This word came to Jeremiah from the Lord. Jeremiah 36:1
In the early nineteenth century, Thomas Carlyle gave a manuscript to philosopher John Stuart Mill to review. Somehow, whether accidentally or intentionally, the manuscript got tossed into a fire. It was Carlyle’s only copy. Undaunted, he set to work rewriting the lost chapters. Mere flames couldn’t stop the story, which remained intact in his mind. Out of great loss, Carlyle produced his monumental work The French Revolution.
In the waning days of ancient Judah’s decadent kingdom, God told the prophet Jeremiah, “Take a scroll and write on it all the words I have spoken to you” (Jeremiah 36:2). The message revealed God’s tender heart, calling on His people to repent in order to avoid imminent invasion (v. 3).
Jeremiah did as he was told. The scroll soon found its way to Judah’s king, Jehoiakim, who methodically shredded it and threw it into the fire (vv. 23–25). The king’s act of arson only made matters worse. God told Jeremiah to write another scroll with the same message. He said, “[Jehoiakim] will have no one to sit on the throne of David; his body will be thrown out and exposed to the heat by day and the frost by night” (v. 30).
It’s possible to burn the words of God by tossing a book into a fire. Possible, but utterly futile. The Word behind the words endures forever.
Read: Jeremiah 36:27-32 (NIV)
27 After the king burned the scroll containing the words that Baruch had written at Jeremiah’s dictation,b the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: 28 “Take another scrollc and write on it all the words that were on the first scroll, which Jehoiakim king of Judah burned up. 29 Also tell Jehoiakim king of Judah, ‘This is what the Lord says: You burned that scroll and said, “Why did you write on it that the king of Babylon would certainly come and destroy this land and wipe from itd both man and beast?”e 30 Therefore this is what the Lord says about Jehoiakimf king of Judah: He will have no one to sit on the throne of David; his body will be thrown outg and exposedh to the heat by day and the frost by night.i 31 I will punish him and his childrenj and his attendants for their wickedness; I will bring on them and those living in Jerusalem and the people of Judah every disasterk I pronounced against them, because they have not listened.l’ ”
32 So Jeremiah took another scroll and gave it to the scribe Baruch son of Neriah, and as Jeremiah dictated,m Baruch wroten on it all the words of the scroll that Jehoiakim king of Judah had burnedo in the fire. And many similar words were added to them.
INSIGHT
- What has caused you or those you know to ignore the words of God?
- Why is it vital for you to submit to and obediently follow what He’s instructed?
King Jehoiakim’s rejection of the words of God demonstrated by his reckless burning of Jeremiah’s scroll wasn’t an isolated event. The prophet Jeremiah had touched a nerve in a land once entrusted to a nation of freed slaves. Since the days of Moses, there'd been a humane law in Israel requiring Hebrew slaves to be freed after seven years (Exodus 21:2). But this law had long since been ignored by wealthy land owners accustomed to living off the backs of a captive and oppressed workforce (Jeremiah 34:8–17). Their social privilege made it easy to ignore a troublesome prophet who claimed to speak the word of Israel’s God (37:1–2). According to Jeremiah, a looming Babylonian invasion was the inevitable corrective. What even Jeremiah couldn’t foresee, however, is that the flagrant burning of a scroll would foreshadow something far more horrific—a literal rejection and crucifixion of Jesus, the living Word of God.
PRAYER
Father, help me to take Your words to heart, even if they’re difficult to hear. Please give me a heart of repentance—not defiance. In Jesus name, I pray. Amen!!
Read: Jeremiah 36:27-32 (NIV) | Bible in a Year: Isaiah 41-42; 1 Thessalonians 1
