Jeremiah 18

Jeremiah 18:1-10

In this chapter we have, 1. God’s ways of dealing with nations and kingdoms pointed out; that he can at eighty do what he will wish them, as the potter can wash the clay, ver. 1—6. But that he certainly will do what is just; nothing but impunity will be a nation’s ruin, ver. 7—10. 2. The folly of the Jews demonstrated in departing from their God to idols, and in bringing ruin upon themselves, notwithstanding the fair wavering green them, and God’s kind asceticism twinkled them, ver. 1—17. 3. The prophet’s complaint to God of the ingratitude and justice of his enemies, and his prayers against them, ver. 18—23.

1. THE word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, 2. Anfe, and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cycle thee to hear my words. 3. Then I went down to the potter’s house, and behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. 4. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hands of the potter, so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. 5. Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 6. O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? Saith the LORD. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel. 7. At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it: 8. If that nation against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. 9. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it: 10. If it do evil in my fight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good where I said I would benefit them.

God often teaches by similitude to make the deeper imperilies, and that the truths may be the better remembered. We have,

1. The prophet sent to the patter’s house, and informed, that God would there instruct him. Instantly obedient, he goes down, observes the workman turning the wheel, fashioning the vessels, marring and making them according to his plankton.

2. God’s application of the subject. Such absolute power as the patter hath over the clay, hath God over the sons of men. He hath the most unconscionable right over us: it were arrogance in us to find fault with his procedure, and folly to oppose what we cannot prevent. According to the counsels of his own will he may dispose of nations and individuals, and none can say unto him, What doft thou? Submission absolute and entur to his will is our bounden duty: not that he exercises his power in any manner to the impeachment of his justice or mercy. He will be found righteous in all his ways; not only sovereignly great, but infinitely gracious. Even when his threatening have gone forth against a nation, and their defraudous approaches, if they repeat and return, he will change the method of his dispositions towards them, remove their fears, and return to them in mercy. On the other hand, if he have spoken by way of promise, to crown a people with every national blessing, to enrich them with good, and prosper all their enterprises; if they prove ungrateful for his favours, desert his service, and dislobe his word, then he will turn the current of his bearded from them, and pour on them the wrath they have provided. Note, (1.) All our miseries may be traced from our son, whether private or public. (2.) God will make his glory to appear; and though as absolutely sovereign none have a right to question him, he will vindicate his ways to man, and appear; all when he judges.

3. Now therefore go to, speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, Thus faith the LORD, Behold, I frame evil against you, and devise a devise against you: return ye now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings good. 12. And they said, ‘There is no hope, but we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart. 13. Therefore thus faith the LORD, ‘Ask ye now among the heathen, who hath heard such things: the virgin of Israel hath done a very horrible thing. 14. Will a man leave the snow of Lebanon, which cometh from the rock of the field? or shall the cold flowing waters that come from another place, be forsaken? 15. Because my people hath forgotten me, they have burnt incense to vanity, and they have caused them to thumble in their ways from the ancient paths, to walk in paths, in a way not cast up; 16. To make their land deddite, and a perpetual hissing: every one that passeth thereby shall be astonished, and wag his head. 17. I will scatter them as with an east-wind before the enemy: I will shew them the back and not the face in the day of their calamity.

Jeremiah 18:11-17

The foregoing truths are here particularly applied to the Jewish nation. Here is,

1. The warning and admonition given to the Jewish people. Evil was on the wheel for them, though the execution was for a while suspended; and one more invitation given them, by their speedy and penitent return to prevent the impending ruin, v. 11. Note, God never strikes without warning: they who continue impatient are inexcusable.

2. Their hardened rejection of the warning. They said, There is no hope; if nothing but parting from their sins would do, they resolved to abide the consequences. Let God do his worth, our will would after our own devices, and our will do every one the imagination of his evil heart. Note, Sinners often dare not express themselves with such effrontery in words, yet practically every sinner doth it in works, and these speak most strongly.

3. Their monstrous folly and wickedness upbraided. Among the vilest heathen nations were no abominations or insolence bound equal to theirs; even the people of Nineveh repeated at the preaching of Jonah; but, horrible to tell Israel, that virgin daughter, that by her relation to God should have kept herself wholly for him, pure in his ways and worship, hath apolitanized from him, hath forsaken the living God for dumb idols. Will a man, parched with thrift, leave the same water of Lebanon, which cometh down melted in summer from the rock of the field? or shall the cold flowing waters that come from another place be forsaken by the thrifty traveller? This would be fully unheard-of; yet more egregiously foolish were they; because my people hath forgotten me, the fountain of living waters, to drink at the broken cisterns of idol altars. They have burnt incense to vanity, to wretched deities, who could not profit them: or, in

twine they burn incense; their services were an abomination which their sins remained: and they have caused them to thumble in their ways, their idols, or their false prophets, from the ancient paths, the way revealed of old in God’s word; or the paths of eternity, which led to glory everlasting, to walk in paths, in a way not cast up; a road unknown to the saints of God; a way of wickedness and idolatry, in which they stumbled and fell into the pit of eternal misery; this being the certain and fatal consequence of their ways, to make their head defiance, ravaged by the enemy, and depopulated by famine and the sword; a perpetual hissing, every one who passed by expressing their abhorrence of such guilty conduct; afterglowed at the devastations they beheld, and wagging their head, deriding or upbraiding them. With blasts of displeasure, furious as the only wreck, God will gather them before their enemies, weak as stubble to resist their attacks, and in the day of their calamity turn a dead ear to their cries, nor cast a look of compaction on their miseries. Note, (1.) Apolitanes deserve to be upbraided, and they will shortly awake to everlasting shame and contempt. (2.) They who persevere in the ways of sin, must expect no mercy in the day of judgment. God will then mock at their calamities, Prov. i. 26—28.

18. Then said they, ‘Come,’ and let us devise devices against Jeremiah: for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wife, nor the word from the prophet: come, and let us smite him with the tongue, and let us not give heed to any of his words. 19. Give heed to me, O LORD, and hearken to the voice of them that contend with me. 20. Shall evil be recompensed for good? for they have digged a pit for my soul: remember that I found before thee to speak good for them, and to turn away thy wrath from them. 21. Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and pour out their blood by the force of the sword, and let their wives be bereaved of their children, and be widows, and let their men be put to death, let their young men be slain by the sword in battle. 22. Let a cry be heard from their houses, when thou shalt bring a troop suddenly upon them, for they have digged a pit to take me, and hid shares for my feet. 23. Yet, LORD, thou knoweth all their counsel against me to slay me: forgive not their iniquity, neither blot out their sin from thy sight, but let them be overthrown before thee; deal thou with them in the time of thine anger.

Jeremiah 18:18-23

Behold the treatment the faithful ministers may expect from a disobedient and gainsaying people.

1. Enraged by his rebukes, they consult how to destroy him. To cover their malice, they pretend zeal for religion, and would brand him as a false prophet. Then said they, Come, and let us devise devices against Jeremiah, to get rid of him and his prophecies; for the law shall not perish from the priest, &c. Notwithstanding his predictions of the inflation of the temple service; of the infatuation of their counsels; and his warnings of the fasthood of their prophets; they flattered themselves their priesthood should continue, their rulers in church and state consult and secure their safety; and that they should see the fulfilment of the visions of peace with which their own prophets flattered them: therefore, said they, Come, let us smite him with the tongue; either accuse him as a lying prophet before the nighttimes, to put him to death, v. 23, or load him with reproaches, and make him contemptible in the eyes of the people: and let us not give heed to any of his words, but treat him as a deceiver, who speaks not from the Lord, but out of his own heart. Note, (1.) The wicked would in in a confederacy against the true prophets, and none forwarder to shew their malice, than the false and faithful ministers who cannot bear their just rebukes. (2.) To cloak the malice of persecutors this was the old pretence, to represent the faithful and zealous ministers as men dangerous to the state, and not to be tolerated; or as deluders and enthusiasts, and to be trampled on. (3.) They who dare not encounter the lails of men’s tongues, must never think of standing up for God. (4.) Rejection of the servant is an insult on the master. Little do the revilers of Christ’s ministers think, that their reproaches light not so much on them as him.

2. He lodges his appeal with God, and begs his interposition on his behalf. He prayed God to take notice of their blasphemies and reproaches, v. 19. their ingratitude and cruelty, in returning him evil for good, and thinking for his blood, when God, the searcher of hearts, knew how earnestly he had laboured, how fervently he had prayed, to avert the impending judgments from them, v. 20. Therefore in just indignation he unpreceates upon them the vengeance they had provoked; that death in every remembrance they might slide both young and old, and their widows, bereaved of husbands and children together, lament the fearful ravages they beheld; that shrieks and cries

Babam Chaff etc.

might fill the houths, when the enemy suddenly entering at the breach, massacred and plundered without pity or remorse: for this would be but the just retaliation for the soares they laid to murder him, which, however secret, God knew and would avenge. Their sin was now unpardonable; he that had often prayed for them, now abandons them to their ruin; not in a spirit of revenge defining their misery, but in zeal for God’s glory, to see that vindicated, waiting their final overthrow, and expecting and defining God would deal with them in the time of his anger according to the denunciations which, as his prophet, he had delivered. Note, (1.) Jeremiah was a type of Jesus, thus lately reviled, ungratefully persecuted, and all his prayers returned with blasphemies. (2.) What Jeremiah spoke in the spirit of prophecy must not be pleaded as an example for our imitation. We must pray for those that persecute us, if per-adventure God may yet give them repentance. (3.) The persecutions of his prophets will find at last an avenging God, and we to them against whom those abused ministers of grace stand up to bear witness in a judgment day.

Jeremiah 18:34-39

Elam, concerned in this prophecy, which is dated in the beginning of Zedekiah’s reign, is supposed not to be feeble at large, but a country nearer Judea, called Elymus, some of which inhabitants served under Bennacherib, king of Alfyria, at the siege of Jerusalem, Ife. xvii. 6. They were afterwards subdued by Nebuchadnezzar, and the kings of Babylon sometimes made it the fear of their residence, Zea. viii. 2.

2. Universal destruction is threatened. God undertakes to break their bans, and to disable the chief of their might, and then they must fall an easy prey, v. 35. By the Chaldean army they shall be disposed into the four corners of the earth, as fugitives of captivity, v. 36. Terrors shall seize them, the sword devout them, the wrath of God pursue them, and therein all evil is

comprehended, v. 37. nor shall the king and princes thereof escape, but fall in the promiscuous ruin, and the conqueror shall erect his throne in Elam, which may well be called the throne of God, by whose power and gift he obtained the dominion, v. 38.

2. A gracious promise is given them of restoration, which probably under Cyrus was accomplished in a measure, but more eminently was fulfilled when, by the presching of the gospel, the Elamists, among other nations, were called unto the church, and into the glorious liberty of the sons of God, Acts ii. 9.