Jeremiah’s complaint and God’s answer
12
📚You are righteous,O LORD, when I plead with you.
Yet let me talk with you of your
judgments.
Why does the way of the wicked prosper?
Why are all those who act
very treacherously at ease?
2 📚You have planted them;
yes, they have taken root, they grow;
yes, they produce fruit.
You are near on their lips,
and far from their inner being 📖.
12:1-2 Gen 18:25; Ps 9:8; 67:4; 75:2; 96:13; 98:9; John 17:25. Jeremiah knows God is just in all His actions, but he is troubled about the prosperity of the wicked. He asks the question that has troubled believers through the ages (Job 21:7-15; Ps 73:3-12; Eccl 7:15; Hab 1:13; Mal 3:15).⚜
3 📚But you, O LORD, know me.
You have seen me, and tested my heart
toward you.
Pull them out like sheep for the slaughter,
and prepare them for the day of slaughter 📖.
12:3 Jeremiah knows he is not a hypocrite.⚜
4 📚How long 📖 will the land mourn,
and the plants of every field wither 📖
because the wickedness of those
who dwell in it?
The beasts and the birds are consumed,
because they said,
“He does not see the end we reach”.
5 📚The LORD said, “If you have run
with men on foot,
and they have worn you out,
then how can you compete with horses?
And if they wore you out
in the land of peace,
in which you trusted,
then what will you do in the flooding of Jordan?
12:5 God does not answer Jeremiah’s question, but warns him that even greater difficulties await him in the future. God tells us all we need to know, not necessarily all we want to know.⚜
6 📚For even your brothers and the household
of your father have dealt treacherously
with you;
yes, they have called on many to go
after you.
Do not believe them, though they speak
smooth words to you.
12:6 It seems from this that at least some of Jeremiah’s relatives participated in the plot to kill him (Jer 11:18-19).⚜
7 📚“I have forsaken my house,
I have left my inheritance,
I have given my dearly beloved
into the hand of her enemies.
8 📚My inheritance is to me like
a lion in the forest;
it roars against me;
therefore I have hated it.
9 📚My inheritance is to me like
a speckled bird;
the birds all around are against it.
Come, assemble all the beasts of the field,
come to devour.
12:9 Some birds will attack a strange bird not of their kind.⚜
10 📚Many shepherds have destroyed
my vineyard,
they have trampled my portion underfoot,
they have made my pleasant portion
a desolate wilderness.
12:10 Shepherds here refer to rulers.⚜
11 📚They have made it desolate,
and being desolate it mourns to me.
The whole land has been made desolate,
because no one takes it to heart 📖.
12 📚The despoilers have come over all
the desolate heights in the wilderness;
for the sword of the LORD 📖 will devour
from one end of the land
to the other end of the land.
No one will have peace.
13 📚They have sown wheat,
but will reap thorns.
They have taken pains,
but will not profit.
And they will be disappointed
about the harvest,
because of the fierce anger 📖 of the LORD.
12:7-13 God speaks of “my” house, “my” inheritance, “my” vineyard, “my” field. He means, of course, His temple, His people, His land. But He will give it all into the hands of destroyers. Notice that God calls Israel “my beloved” in v 7 and yet in v 8 speaks of hating. He loved Israel but her ways were so detestable He could not bear them any longer and turned her over to her enemies for punishment.⚜
14 📚“Thus says the LORD against all my evil neighbours who touch the inheritance which I have caused my people Israel to inherit: See, I will uproot them from their land, and uproot the house of Judah from among them. 15 📚And it will happen after I have uprooted them that I will return, and have compassion on them, and will bring them back, each man to his inheritance, and each man to his land. 16 📚And it will come about, if they will diligently learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name, ‘The LORD lives’, as they taught my people to swear by Baal, then they will be established among my people. 17 📚But if they will not obey, I will fully uproot and destroy that nation, says the LORD”.
12:14-17 God will punish the neighboring nations that seize any of Israel’s land. See 2 Kings 24:2. Observe the word of hope in these verses. God is compassionate – Ps 78:38; 86:15; 111:4; 145:8. But just as Israel had learned evil ways from the surrounding nations, so later on the nations must learn good ways from Israel, or else face annihilation.⚜