Notes

JEREMIAH 38, Jerusalem didn’t have to burn

Jerusalem was the home of Solomon’s Temple and had been the seat of power in Judah since the time of David. The palace and the temple there were awe-inspiring works of construction and the city was a well-built fortress. Jeremiah has been prophesying destruction for this city for some time now in our reading, and in chapter 38, we are standing right at the precipice of this actually occurring.

Artist’s rendering of what first-temple Jerusalem would have looked like prior to it’s destruction by the Babylonians in 586 BC

Despite the fact that Zedekiah’s mistreatment of Jeremiah has continued - even allowing him to be sunken down into a muddy cistern earlier in the chapter. God - through Jeremiah - offers Zedekiah a way to save the city and the Temple.

Jeremiah 38:17 Then Jeremiah said to Zedekiah, “This is what the Lord God Almighty, the God of Israel, says: ‘If you surrender to the officers of the king of Babylon, your life will be spared and this city will not be burned down; you and your family will live. 18 But if you will not surrender to the officers of the king of Babylon, this city will be given into the hands of the Babylonians and they will burn it down; you yourself will not escape from them.’”

Can you imagine how different it would have been if Zedekiah had listened to God? Jesus could have walked in Solomon’s temple!

Zedekiah here seeks God’s word, but he does not listen. He has been not listening for a long time. Even still, God offers him this last-second olive branch: ‘just take your punishment and go, you can save the city,’ and he refuses. Even when we’ve been walking away from God, He still wants to help us, He still is pursuing our faithfulness and repentance. Be more receptive to His overtures than Zedekiah

JEREMIAH 39:6: ZEDEKIAH'S FATE

Do you remember what Jeremiah told Zedekiah about his fate when he refused to surrender to the Babylonians as God commanded?

Zedekiah king of Judah will not escape the Babylonians but will certainly be given into the hands of the king of Babylon, and will speak with him face to face and see him with his own eyes. (Jeremiah 32:4)

This prophecy was fulfilled with an extra dose of sadness and irony.

There at Riblah the king of Babylon slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes and also killed all the nobles of Judah. Then he put out Zedekiah’s eyes and bound him with bronze shackles to take him to Babylon. (Jeremiah 39:6-7)

This is the punishment that he faced for not submitting to God’s discipline and surrendering to the Babylonians as instructed by Jeremiah. Instead of honorably/righteously suffering the consequences of his sin, he tried to escape them under his own power, and with these efforts, he purchased a horrifying end.

Jeremiah 39: The fall of Jerusalem

The fall of Jerusalem described here is depicted in more detail in 2nd Kings

2nd Kings 25:1 So in the ninth year of Zedekiah’s reign, on the tenth day of the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon marched against Jerusalem with his whole army. He encamped outside the city and built siege works all around it. 2 The city was kept under siege until the eleventh year of King Zedekiah.
3 By the ninth day of the fourth month the famine in the city had become so severe that there was no food for the people to eat. 4 Then the city wall was broken through, and the whole army fled at night through the gate between the two walls near the king’s garden, though the Babylonians were surrounding the city. They fled toward the Arabah, 5 but the Babylonian army pursued the king and overtook him in the plains of Jericho. All his soldiers were separated from him and scattered, 6 and he was captured.
He was taken to the king of Babylon at Riblah, where sentence was pronounced on him. 7 They killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. Then they put out his eyes, bound him with bronze shackles and took him to Babylon.
8 On the seventh day of the fifth month, in the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, Nebuzaradan commander of the imperial guard, an official of the king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem. 9 He set fire to the temple of the Lord, the royal palace and all the houses of Jerusalem. Every important building he burned down. 10 The whole Babylonian army under the commander of the imperial guard broke down the walls around Jerusalem. 11 Nebuzaradan the commander of the guard carried into exile the people who remained in the city, along with the rest of the populace and those who had deserted to the king of Babylon. 12 But the commander left behind some of the poorest people of the land to work the vineyards and fields.

The policy of deportation enacted here by Babylon is described further in the IVP Bible Background Commentary

The Neo-Babylonians continued the policy of de porting rebellious populations that was first employed by the Assyrian kings Ashurnasirpal II and Tiglath-Pileser III. This was both a political and an economic ploy. It was de signed to hold a portion of the people as hostages while a native dynasty continued to rule the vassal state. Thus, in 597 Zedekiah had been placed on the throne of Ierusalem while Jehoiachin, much of the royal family, high-ranking priests, nobles and artisans had been taken back to Mesopotamia. Even after Zedekiah's revolt and the fall of Jerusalem, Nebuchadnezzar attempted to maintain native Judean rule through the appointment of Gedaliah. However, his assassination resulted in a Babylonian governor being installed. It should be noted that only a portion of the population was ever deported. The Babylonians still wanted to derive revenue from ludah, and thus land was redistributed to the landless poor with the expectation that the economy of the region could be restored.
Not all of the people of Judah were deported after the fall of Jerusalem in 586. Many of the people, like Jeremiah, had actually been pro-Babylonian or at least anti-Jerusalem in their sentiments (compare Micah's condemnation of Jerusalem in Hezekiah's time Mic 3:8-12). By redistributing the land that had belonged to persons now exiled, the Babylonians created friendships with the landless poor and also laid the foundation for the agricultural and economic restoration of a land that had been devastated by years of warfare.

Jeremiah 40: Gedaliah

This seal impression of Gedaliah was discovered in 2008

After the fall of Jerusalem in 586 and the arrest of Zedekiah, Nebuchadnezzar installed Gedaliah, son of Ahikam, of the important but non-Davidic house of Shaphan, as governor of Judah. During approximately one to two months of work, he began the restoration of the country's economy from his new administrative center at Mizpah (see 2 Kings 25:22-26). A seal impression bearing the name Gedaliah has been found at Lachish, suggesting that this man had some administrative experience. It is also possible that he was "Master of the Palace" under Zedekiah, a post fitting him for his Babylonian appoint-ment. His efforts at getting a harvest in did encourage some of the refugees to return to Judah.

3rd John:

Nature of the Letter. This is a “letter of recommendation” for Demetrius, a traveling missionary (vv. 7-8) who needs to be put up by a local *church while he is evangelizing in their area (cf. comment on Mt 10:11-13, 40-42). For the first three centuries of the church’s existence, congregations usually met in homes; for further details on this practice, see Romans 16:5. In this letter to Gaius, a house-church leader, John is apparently attempting to counter the opposing influences of Diotrephes, a different house-church leader who is asserting his own authority and rejecting emissaries backed by John’s apostolic authority.
Keener, Craig S.. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament (p. 718). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.

Week 29 - Jeremiah 38-40, 3rd John (July 16 - July 22)