Jeremiah 11:18-23

Hey, hey, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This morning we're going to finish up Jeremiah chapter 11 and kind of does Jeremiah just get off scot-free, giving these hard prophecies and telling people they're not keeping his covenant or God's covenant? We'll find out. Let's go ahead and have some coffee. We'll pray and we'll get into God's Word. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for your word. We pray, God, that you would please help us as we read your word to understand it. You are a good God. You are merciful and loving. You've given us your word in a language we can understand. So, God, we pray that we would be able to understand it, that we would know it, and that you would please bless it to our hearts and let us live it in our lives. In Jesus' name, amen. Here we go. We are at Joshua chapter 11, beginning at verse 18.
Now the Lord gave me knowledge of it, and I know it, for you showed me their doings. But I was like a docile lamb brought to the slaughter, and I did not know that they had devised schemes against me, saying, Let us destroy the tree with its fruit, and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be remembered no more. But, O LORD of hosts, you who judge righteously, testing the mind and the heart, let me see your vengeance on them, for to you I have revealed my cause.
Therefore thus says Jehovah concerning the men of Anathoth, who seek your life, saying, Do not prophesy in the name of Jehovah, lest you die by our hand. Therefore thus says Jehovah of hosts, Behold, I will punish them. The young men shall die by the sword. Their sons and their daughters shall die by famine, and there shall be no remnant of them. For I will bring catastrophe on the men of Anathoth, even the year of the punishment."
Well, we need to ask ourselves, A, what's this about? B, what's the best verse to summarize this? And C, what are we called to do? Well, what's this about? Jeremiah becomes aware that the men of his own town hate him, want him dead. And they're mad. I mean, all these things about, right, they've made incense to Baal and stuff like that.
Ellie and I talked last time about why they would do this, right? They're just dreaming up from their own hearts, from their own minds, the imaginations of their own doing. They're creating ceremonies and doing stuff and it's never been in the Lord's mind. He's never told them to do this. And where was this directed at? The other priests.
If we went all the way back to Jeremiah chapter 1, we would find out right there that these were Jeremiah's own kinsmen. The words of Jeremiah, the son of Hilkiah, of the priests who were in Anathoth, in the land of Benjamin. Jeremiah's criticizing uncles, great-uncles, cousins, first cousins, second cousins, third cousins, his family members. He's telling them, you're leading the people in lies and God's going to judge the nation because of it, because you've broken His commandments, broken His covenant.
And what's their response to this? It is not, oh no, we've sinned. It's not grief and hatred of their sin in their hearts. It's not being humble and turning to God. No, we've got to kill that guy. We've got to tell him to shut up or we're going to take him out. That's what they're doing here. They've schemed, right? Let us destroy the tree and its fruit and let us cut him off from the land of the living. that his name may be remembered no more, right? They're gonna throw him in a shallow grave without a tombstone so nobody remembers him. And he cries out, Lord, take vengeance. You test the mind, you test the heart, right, in verse 20. You are the Lord of hosts. You're Adonai Tzavahot, right? You are the God of armies. And so, Lord, you judge between me and them.
And that's where he's told them to repent, and now instead of repenting, they're digging in their heels and plotting to kill him. And so he prays this one-verse imprecatory prayer against them. We may be uncomfortable with that type of thing, but I know people, I know people in other countries, and even in this country, who they'll cry out to the Lord, Lord, convert them or stop them. And that's what He's saying here. He's preached them to convert. He's preached them to repent.
And they won't. So it's His response. God stopped them. Stopped them from these schemes. And so He speaks to them the answer that the Lord gives. That's what happens in verse 20 and 22 and 23. He says, you're going to bear your year of punishment. The Lord is going to visit you for your iniquities. So, what's this section about? Jeremiah becomes aware of their schemes to kill him.
I think in my Bible for the best verse, I think I would underline verse 19 in my Bible. That's what I would underline, but I could be convinced to underline other things. So let me know down in the comments, what would you underline in your Bible as the best verse to summarize this? Well, ask, seek, calling.
What are we called to do? This is one of the difficult parts in our lives where we have to love our neighbor as ourselves. If our enemy slaps us on the cheek, what do we do? We turn and we let them strike us on the other one. They tell us to walk one mile, we go another.
We do everything we can to live at peace with all men so long as it depends upon us, but especially in the household of God. when there are people who are twisting God's word, when there are people who are taking God's name and blaspheming it with their idolatry, there's a point at which a prophet has to say something and his life may even be in danger.
So, you may have to say something. It may be to your pastor. It may be to me someday. There may be a day in which I'm saying something is not according to God's Word and you I hope you as Bereans will go and if you find that this is not so that you come and you bring it to me you say Pastor this is wrong. This is not just a disagreeing on some application or some minutiae, but you're getting the gospel wrong You're introducing idolatry. I hope that the Holy Spirit will fill you with courage to do such a thing slowly and repeatedly and begging. But eventually there may come a day where you have to say, no more. And the abuse of justice in your schemes are wrong.
There are far too many churches in the world where there are false gospels being preached. Elders, pastors, bishops, apostles, whatever they want to call themselves, who are abusing God's sheep, leading people astray and no one holds them to account. And yet there are others in other churches where the pastor is preaching faithfully and instead the pastor gets ejected, the pastor gets criticized, the elder who's holding firm to the truth gets thrown under the bus, pushed out of his office, May it never be. May we be those who go to God's Word, seek His truth, hold on to that, because we love God above all else. Make no doubt about it, these other priests of Anathoth were committing iniquity, trying to kill Jeremiah, threatening his life. That was sinful and wrong. that was unrighteous, oppressive, and evil.
May we be on the lookout for such things, even in our communities, even in our churches. Let's pray. Father, we plead with you that you would please help us, because there may come times of persecution. Lord, we know that Jesus said very similar things As Jeremiah said, and yet they crucified you, the very Son of God, the one in whom there was no darkness. And so, Father, we pray that if they hated you, that your Spirit would help us to know that they may also hate us. That doesn't keep us from feeling hurt. Lord, we pray that we would be able to cry out to you. Just as we hear Christ's words in the Psalms, And as we heard Jeremiah's words today.
But God, we pray that we would be ordered by a higher commitment and principle and love. Lord, that we would love you, even though it may cost us dearly. Give us strength, Lord, we pray. In Jesus' name, amen. May the Lord bless you. May you walk in the joy and peace of Jesus Christ, despite any headwinds that may try to buffet against you. May you have an anchor for your soul in the hope of Christ. I'll see you next time. Bye.