SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/30/2014
8:30 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
Johanan: a Hypocritical Leader PT-4-5
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Jeremiah 43:1-13
Message of the
verses: I am not sure exactly how
far we will get in today’s SD, but we will begin with the first seven verses of
chapter 43 of Jeremiah.
The Arrogant Rebellion (Jeremiah 43:1-7): “1 But as soon as Jeremiah, whom the LORD
their God had sent, had finished telling all the people all the words of the
LORD their God-that is, all these words- 2 Azariah the son of Hoshaiah, and
Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the arrogant men said to Jeremiah, "You are telling a lie!
The LORD our God has not sent you to say, ’You are not to enter Egypt to reside
there’; 3 but Baruch the son of Neriah
is inciting you against us to give us over into the hand of the Chaldeans, so
they will put us to death or exile us to Babylon." 4 So Johanan the son of
Kareah and all the commanders of the forces, and all the people, did not obey the voice of the
LORD to stay in the land of Judah. 5 But Johanan the son of Kareah and
all the commanders of the forces took the entire remnant of Judah who had
returned from all the nations to which they had been driven away, in order to
reside in the land of Judah- 6 the men,
the women, the children, the king’s daughters and every person that Nebuzaradan
the captain of the bodyguard had left with Gedaliah the son of Ahikam and
grandson of Shaphan, together with Jeremiah the prophet and Baruch the son of
Neriah- 7 and they entered the land of
Egypt (for they did not obey the voice of the LORD) and went in as far as
Tahpanhes.”
When we read that Johanan told Jeremiah that he was
telling them a lie, that they were suppose to stay in the land of Judah and not
go to Egypt what we see is that Johanan was calling the Lord a lire, and not
just Jeremiah for Jeremiah was a true prophet of the Lords. We have to give credit to the Jews who became
scribes who copied the books of the Bible to include the accurate books and not
include the books that may have been written or at least words spoken from
false prophets. The test of a true
prophet of the Lord was that he made not one mistake in what he said, for if he
made one mistake and what he said did not come true then the children of Israel
were to make a rock pile out of him with his dead body at the bottom of the
rock pile. Being a prophet of God was a
very serious thing and Jeremiah was a true prophet of God, for all of the
things that the Lord told him came true.
We have said that Jeremiah was the “weeping prophet” and so these words
must have hurt Jeremiah very much and probably broke his heart. It is like a preacher today who tells a young
lady not to marry that unbelieving man, but she says that she will be used of
God to convert this man to Christ, but a few years later she finds out that she
should have listened to the wise preacher as her life was not a big mess. This wise preacher would not boast about the
advice he gave her by telling her “see I told you so,” but his heart would be
broken at the wasted life that this girl was not living, knowing it could have
been better if she would have listened to the Word of God that he spoke to her,
Jeremiah probably felt the same way.
Dr. Wiersbe writes “Johanan even accused Baruch of influencing
Jeremiah, although it’s difficult to understand what kind of special power
Baruch could possibly have had over this courageous prophet. But they had to blame somebody.
‘”So they came into the land of Egypt’ (43:7). Once again God’s people walked by sight and
not by faith.”
The Timely warning (Jeremiah 43:8-13): “8 Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah in
Tahpanhes, saying, 9 "Take some
large stones in your hands and hide them in the mortar in the brick terrace
which is at the entrance of Pharaoh’s palace in Tahpanhes, in the sight of some
of the Jews; 10 and say to them, ’Thus
says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, "Behold, I am going to send and get Nebuchadnezzar the
king of Babylon, My servant, and I am going to set his throne right over
these stones that I have hidden; and he will spread his canopy over them. 11 "He
will also come and strike the land of Egypt; those who are meant for death will
be given over to death, and those for captivity to captivity, and those for the
sword to the sword. 12 “And
I shall set fire to the temples of the gods of Egypt, and he will burn them and
take them captive, so he will wrap himself with the land of Egypt as a
shepherd wraps himself with his garment, and he will depart from there safely. 13
“He will also shatter the obelisks of Heliopolis, which is in the land of
Egypt; and the temples of the gods of Egypt he will burn with
fire."’"
I first want to quote John Gill again as we have used his
commentary on certain verses while studying Jeremiah, and this time I want to
look at his commentary on the first part of verse thirteen. Now he used the KJV of the Bible and so it
will be a bit different, but we will still be able to understand it. “Ver. 13. He shall break also the images of
Bethshemesh, that [is] in the land of Egypt, &c.] Or, "of Heliopolis," as
the Septuagint; the "city of the sun"; and so "Bethshemesh"
here signifies the "house of the sun"; either it designs the temple
of the sun, or the city where it was worshipped; as Heliopolis was famous for the worship of the sun,
and for a magnificent temple in it, built for that purpose, and where abundance
of persons resorted on that account, as Herodotus {l} observes; here were many
images of the sun; and these now should be broke to pieces, when this city
should become the city of destruction, as is foretold it should by Isaiah, #Isa
19:18; where the Targum expressly calls it the city Bethshemesh, that is to be
destroyed; see Gill on "Isa 19:18". This is the same city that was
formerly called On, and had a priest in Joseph’s time, #Ge 41:45.” I have a “problem” when I am in a doctor’s
office of in an office waiting to be seen and I pick up a magazine and it seems
I always start from the back and go forward which is what I am doing taking the
last verse in this section first and then moving to the front.
Dr. Wiersbe has been telling us about “action sermons”
that Jeremiah has made throughout his book and this is the last of those action
sermons as he takes some rocks and puts them on the wall around at the city of Tahpanhes,
well actually around the temple that is there, and then he speaks about what he
has done in order to make his point, the point that God had given to them, and
this would fulfill some of what he had already spoken, or at least reinforce
what he had said earlier in the chapter.
What he added was who it was that was going to destroy this temple and
other parts of Egypt as it would be God’s servant Nebuchadnezzar who would
accomplish this for the Lord, however this time he would be destroying a
heathen temple instead of the temple of God, but God’s temple had been made
into a heathen temple by the Jews who lived in Jerusalem as seen from the book
of Ezekiel.
Dr. Wiersbe concludes “His victory would be so easy that
it would be like a shepherd wrapping his garment around himself! And yet
these are the very gods that the Jews would worship in Egypt, gods destined to
be destroyed!”
We have two more main points to look at from Dr. Wiersbe’s
outline and then it should be early in August and I have made up my mind to
look at the entire fifth chapter of the other book we have been studying, that
is 1 Thessalonians, and the fifth chapter has much in it to look at and that is
why I want to take the time to go through all of it, and then we will return to
the book of Jeremiah in September, God willing.
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: Warren Wiersbe
wrote that the Jews once again were walking by sight and not by faith, and that
is an easy thing to do at times. When we
go against the Word of God we are then walking by sight and not by faith. I know that there are grey areas in our lives
when we can’t go to chapter and verse to find out what to do, but when we can
find chapter and verse to tell us what to do and not do it, then we are being
like those Jews who were told to stay because God was going to destroy Egypt
and did not want them there, but they chose not to listen to the Word of
God. I want to walk by faith and not by
sight.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Trust the Lord to give me the courage to take
care of a few problems that I am exercising!
Memory verses for the
week: Colossians 3:1-3.
1 Therefore if we have been
raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated
at the right hand of God. 2 Set your
minds on things above, not on the things that are on earth. 3 For you have died and your life is hidden
with Christ in God.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “By bearing one another’s
burdens” (Galatians 6:2).
Today’s Bible
question: “According to Matthew 24:6,
what will come to pass, but the end is not yet?”
Answer in our next SD.
7/30/2014 9:20 AM
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