119 - The Choice: Life or Death

Jeremiah 13-21 

Make Yourself Nice

Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard its spots? Then you also may do good, who are accustomed to doing evil. 13:23.

It seems that ever since Abraham convinced his offspring that they were special because Jehovah had chosen them, the Jewish people have had a tendency to look down on others. Certainly, their feeling is that any Ethiopian would gladly give anything to change from being black to being a Jew if only he could.  Ethiopian Jews in particular have faced discrimination from non-Black Jews. Wikipedia: Racism in Israel.   An Ethiopian can't change his race any more than a leopard can change its spots.  But both the Ethiopian and the leopard can do that as easily as bad people can make themselves good. 

Woe to you, O Jerusalem! Will you not be made clean? How long will it still be? 13:27.  Again Jehovah is calling His wayward people to repent.   How long till the prodigal son will come home?

Jeremiah knew a thing or two about public speaking and psychology.  He made good use of it in this situation.   When ... this people ... say to you, Why has Jehovah pronounced all this great evil against us? Or what is our iniquity, or what is our sin that we have committed against Jehovah our God? Then you shall say to them, Because your fathers have forsaken Me, says Jehovah ... and have not kept My Law.   

Now his listeners were all ears; this preacher was saying good things about them. They were innocent and the problem was caused by their fathers; they like this preacher and they will keep on listening.  Then the preacher throws the punch; And you have done worse than your fathers. 16:10-12.  

Jeremiah lost his following; now they turn to ridicule.  Tauntingly they say, Where is the Word of Jehovah? Let it come now! 17:15.  For a long time already, Jeremiah, you have been saying that Babylon will come and destroy us.  If you are really preaching the Word of the Lord, Let it (the destruction) come now!  BRING IT ON!  Prove that what you are saying is true. 

Choose Life or Death

A similar scenario is repeated in the New Testament.   There will come in the last days scoffers (mockers) ... saying, Where is the promise of His coming? For two thousand years you have been preaching that Christ is coming back, well, if you were telling the truth, it would already have happened! BRING IT ON! 

For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation. 2 Peter 3:3-4.  Nothing has changed since the creation of the universe and nothing will ever change.  

Of course, not all things are as they were since creation.

Peter writes: For this they willingly are ignorant of:

1. The earth was void and became habitable,
2. Then, the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished (Noah's flood), 2 Peter 3:6 KJV
3. But God has commanded the present heavens and earth to remain until the day of judgment. Then they will be set on fire, and ungodly people will be destroyed. 2 Peter 3:7 CEV. This is why they, the ungodly, won't accept as fact, the promise of Christ's return, they do not like the ensuing consequences?

As the Chaldean army was marching closer and closer to Jerusalem, Jeremiah puts a tough choice into the minds of the Israelites:

1. He who remains in this city shall die by the sword, and by the famine, and by the plague. They are thinking: Surely, if we are inside the walls of the city, our army will protect us from those barbarians. 
2. But he who goes out and falls to the Chaldeans who are all around you, he shall live, and his life shall be his prize.  On the other hand, they are thinking, If we do go outside the city, the best we can hope for is that we will become prisoners of war; if, and that is a big if, Jeremiah knows what he is talking about and if he is telling the truth.

Jeremiah told them that that is exactly what they could expect; to be prisoners of war in a foreign country till their death or else death inside the city walls now.  

• Death by the sword, 
• by famine 
• or by one of the diseases brought on by dead corpses lying all around.

Which should they choose? 21:9.  Life as slaves in a foreign country or trust that their army would keep them safe inside the city walls.