Scripture Daily

Context No. 1429 of 4322 · Jeremiah

Context · Reflection

Jeremiah 27:16-22: in context

16Also I spoke to the priests and to all this people, saying, the LORD says, “Don’t listen to the words of your prophets who prophesy to you, saying, ‘Behold, the vessels of the LORD’s house will now shortly be brought again from Babylon;’ for they prophesy a lie to you. 17Don’t listen to them. Serve the king of Babylon, and live. Why should this city become a desolation? 18But if they are prophets, and if the LORD’s word is with them, let them now make intercession to the LORD of Armies, that the vessels which are left in the LORD’s house, in the house of the king of Judah, and at Jerusalem, don’t go to Babylon. 19For the LORD of Armies says concerning the pillars, concerning the sea, concerning the bases, and concerning the rest of the vessels that are left in this city, 20which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon didn’t take when he carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, from Jerusalem to Babylon, and all the nobles of Judah and Jerusalem— 21yes, the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, says concerning the vessels that are left in the LORD’s house, and in the house of the king of Judah, and at Jerusalem: 22‘They will be carried to Babylon, and there they will be, until the day that I visit them,’ says the LORD; ‘then I will bring them up, and restore them to this place.’”

Other prophets are telling the people of Jerusalem a comforting message: the temple vessels that Babylon carried off will soon be brought back; the crisis will be over shortly. Jeremiah calls this a lie. Do not listen to them, he says in the LORD's name; serve the king of Babylon and live; why should this city become a ruin? If they were true prophets, let them pray that the vessels still remaining not go to Babylon too. But the truth, Jeremiah says, is harder: even those remaining vessels will be carried to Babylon, and there they will stay, until the day I visit them, says the LORD; then I will bring them back and restore them to this place.

Two kinds of message are set against each other here, and it is worth learning to tell them apart. The false prophets offered comfort: it will soon be over, the loss will quickly be reversed, no need to endure anything hard. It was what the people wanted to hear, and it was a lie. Jeremiah offered something harder and truer: the trouble is real, it will not be brief, you must submit and endure it, the vessels will go to Babylon and stay there. But notice that Jeremiah's harder word was not without hope; it ended with a genuine promise: until the day I visit them, then I will bring them back and restore them. The difference between the two messages was not that one had hope and the other did not; it was that the false comfort offered a quick, painless escape that would not come, while the true word offered a real but deferred restoration on the far side of a hard endurance. This is a distinction worth holding onto, because the comforting lie is always more attractive in the moment. We would rather be told our trouble will soon be over than that we must endure it; but the message that promises a painless, quick deliverance, when God has not promised it, is a cruelty dressed as kindness, leaving us unprepared for the endurance actually required. The true word is harder to hear, but it does not abandon us to despair; it tells the truth about the difficulty and holds out a real hope in God's own time. Better the hard truth with its genuine promise than the comforting lie with its false one.

Do I prefer the comforting message that my trouble will soon be over to the harder, truer word that I must endure it, and can I tell the difference between a false comfort that offers a painless escape and the true hope that tells the truth and still holds a real promise in God's time?

Sources