Jeremiah the Prophet

Jeremiah lived in Judah. He was called by God to be His prophet. 

God told him that he must warn the people of Judah that terrible things would happen to them unless they gave up praying to the false gods and became faithful to the one true God. 

Jeremiah was afraid. 'Lord God, he said. 'I'm too young to do this, and I'm no good at speaking in public.

God replied. 'I chose you before you were born. I will tell you what to say, and I will always keep you safe.

The little kingdom of Judah was ruled by King Josiah, but there was always war with his enemies on his borders. 

Josiah was killed fighting the Egyptians who were marching north through his land to join the Assyrians in battle against the Babylonians.

Over the years. Jeremiah told the people in Judah again and again what God told him to say, but they took no notice. 

One day, he went to a potter and watched him shape a clay pot on his wheel. When the pot became lopsided, the potter squashed the clay into a lump, and began to make the pot again.

The people in the house stared at Jesus, amazed and a little frightened. 

They had never seen anything like this before. 

Very excited, they whispered to each other and said prayers of praise to God.

God said to Jeremiah; 'The people of Israel are like clay in My hands. I can destroy them if they persist in doing evil, but I can remake them if they change their ways.

Jeremiah told the people what God had said to him, but still they wouldn't listen.

Another time, Jeremiah stood in front of the Temple in Jerusalem. He shouted to the people. 'God says if you won't listen to Him and obey His laws. 

He will destroy the Temple and the city of Jerusalem. The priests in the Temple were so angry with Jeremiah, they had him beaten and put in prison.

Jeremiah couldn't speak to the people then, but he could write to them. He spent many hours writing to the King of Judah, but the King threw the parchment on the fire. 

So Jeremiah wrote it all out again, but it was no use.

A man named Ebedmelech, who worked in the King's palace, asked for permission to rescue Jeremiah. 

The King agreed, and Ebedmelech and some men let down ropes into the well, and pulled Jeremiah to safety.

King Zedekiah asked Jeremiah what he should do. 'You must surrender, or Jerusalem will be destroyed, answered Jeremiah. 

Zedekiah refused, and tried to escape from the beseiged city. He was captured by the Babylonians, who blinded him, and killed his two sons. 

Then he was led in chains to Babylon.

Nebuchadnezzar's army broke through the walls of Jerusalem. They destroyed the King's palace, smashed the Temple and the houses, and set fire to them. 

They carried away all the treasure from the Temple, and marched thousands more Israelites in chains back to Babylon.

Jeremiah stayed with the few people who were left. The people of Judah hadn't listened to God's warnings, and now they had been punished. 

Jeremiah wrote to the people who were living in exile in Babylon. 'God says, he wrote, He promises that one day He will bring you home. 

While you are in exile, you will leam to love Him again. You will remember His laws and do what is right.  Look forward to the time when you will return to your own land.

Nebuchadnezzar, the King of the Babylonians, led his army to Jerusalem. He made Zedekiah King of Judah, and took thousands of people prisoner, marching them back to Babylon to work as slaves. 

Zedekiah ruled Judah for ten years, and then he rebelled against the Babylonians. Nebuchadnezzar led his army again to beseige Jerusalem.

'If you want to save your lives. you must surrender. Jeremiah told the people; 'God will give Jerusalem to the Babylonians. Some of Zedekiah's officers were furious with Jeremiah. 

They put him into a well. There was no water in it, but it was very muddy at the bottom. They left Jeremiah there to die.


↪ Jeremiah the Prophet 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Beginning

Image
Every day should be a holy day Long ago, before there was any time. God created the heavens and the Earth. At first there was nothing but a vast dark space of swirling water.  God looked at the darkness and made the light. There was now the light of day and the dark of night. This was the very first day. On the second day, God made the sky. He put some of the water in clouds in the sky, and the rest of the water He made into the seas. In between the sky and the seas was the air. Then God collected the seas together so that there was dry land between them. He ordered all kinds of plants and trees to grow on the land to produce seeds and fruit. That was the third day. On the fourth day. God put the brilliant golden sun in the sky to shine during the day, and the silver moon and stars to shine at night. Together they marked the seasons of the year. Next God created all the fish and creatures that live in the seas, and all the birds and creatures that fly in the air. He blessed them, and t
Read more

Who's who in the Bible

Image
↪  Aaron  the brother, companion and helper of Moses. He spoke to the King of Egypt on behalf of Moses, asking him to let the Hebrews leave Egyp. According to the Book of Numbers, Aaron died at 123 years of age, on Mount Hor, in the fortieth year after the Israelites had come out of the land of Egypt. Deuteronomy, however, places these events at Moseroth. ↪   Absolom   son of David, who fought his father for the Kingdom. At Caesarea, in Cappadocia, the holy martyrs Lucius the Bishop. Caesarea Absolom, Lorgius, is a part of the William Blackwood & Sons published English language version of the Roman Breviary, the liturgical book of the rites of the Catholic Church containing hymns, readings, notations, and other religious material. What does Revelation 1:8 mean? In this verse John identifies Jesus as the Alpha and Omega. These are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet.  The designation emphasizes Jesus as eternal—the beginning and the end. As someone correctly observed; &
Read more

Ruth and Naomi

Image
I'll talk to him tomorrow When they reached Bethlehem, it was harvest time for the barley. Naomi and Ruth were very poor. To get food. Ruth walked out to the fields each morning and picked up the barley the reapers had left behind. Elimelech lived in the little town of Bethlehem. in Judah, with his wife, Naomi, and his two sons. There had been bad harvests and everyone was growing hungry.  To save his family. Elimelech took them on the long journey across the Jordan River to the country of Moab, where there was plenty of food. There Elimelech's two sons grew up, and married two girls, named Orpah and Ruth. Then Elimelech died and, later, the two sons also died.  Naomi was left alone with her daughters-in-law. When she heard that the crops were good again in Judah and there was plenty of food, she longed to go back to Bethlehem and be with her own people. 'Let us come with you', said Orpah and Ruth, and together the three women left their homes and began the journey back
Read more

From Origin

The word 'Bible', is the equivalent of the Greek word biblia (diminutive from bı́blos, the inner bark of the papyrus), meaning originally 'books.' The phrase 'the books' (ta biblia ) occurs in Daniel 9:2 (Septuagint) for prophetic writings. 

In the Prologue

to Sirach it designates generally the Old Testament Scriptures; similarly in 1 Macc 12:9 ("the holy books"). The usage passed into the Christian church for Old Testament (2 Clem 14:2), and by and by (circa 5th century) was extended to the whole Scriptures.

Bibliotheca Divina

Jerome's name for the Bible (4th century) was "the Divine Library" (3) Afterward came an important change from plural to singular meaning. In process of time this name, with many others of Greek origin, passed into the vocabulary of the western church; and in the 13th century, by a happy solecism, the neuter plural came to be regarded as a feminine singular, and 'The Books' became by common consent 'The Book' (biblia, singular), in which form the word was passed into the languages of modern Europe" (Westcott, Bible in the Church, 5).