1
📚The words of Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah, of the priests who were in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin.1:1 Anathoth was a town about 5 kilometers north of Jerusalem. It was set apart for the priests of Israel (Josh 21:18; 1 Kings 2:26).⚜
2 📚The word of the LORD 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, up to the end of the eleventh year of Zedekiah the son of Josiah, king of Judah, until Jerusalem was carried away into exile in the fifth month.
1:3 The time period covered by vs 2 and 3 was 40 years, between 626 and 586 BC. Afterwards Jeremiah continued to prophesy a few more years. Of the kings mentioned here only Josiah was a good one. A brief history of those years is found in 2 Kings chapters 22–25 and 2 Chronicles chapters 34–36.⚜
God calls Jeremiah to his work
4 📚Then the word of the LORD
came to me, saying:
5 📚“Before I formed 📖 you in the womb,
I knew 📖 you, and before you were born
I sanctified 📖 you, and I ordained you 📖
a prophet to the nations”.
6 📚Then I said, “Ah, Lord God 📖! Look, I cannot speak, for I am a child”.
7 📚But the LORD said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am a child’, for you will go to all to whom I send you, and you will speak whatever I command you.
1:7 When God appoints a man for a task He will accept no excuses he may make to escape from it. Compare Ex 3:10-13; 4:1, 10-17.⚜
8 📚Do not be afraid 📖 of their faces, for I am with you 📖 to defend 📖 you”, said the LORD.
9 📚Then the LORD put out his hand, and touched my mouth. And the LORD said to me,
“Look, I have put my words in your mouth.
1:9 Ex 4:12; Num 22:38; 23:5, 12, 16; Deut 18:18; Isa 51:16. So the prophets who wrote the Bible could, and did, speak the very words of God without error of any kind. They spoke God’s words by the inspiration of God’s Spirit (2 Tim 3:16; 2 Pet 1:21).⚜
10 📚See, today I have set you over the nations
and over the kingdoms, to root out,
and to pull down, and to destroy,
and to throw down, to build,
and to plant”.
1:10 It was the Word of God sent by God through Jeremiah that would accomplish these things among the nations. See Isa 55:10-11. Jeremiah’s utterances by God’s Spirit were to have two effects – one destructive, one constructive. God’s word will always have these two results depending on the condition and response of those who hear it. Sometimes for the good to flourish it is necessary to destroy the bad.⚜
11 📚Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying, “Jeremiah, what do you see?” And I said, “I see a branch of an almond tree”.
12 📚Then the LORD said to me, “You have seen well; for I will watch over my word to fulfil it”.
1:11-12 God sometimes used object lessons to bring His message to the prophets (v 13; Amos 7:8; 8:2; Zech 4:2; 5:2). The two He gave in the next few verses are basic to the teaching of the book of Jeremiah. In Hebrew the word for “almond tree” and the word for “watch over” are very similar (sha’ked and sho’ked). Aaron’s rod that budded was from the almond tree. See Num 17:1-13.⚜
1:12 God will fulfill His word, in spite of unbelieving Israel and a world of nations and peoples who do not know Him, and Jeremiah was not to fear that He would not (compare Isa 55:11; Matt 5:17-18). This is God’s very first message to Jeremiah after His appointment as prophet. It is one of the first things about which God wants all of His servants in any time or place to be sure.⚜
13 📚And the word of the LORD came to me the second time, saying, “What do you see?” And I said, “I see a boiling pot, and its face is toward the north”.
14 📚Then the LORD said to me, “Out of the north a disaster will burst out on all the inhabitants of the land. 15 📚For, see, I will call all the families of the kingdoms of the north, says the LORD,
“And they will come, and each of them
will set his throne at the entrance
of the gates of Jerusalem,
and against all its surrounding walls,
and against all the cities of Judah.
16 📚And I will utter my judgments against
them concerning all their wickedness,
because they have forsaken me
and burned incense to other gods,
and worshipped the works
of their own hands.
1:16 The reason for God’s judgment is plain. They habitually broke the most important commandment of the law and forsook the Creator to worship things they had made. See Ex 20:1-6; Lev 26:14-39; Deut 27:14-26.⚜
1:13-16 The second message concerns destruction on Israel. Nations would come from the north, hot and agitated as boiling water, and overflow the land (Jer 4:6; 6:1). As far as Jeremiah’s lifetime is concerned this happened when Babylon and its allies invaded and conquered Judah. See chapter 39; 2 Kings chapters 24,25; 2 Chronicles chapter 36. Perhaps a more complete fulfillment will come at the end of this age (see Ezekiel chapters 38,39 and Zechariah chapter 12).⚜
17 📚“Therefore make yourself ready,
and arise and speak to them all that
I command you.
Do not be afraid of their faces,
so that I do not make you fear
before them.
1:17 This is always the principal responsibility of God’s spokesman – to speak His word just as it is, without fear of men. This can be done when there is the fullness of the Holy Spirit (Acts 4:31). The choice is always between fearing men or fearing God (Matt 10:28; Isa 8:12-13).⚜
18 📚For, see, today I have made you
a fortified city, and an iron pillar,
and bronze walls against the whole land,
against the kings of Judah, against its princes,
against its priests, and against the people
of the land.
19 📚And they will fight against you,
but they will not prevail against you;
for I am with you, says the LORD,
to deliver you”.