Don’t Be Fooled

“And king Zedekiah the son of Josiah reigned instead of Coniah the son of Jehoiakim, whom Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon made king in the land of Judah. But neither he, nor his servants, nor the people of the land, did hearken unto the words of the LORD, which he spake by the prophet Jeremiah. And Zedekiah the king sent Jehucal the son of Shelemiah and Zephaniah the son of Maaseiah the priest to the prophet Jeremiah, saying, Pray now unto the LORD our God for us. Now Jeremiah came in and went out among the people: for they had not put him into prison. Then Pharaoh’s army was come forth out of Egypt: and when the Chaldeans that besieged Jerusalem heard tidings of them, they departed from Jerusalem. Then came the word of the LORD unto the prophet Jeremiah, saying, Thus saith the LORD, the God of Israel; Thus shall ye say to the king of Judah, that sent you unto me to enquire of me; Behold, Pharaoh’s army, which is come forth to help you, shall return to Egypt into their own land. And the Chaldeans shall come again, and fight against this city, and take it, and burn it with fire. Thus saith the LORD; Deceive not yourselves, saying, The Chaldeans shall surely depart from us: for they shall not depart. For though ye had smitten the whole army of the Chaldeans that fight against you, and there remained but wounded men among them, yet should they rise up every man in his tent, and burn this city with fire” (Jer. 37:1-10). The prophet Jeremiah had commanded the king and the people of Jerusalem by the word of the Lord, to surrender to the king of Babylon and be taken captive into Babylon. It was a hard message, but it was the will of God for a nation that had been revolted of a long time, and had refused every correction given to it. What we see here is that the kings who were in Jerusalem during Jeremiah’s prophecy refused to obey his word, and were determined to ‘tough it out’ and listen to the erring prophets who promised them victory in the name of the Lord. We also see that Pharaoh’s army came from Egypt to help Jerusalem, and the Babylonian army retreated and left its siege of Jerusalem. Now this appeared to be an answer to the people of Jerusalem’s prayers to remain in the city, as well as a fulfillment of the words of the 'prophets of victory’ who were prophesying to the people in error. But as we see, God sent Jeremiah to king Zedekiah with the assurance that their misguided joy over the departure of the Babylonians was to be short lived. To quote again God’s words, “For though ye had smitten the whole army of the Chaldeans that fight against you, and there remained but wounded men among them, yet should they rise up every man in his tent, and burn this city with fire."

It didn’t matter what things APPEARED to be, and they in fact appeared to be going in the direction of confirming the erring prophets, and disproving Jeremiah’s words. The truth of the matter was and is, that if God’s will and his word about his will is being resisted, it is impossible to win. Period. Job said the same thing this way: "He is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who hath hardened himself against him, and hath prospered? (Job 9:4). A troubled young man once asked me to pray for him about some of the troubles that were besieging him in his life. He said that things would start looking better for a while, and then everything would go back downhill for him. He also told me that he wasn’t serving the Lord fully, but that he hoped to do so in the future. He would ask me from time to time for prayer or advice, and as always I told him I would do it. It was on a job, and we were both heading for our lunch break when he asked me. When I got outside and was getting ready to pray about his issues, the holy Ghost impressed our text passage from Jeremiah upon my spirit. When I got back inside I told him that the Lord showed me that his problems would never cease, regardless of how much it appeared that they would, unless he surrendered all to Jesus and let him have full control of his life. He bowed his head and acknowledged that he knew it was the Lord, and thanked me. And that’s the way it is for every one of us. If we are resisting the will of God in something, or holding onto something that we should let go of, or failing to do something that we’re supposed to be doing; things simply will never work out and flow rightly in our lives until we give God our all. If we continue to stumble over the same things, we need to get serious and find out what it is that we’re doing wrong that is causing it. A lot of folks are indifferent about doing God’s will in their lives, and suffer trouble becauseof it. Yet when it appears that the trouble is subsided, they get a sense of false relief; that is until trouble comes back in spades. We’re not going to be able to sneak anything past God, so we may as well just let him have his way so that we can be blessed with peace. Zedekiah and most of Jerusalem never learned this lesson, and they suffered great calamity as a result. The king of Babylon captured Zedekiah and put out both of his eyes after killing his sons in front of him (Jer. 39:6,7). He went to Babylon as a prisoner, with that being his final visual memory. So he lived the rest of his life in blindness, remembering the words of Jeremiah, and the result of not doing things God’s way. I believe the moral of the story is evident. Amen.