3.2 Jeremiah

Jeremiah 1:2-3 names the kings of Judah when Jeremiah heard and prophesied the word of the Lord, beginning with the reign of Josiah in 626 BC and continuing for 40 years:

2 Jeremiah 1:2-3

2 Yahweh's word came to him in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reign.

3 It came also in the days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, to the end of the eleventh year of Zedekiah, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, to the carrying away of Jerusalem captive in the fifth month.

Josiah was the last godly king of Judah. While searching the temple in Jerusalem, Josiah discovered the books of the Law. Josiah recognized that Judah was guilty of disobedience and subject to the curses described in Deuteronomy 28:36-37:

2 Deuteronomy 28:36-37

36 Yahweh will bring you, and your king whom you will set over yourselves, to a nation that you have not known, you nor your fathers. There you will serve other gods of wood and stone.

37 You will become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword among all the peoples where Yahweh will lead you away.

Josiah initiated reforms, but Jeremiah watched as Judah again turned against the Lord after Josiah died. Jeremiah witnessed Judah's continuing decline. Jeremiah 25:8-11 describes God's judgment against Judah at the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, God's servant, and that Judah will be in exile in Babylon for seventy years:

4 Jeremiah 25:8-11

8 Therefore Yahweh of Armies says: "Because you have not heard my words,

9 behold, I will send and take all the families of the north," says Yahweh, "and I will send to Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against its inhabitants, and against all these nations around. I will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and a hissing, and perpetual desolations.

10 Moreover I will take from them the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones, and the light of the lamp.

11 This whole land will be a desolation, and an astonishment; and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.

However, God still planned to return Israel home after the exile, but Jeremiah (like Isaiah) prophesied about a future new covenant as described in Jeremiah 31:31-34:

4 Jeremiah 31:31-34

31 "Behold, the days come," says Yahweh, "that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:

32 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which covenant of mine they broke, although I was a husband to them," says Yahweh.

33 "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days," says Yahweh: I will put my law in their inward parts, and I will write it in their heart. I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

34 They will no longer each teach his neighbor, and every man teach his brother, saying, 'Know Yahweh;' for they will all know me, from their least to their greatest," says Yahweh: "for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more."

Note that Israel broke their Old Covenant with God. The New Covenant involved God writing his law on their hearts, which is consistent with the work of the Holy Spirit as counselor and guide. It was a major paradigm shift for Israel - the New Covenant would be about a personal relationship with God. He is Immanuel, God with us!

Jeremiah reiterated that God was making this an everlasting covenant as described in Jeremiah 32:40:

1 Jeremiah 32:40

40 I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from following them, to do them good. I will put my fear in their hearts, that they may not depart from me.