Jeremiah 52:6-11: a reflection

6In the fourth month, in the ninth day of the month, the famine was severe in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land. 7Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled, and went out of the city by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which was by the king’s garden. Now the Chaldeans were against the city all around. The men of war went toward the Arabah, 8but the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho; and all his army was scattered from him. 9Then they took the king, and carried him up to the king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath; and he pronounced judgment on him. 10The king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. He also killed all the princes of Judah in Riblah. 11He put out the eyes of Zedekiah; and the king of Babylon bound him in fetters, and carried him to Babylon, and put him in prison until the day of his death.

The end of Jerusalem is grim. After a long siege and famine, the city falls; King Zedekiah tries to flee, is captured, and is brought before the king of Babylon, who kills his sons before his eyes and then blinds him, so that the last thing Zedekiah ever saw was the death of his children. It is a bitter, tragic end, and it did not come without warning. For years, Jeremiah had pleaded with Zedekiah to heed God's word, to surrender and live; and for years, Zedekiah had wavered and refused.

Notice the tragedy of ignored warnings. Zedekiah's ruin was not arbitrary; it was the bitter fruit of persistently refusing the word of God that Jeremiah had faithfully brought. God had warned him, again and again, and offered him a way through; Zedekiah, afraid and vacillating, would not heed it. And the consequences he had been warned of came to pass, in all their horror. The refusal of God's word had real and terrible results.

That is a sober word, not to frighten us needlessly, but to make us take God's warnings seriously. God's warnings are not idle; they are mercies, meant to turn us from paths that end in ruin. To hear them and, like Zedekiah, keep refusing, keep wavering, keep putting off obedience, is to walk toward consequences we were warned of. Where God, through his word or your conscience, is warning you away from something, do not do as Zedekiah did. Take the warning seriously; heed it while there is time. God's warnings are mercies; do not refuse them until the consequences come.

Lord, Zedekiah's tragic end was the bitter fruit of years of refusing the warnings you faithfully sent him through Jeremiah. Help me take your warnings seriously, understanding that they are mercies, meant to turn me from paths that end in ruin. Where you are warning me, through your word or my conscience, away from something, keep me from wavering and refusing as Zedekiah did. Give me a heart that heeds your warnings while there is time. Turn me before the consequences come.