts the fulfillment of much of this prophesy: the

invasion and decimation of Judah.

• All together, it amounts to the longest book in the Bible.

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A. Major Themes:1. Breach of Covenant. • Jeremiah God accuses Judah of breaking his covenant. • Read verses 2:9-12. God brings charges against Judah and future

generations for idolatry.• As the book continues, God’s condemnation grows more graphic,

more passionate, and more intense. • He likens Judah’s sin to adultery. “as a wife treacherously

departs from her husband, So have you dealt treacherously with Me, O house of Israel," says the LORD.” (3:20). (unfaithful)

• He likens their sin to prostitution. “… By the roadside you sat waiting for lovers …” (3:2)

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2. Repeated, Widespread Sin. • The breach of covenant was not a one-time event. • It was a repeated habit that had become pervasive.• God gave Israel hundreds of years sending multiple prophets 7:13

• Jeremiah preached for 23 years! 25:3b “this is the twenty-third

year in which the word of the LORD has come to me; and I have spoken to you, rising early and speaking, but you have not listened.”

• Read 15:1! • They listen to false prophets who say “'Peace, peace,' when there

is no peace.” 6:14• Again in 7:8 “You trust in lying words that cannot profit.”• In many churches the word of God is not preached substituting

empty words designed to “scratch itching ears”. • As a result, Christians don’t grow, and churches stagnate.

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3. Total Depravity. • Why this has happened? Its more than just a broken covenant. • Why was the covenant broken? Why couldn’t the people keep it?

• It’s a heart issue - 6:10, “Their ears are closed so they cannot

hear. The word of the LORD is offensive to them.” • They can’t here because they have no desire to - because their

sin is so deep they will not.• Why? Sin is carved, etched, onto the heart! 17:1 • 17:9 is a familiar verse “The heart is deceitful above all things,

And desperately wicked; Who can know it?”• 18:12 God tells Jeremiah what to expect from Judah.• Led by these evil hearts. Sin drives and controls them. Sin is

carved onto our hearts and it binds, limits, and controls and won’t release him!

• Sin has become a slave master, driving and controlling the man and there is no way for man to change his own heart by himself

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4. Proclamation of Judgment. • After God charges Judah - He proclaims judgment. 11:11-12• Interesting … God proclaims judgment and they cry to their gods!

Behold, I will bring a nation against you from afar, O house of Israel," says the LORD. " It is a mighty nation, It is an ancient nation, A nation whose language you do not know, Nor can you understand what they say. And they shall eat up your harvest and your bread, Which your sons and daughters should eat. They shall eat up your flocks and your herds; They shall eat up your vines and your fig trees; They shall destroy your fortified cities, In which you trust, with the sword. 5:15,17

• Here is where Jeremiah gets his reputation. “O daughter of my people, Dress in sackcloth And roll about in ashes! Make mourning as for an only son, most bitter lamentation; For the plunderer will suddenly come upon us.” (6:26). “Speak , "Thus says the LORD: ' Even the carcasses of men shall fall as refuse on the open field, Like cuttings after the harvester, And no one shall gather them.‘” 9:22

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Judah “will be made a wasteland, parched and desolate before me; the whole land will be laid waste because there is no one who cares. Over all the barren heights in the desert destroyers will swarm, for the sword of the LORD will devour from one end of the land to the other; no one will be safe”. 12:11-12God says “I will bring bereavement and destruction on my people, for they have not changed their ways. I will make their widows more numerous than the sand of the sea”. 15:7-8And it goes on, and on, and on, and on—for 30 chapters.

• Hebrews 10:31 says, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” (some translations use dreadful.)

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B. Jeremiah the Prophet. • “Jeremiad” means “long and mournful complaint” used to

describe the words of a pessimist, a purveyor of doom.• 20:9b, “But His word was in my heart like a burning fire Shut up

in my bones; I was weary of holding it back, And I could not.”• 1:9 records his call, “Then the LORD put forth His hand and

touched my mouth, and the LORD said to me: " Behold, I have put My words in your mouth.”

• This is not a pessimist but a man with God’s word in his heart!• Often we think of God’s inspiration as a gentle wind - Jeremiah

experienced it as a driving hurricane, a consuming fire, and irresistible force!

• And God’s words earned Jeremiah enemies. – Ch 26 - a plot against his life by the priests and false prophets – Ch 37 - arrested for treason for prophesying the Babylonians would win.

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– Arrested, beaten, and put on trial for his life because he refused to compromise his message telling the king he would be handed over to the king of Babylon.

• What courage – to tell the king bad news and challenge his judgment, knowing what it would cost him.

• Jeremiah was driven to speak God’s judgment because he loved the word of God and was surrounded by sin.

• Not because he suffered from clinical depression.

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C. The New Covenant: 31:31-37. • Jeremiah is not solely focused on sin and judgment. • In this most harsh of prophets, we see a promise of God’s

continuing plan of redemption. • This is one of the most explicit passages of promise in the Old

Testament prophets. 31:31-34:"Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah --- not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more."

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• In verse 31 God is promising a new covenant. • The problem with the first covenant was not God, nor the

covenant itself, it was the people and their sinful hearts. • The solution was to give them new hearts! • With a wicked, deceitful heart, beyond a cure, and no one can fix

their own heart – only God can intervene and miraculously heal!• Only God can remove a heart of stone and replaces it with a

heart of flesh and writes his law on it. • The difference is that now the law is within the people of God. • It is something they delight in doing! Indeed they love it.• It is only possible because God promises to forgive sin.• God makes a new covenant with his people, forgives theirs sins,

and puts his law into their hearts only through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, which takes away sin once and for all.

• That’s the gospel!

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• Those who’ve trusted in Christ do so because God has given them new hearts.

• … and minds to love Him with, eyes to see and ears to hear the truth, wills and desires that are no longer enslaved to sin but set free .

• Use Jeremiah to understand your own complete inability and unwillingness to follow the law of God apart from Christ.

• Then embrace the good news found in chapter 31.

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D. Judgment Against the Nations and The Destruction of Jerusalem: 46-52.

• Chapters 46-51 are prophecies of judgment against other nations, including Egypt, Philistines, Moab, Ammon, Edom,…

• He condemns the gentile nations for pride, insolence, boasting, foolishness, for mistreating God’s people, for trusting in riches and military power.

• This section ends with a lengthy proclamation of judgment against Babylon itself.

• God used Babylon to exact his punishment on Judah.• Jeremiah was accused of treason for his by prophesy• While being used by God, Babylon is not guiltless. • Babylon is condemned “because you rejoice and are glad, you

who plunder my inheritance,” (NIV 50:11). • Guilty of cruelty, oppression, and murder of God’s people.

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• Therefore Babylon overthrow was “vengeance of the LORD,” (50:15).

• Babylon is God’s “war club to destroy nations” – read 51:20.• Though God judges his people, he will ultimately vindicate them

and judge their oppressors. Read 51:5• Chapter 52 actually records the fulfillment of his main prophecy. • 52:6-7a, 13a: “By the fourth month, on the ninth day of the

month, the famine had become so severe in the city that there was no food for the people of the land. Then the city wall was broken through, and all the men of war fled and went out of the city at night by way of the gate between the two walls…[The Babylonians] burned the house of the LORD and the king's house.

• So Judah went into captivity, away from her land.” • The stay of God’s people in the promised land was seemingly at

an end, and the nation of Israel appeared to have failed. • The judgment of God is inescapable and certain—both for them

and for us.

Introduction - Lamentations

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• Lamentations is right after God has destroyed His own city.• The text is a poem with Jerusalem is personified as a woman

mourning for her lost children and has no one to comfort her.Theme• The message to those left behind after the destruction of the city

We are in mourning because God has done this, even though it’s our fault. Now we need Him to change our hearts, for He will again comfort us.

• The author makes it clear that God has destroyed His city.• It speaks strongly of the sovereignty of God. • It’s the people’s own fault that this has happened. Yet, as with

every prophet, there is hope. • That hope is the prospect of receiving new hearts from God. • It is highly structured as a series of acrostic poems written in a

specific rhythm associated with a lament or a funeral dirge. • Much is lost in translation. Chs 2&4 touch sin – 3 is compassion.

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The City’s Sin and the Judge’s Wrath• In the first poem the author recounts the fall of Jerusalem, and

the sins of the people that brought about God’s judgment. • V1 “How lonely sits the city That was full of people!” he cries.• V5 “Her adversaries have become the master, Her enemies

prosper”. • Worst of all, this desolation is deserved. Read 1:8-9.• The second and fourth poems expand on the themes of sin and

judgment, echoing much of what is in the book of Jeremiah.V2:1,2 “How the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion With a cloud in His anger!” “The Lord has swallowed up and has not pitied All the dwelling places of Jacob.”

• In the fourth poem the author says “The LORD has fulfilled His fury, He has poured out His fierce anger. He kindled a fire in Zion, And it has devoured its foundations.” (4:11).

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The Compassion of God• In chapter 3, the middle of the poem, the theme changes to a

meditation on God’s compassion and goodness. 3:21-26– “This I recall to my mind, Therefore I have hope. Through the LORD's

mercies we are not consumed, Because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. " The LORD is my portion," says my soul, " Therefore I hope in Him!" The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, To the soul who seeks Him. It is good that one should hope and wait quietly For the salvation of the LORD.

• V 3:38-39 speak of God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility.“Is it not from the mouth of the Most High That woe and well-being [calamities and good things ] proceed? Why should a living man complain, A man for the punishment of his sins?

• The author notes that both blessings and curses come from God, but that we are responsible for our sins.

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• The fifth and final poem ends with a recognition of God’s rightful kingship and a plea for his mercy.

• Read 5:19-21.• Even in the midst of God’s most severe judgment, God’s people

may still turn to him in hope, plea for mercy, and look forward to renewal.

• This can be a message of great encouragement and solace in the midst of suffering.