Jeremiah 44:11-19 11 “Therefore this is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: I am determined to bring disaster on you and to destroy all Judah. 12 I will take away the remnant of Judah who were determined to go to Egypt to settle there. They will all perish in Egypt; they will fall by the sword or die from famine. From the least to the greatest, they will die by sword or famine. They will become a curse and an object of horror, a curse and an object of reproach. 13 I will punish those who live in Egypt with the sword, famine and plague, as I punished Jerusalem. 14 None of the remnant of Judah who have gone to live in Egypt will escape or survive to return to the land of Judah, to which they long to return and live; none will return except a few fugitives.” 15 Then all the men who knew that their wives were burning incense to other gods, along with all the women who were present—a large assembly—and all the people living in Lower and Upper Egypt, said to Jeremiah, 16 “We will not listen to the message you have spoken to us in the name of the Lord! 17 We will certainly do everything we said we would: We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven and will pour out drink offerings to her just as we and our ancestors, our kings and our officials did in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. At that time we had plenty of food and were well off and suffered no harm. 18 But ever since we stopped burning incense to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have had nothing and have been perishing by sword and famine.” 19 The women added, “When we burned incense to the Queen of Heaven and poured out drink offerings to her, did not our husbands know that we were making cakes impressed with her image and pouring out drink offerings to her?”
I can totally understand why is Jeremiah called the weeping prophet. How heartbreaking is that for God to say to His beloved people, they will be a curse and an object of horror, a curse and an object of reproach and that He will punish them!
God knows us even before we were born and the very hairs of our head are all numbered. God loves us dearly and faithfully. He created the light, the sky, the land, the seas, the plants, the trees, the sun, the moon, the stars, the creatures that live in the sea, the creatures that fly, the animals that live on the land and then finally humans. God has everything ready before humans came to be. Again and again for years God sent prophets to warn, to admonish the people of Israel. In verse 16 the Israelites said to Jeremiah, "We will not listen to the message you have spoken to us in the name of the Lord!" Their hearts were hard like stone, they turned God away, they worshiped other gods and they rejected the prophets that were sent by God.
If you know someone is about to walk into danger. Won't you inform them? If they ignore you, you will go get someone else to alert them until they are out of danger.
Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we praise You and we love You. The year of 2020 is truly not an easy year. With the pandemic, the wildfires, the earthquake, climate change crises, economic decline, man-made disasters and such. Please comfort, heal and provide those who have lost their loved ones, people need to recover their physical or mental health, who have financial needs and the like. Lord please watch over us, for You will neither slumber nor sleep. In Jesus's name we pray, Amen!
