Through the Bible (Jeremiah 51-52)

when we get to the book of daniel i'm going to spend some time talking about babylon architecturally and as far as being impenetrable in the city that that was paradise people called it paradise they really thought it was kind of heaven of some kind uh the streets were marbled and um the gates all the city gates had these specific strange blue colored bricks uh and these huge gates and then they had dragons and lions heads and stuff that you'd see as you'd walk up to the gates of the city of babylon it was a massive double-walled city one wall it was a smaller wall and then there was a moat where the euphrates river came in and it was split around the city and then that moat on the other side of wall was another well at the river the moat was another wall and that wall was gigantic and it had all these towers uh all the way around the city and those towers were hundreds of feet up in the air and the uh you know soldiers of babylon would stand guard looking for miles off of the distance and and uh you know there was just uh no way in people's minds that babylon could ever fall to anyone they thought this is the one this is the city that will be the eternal city the one that'll last because of our glorious walls and our strategy and tactics and our might and our power but as soon as you say that beware when you stand lest you fall pride goeth before destruction and a holy spirit before a fall and that was the problem with babylon and the babylonians and we'll see in the book of daniel more of a description of that because we get to kind of look on the inside a little bit of what was going on when babylon actually falls to the medes and the persians but the reason that's important for tonight is the last several chapters we've been going through jeremiah is kind of finishing his book with this notion of the fall of babylon and the destruction of babylon we've seen the destruction of the nations and we saw the moabites and the ammonites and the and the philistines and various people groups that the lord said i'm going to destroy you and i'm going to destroy you and you and you all these nations that he says i'm going to destroy well babylon they get several chapters of their description of their destruction and it's because of their attitude we learned last week if you were with us the bible kind of gave us a hint the lord used babylon to judge these nations and he used the the the nation babylon to judge the jews so you think well then why is he going to punish babylon for judging the jews if they were the sword in god's hand the babylonians why would god punish them well we learned last week because when the babylonians destroyed the jews they did it with great joy and they loved seeing the jews destroyed and not only that we learned last week that the babylonians they didn't know they were doing god service uh in fact they believed and we'll see this tonight even they believed that they were destroying the god of the jews in those days they believed that whoever's god was the strongest well that's that's who would win the war and so when bell and these other gods of babylon would be worshipped by the babylonians they'd think well bell must be greater than you know um jehovah the god of the jews and we defeated jehovah that's the way they looked at it but jehovah is here speaking through the prophet jeremiah saying you think you destroyed the god of the jews but here i am and you're gonna be crushed uh you were just a tool in my hand and and uh the lord would use the babylonians to to sort of spank the jews for their worshipping of other gods and sacrificing their children on altars and all kinds of evil and junk that they were doing and now it comes time to hear this you know destruction of babylon the fall of babylon now one of the things we did last week is you know we started this discussion and it gets pretty pretty detailed but we started in chapter 50 in chapter 50 very long chapter we began the discussion and then 51 is going to continue also a very long fairly tedious chapter uh we're gonna get through that tonight uh but there are little spots here i'm gonna stop us because there's some great little bits and pieces of stuff we can learn so it says here in chapter 51 verse 1. thus saith the lord behold i will raise up against babylon and against them that dwell in the midst of them that rise up against me a destroying wind and i will send unto babylon fanners that shall fan her and empty her land for in the day of trouble they shall be against her round about against him that bendeth let the archer bend his bow and against him that lifted up in his brigadine and spared he not her young men destroy ye utterly all her hosts thus the slain shall fall in the land of the chaldeans and they that are thrust through inner streets for israel hath not been forsaken nor judah of his god of the lord of hosts though their land was filled with sin against the holy one of israel now here in verse 5 is kind of what we were just mentioning the lord has not forsaken israel that's what the babylonians would think they were forsaken and we beat them thus their god is dead but really the lord is speaking to jeremiah i'm alive and well and i've not forsaken my people and there is a remnant of jews now uh small in number as they were there is a remnant of jews surviving in babylon in captivity and they'll be there for 70 years and then under the leadership of ezra nehemiah's rubbable they'll go back and restore and rebuild jerusalem after 70 years but that was going to be the you know the jews were hanging by a thread in their existence right now in the part of this part of the bible but the babylonians were gloating and the lord says you guys are going to be fanned what's this fanner thing verse 2 and i will send them to babylon fanners um that's a word that we don't really know as much or use but maybe you would understand that um if we talk about the you know when you take wheat and you throw it up in the air and uh and then you know the chaff is then blown away from the kernels of wheat and you know separating the wheat from the chaff well that's what the fanners that's by the word here in the original hebrew um it's those who separated the wheat from the chaff that was their job description and the the babylonians were used as fanners to separate god's people out uh the faithful from the non-faithful but the lord says you know here you're the ones who are going to receive the fanning you're going to be separated the chaff from the wheat and it's going to turn around on you but mark verse 5 this is really important it says for israel hath not been forsaken and god will never forsake his people how do we know god will never forsake the jews god's chosen people well it's because of his promise his eternal covenant that he had made with the jews and again we've talked about the various covenants that god made with the jews some of them are conditional covenants um like example uh if the lord had a promise to take care of the jews then why are they destroyed here by the babylonians the answer he had a conditional covenant if you follow my word keep my commandments statutes and judgments i'll protect you from these other nations but if you worship other gods and you forsake my commandments statutes and judgments i'm going to lift my hand of protection and these other nations are going to have a field day with you and that's exactly what happened here those were one of those conditional covenants god made with his people if you do this then this is going to happen but there are unconditional covenants like the abrahamic covenant where god says i will never forsake you as my people i will never never totally destroy you and i will ultimately cause you to prosper and ultimately a king will reign in jerusalem for eternity that's going to be a jew and that jew reigning in jerusalem for eternity is jesus that's right so um make sure when you hear people criticize the jews and say god's done with them uh you know there's churches that believe that there's a replacement theology that's out there that the church has replaced the jews that's really dangerous teaching dangerous although pope believes in replacement theology uh he doesn't believe god's chosen people are um at all the jews anymore that's why the vatican has a really wacko view of israel today and the way they treat israel and you know what's the first place the pope went to this week uh on his first uh kovid trip or antico kova trip he goes to muslim countries and there um you know he's trying to befriend and sort of this kind of ecumenical move that this pope is making to sort of include be inclusive of all faiths oh and by the way um you don't need to listen to my prophecy update because the pope said the world's coming to an end did you hear that he said it's coming to end it's the second great flood coming uh and uh he just said it's coming soon and he said it's because of the sin of the people the sin of climate change that's what he said yeah the world's covered in because of the sin of climate change and that's his eschatology not so brilliant i would just say he needs to dust off his bible and uh maybe read that for once but but the bible has a lot to say about the end of the world but he's got it wrong there but but all that to say um god's chosen people the jews any group that says god's done with the jews then you better be shaken in your tennies if you're a christian because if god forsook the jews because they were bad behavior how much more should he forsake you or why wouldn't he forsake you well brett i'm pretty good not compared to the jews like the jews were kind of our best foot forward if you look at them historically as following god and keeping the law of the old testament i mean these these people were reverent but they did forsake the lord and they had sin in their lives but good news for the church of jesus christ and good news for the jews he doesn't forsake his people the jews or the church of jesus christ we are his people you see you can't do one without the other for for the the church to say we have replaced the jews and the jews have been cut off stupid why is that stupid do you remember donald duck i liken the pope to donald duck i'll tell you why do you remember when donald duck got out of saw i think he was trying to fight chip and dale you know the little chick chipmunks for some nuts and a tree or something but donald duck starts cutting off the branch and remember he's on the wrong side of the branch and he's cutting it off and then the branch falls you know it's like not so bright right well what does the bible say the bible says the church has been grafted into the tree of what the jews we haven't cut down the jews say they're history and we're a new tree no the church has been grafted into the vine and so what is christianity christianity doesn't replace judaism judaism christianity continues to fulfill god's plan for all the earth through judaism do you understand that we're not jews most of us in this room but we're gentiles who've been grafted into the vine and if you ungraft it that that branch what happens to it it dies the church would die without the jews i think that it's such a short-sightedness to say god is done with the jews now in ephesians chapter 2 if you read it it says there's three people groups in the world there's jews gentiles and then there's the church that's what god's view is on that and as it turns out the church is made up of both jews and gentiles anyone who will follow and believe the messiah jesus uh and um and that's what is called the church so it's it's not that the church has replaced israel the church is a continuation of god's plan through israel that's important i harp on that because most of the denominations out there still believe kind of a a strange view of eschatology in the end times and god's plan for the jews and i say most it's really tragic because most churches don't even know what their view is like like because their pastors never talk about this stuff like if you ask your average catholic and you talk about this with them they'll say what are you talking about um but if you go to catholic.org and and look up catholic beliefs which most most of my catholic buddies don't do um but when it comes to israel it's replacement theology israel's done god's plan for the jews are done and uh that explains a lot of why they do what they do politically and stuff like that well be careful on that that's a dangerous teaching well i love it that the lord says i will not forsake israel that should cause you as a gentile or if you're a jew great comfort that the lord does not forsake his people and and i would put an asterisk there uh no matter what you've done no matter how sinful you've been the lord is able to save even to the uttermost the furthest out there and the lord once you're saved man once the lord has died on the cross for your sins and you've accepted that work of the cross you and i can apply this the lord has not forsaken us either um and you know the scriptures declare i will never leave you nor forsake you that's the lord that we serve i love that about our father so the jews are hanging by a thread but the lord has not forsaken them in this story and then verse 6 flee out of the midst of babylon and deliver every man his soul be not cut off in her iniquity for this is the time of the lord's vengeance he will render unto her a recompense um why does the lord say flee out of the midst of babylon the answer the lord even though he took them as punishment to babylon for 70 years of captivity one of the things we're going to hear is they were to rehearse in the ears of their children don't stay in babylon don't become a babylonian you've got to run for your life from this place the first moment we get a chance see that was the thing the babylonians wanted to get the jews kind of comfortable there and assimilate into their culture and then after 50 60 years there'd be no threat the jews would love it why would we move from paradise babylon back to the pile of rubble in jerusalem you know what's interesting about this this story that we're reading and maybe you remember when we were you know reading ezra and nehemiah and those books but according to ezra chapter 2 only 49 897 people returned from babylon you say well brett that's about how many people went to babylon yes but after 70 years there were hundreds of thousands of jews because of you know they had children and children's children within those 70 years and there were really hundreds of thousands of them by that time and the sad thing is is most of them stayed in babylon and never to be heard of again as jews it would be almost the same amount of people that were taken into captivity would come back ezra said 49 897. you say bro what does that have to do with me i don't care about babylon and jews exile for 70 years well here's the thing there's a there's a picture for you and me to not get too comfy in this world you know the jews that were there in babylon they started to get pretty comfortable and i love it that daniel and shadrach meshach and abednego these were guys that didn't bow down to babylon remember when nebby put up his statue of gold and said everybody when the music plays bow down and worship and uh you know and so shatter meshach and bending didn't bow down they were not going to bow down to the images of babylon we're going to heat this furnace seven times hotter if you don't do it we're gonna try it one more time okay strike up the music and they did it again i remember one of my favorite album covers i'd sit and look at when i was a little kid see we used to have these things called records um and you could look at the album work artwork because it was big uh um it was a little digital picture on your iphone but but i remember keith green's record cover of no compromise that record you know and and there's this a bunch of people you know thousands of people bowing down to this golden statue but this one little humble jew is standing there and he won't bow down and this babylonian on this huge fierce horse comes riding up his muscles and he's furiously ah you know and this guy this humble jew is just standing there and he's not gonna bow down it's just i remember as a kid i just left an impression on me as no compromise that's what it means not to give in to the world not to become like the world and um and i feel like that as parents mom and dad you have a job to do like these captivity jews had to do they had to say junior we're living in babylon but you are not a babylonian remember jerusalem we're going to see that later they're going to say rehearse in their ears about how we're going to go back to jerusalem one day and rebuild our city and don't let your kids get too comfy here in this world you know the scriptures tell us you know and paul the apostle had a lot to say about not setting your affections on things of this earth but on things above and and there's this notion uh where we as christians try to be comfortable in this world but i think that might be a perhaps a mistake for us to try to be really comfortable and fit in as much um i even see this tendency for churches and church behavior where we let's try to be relevant to this world and you know hip and cool the problem with christians trying to be hip and cool we're usually about three or four years behind the curve on that like we do that which was hip and cool three or four years earlier but then it looks really dumb four years later i remember about 10 years after hootie and the blowfish were famous we were living in sherwood at the time dev and i and the kids and and i got a thing on my doorknob there was a church that stuck a little thing on doorknob saying come to our church and you know as a pastor these things entertained me i grabbed the little thing what does this say and i said come to our church our church is relevant and and we our worship team sounds like hootie and the blowfish and i was like oh how painful like that's too bad they were trying they were trying to be something you know that was hip and cool or so they thought but hootie was popular well you know we just get kind of weird sometimes as christians come ye out from among them and be ye separate that's what the bible says be different you're strangers pilgrims sojourners in a strange land don't get too comfy in this world and in the same way that the jews had to kind of get it in their minds we're not going to become babylonians while we're living here that was that was hard and a lot of them actually would be assimilated sad to say into the babylonian culture well that's verse six and we'll see more of that even tonight flee out of the midst of babylon deliver every man his soul well verse seven babylon have been a golden cup in the lord's hand that made all the earth drunken the nations have drunken of her wine therefore the nations are mad babylon has suddenly fallen and destroyed howl for her take balm for her pain if so she may be healed we would have healed babylon but she has not healed forsake her and let us go everyone into his own country for her judgment reacheth unto heaven and is lifted up even to the skies the lord hath brought forth our righteousness come and let us declare in zion that's jerusalem the work of the lord our god make bright the arrows gather the shields the lord hath raised up the spirit of the kings of the medes for his device is against babylon to destroy it because it is the vengeance of the lord the vengeance of his temple set in the standard upon the walls of babylon make the watch strong set up the watchmen prepare the ambushes for the lord hath both delivered and done that which he hath spake and spake against the inhabitants of babylon now there's one thing here that's kind of cool and this is where it's amazing to me how the bible critics love verses like this because they say see the book of jeremiah is a forgery and they just assume that why because jeremiah says something here that nobody could have known at the time when jeremiah wrote this we know jeremiah wrote this somewhere before 586 bc he wrote this verse 11 um raise up the spirit of the kings of the medes for his devices against babylon to destroy it and if you know your history what happened well after nebuchadnezzar then you know nabonidus and after nobody came belt built shazzar and it was during the time of belt shazar quite a few years later before the meads and the persons were really a big threat nobody even cared about the maids and the persons when jeremiah wrote this but he basically said but the medes are going to come so shine up their armor sharpen up their arrows because they're going to come and it's going to be the medes who are going to come and wipe out babylon how did jeremiah know that the answer the lord told him that's the bible the bible's inspired when a person like jeremiah wrote the words god was saying the means i wonder if jeremiah said the medes like lord really i mean that'd be like you know here's the united states you know we're one of the greatest powers in the world but that be like saying suddenly um the united states me coming out with a prophecy i have a word for the lord and you'd say what what's that jamaica is gonna attack the united states and they're going to destroy us and they're going to make us be servants and we're going to be all saying no problem man or whatever you know like it'll be a whole other deal you'd say brett that's whacked to say that you know jamaica's gonna attack the united st similar the medes and the persians were not really much of a thing yet they were growing during this time and they would grow to be this massive army eventually and they would take over babylon jeremiah is going to even give us a little bit of a hint as to how they're going to do it this is because it's prophecy so the secularist the anti-bible atheist type will say well this must be a forgery then the book of jeremiah has to be a forgery because there's no way jeremiah could have known that well that's your opinion but my opinion is god told jeremiah these things and that's why we know it's true now um this you can't really do what i'm about to explain with this but you can with a lot of other things let me explain for example the book that the script the critics hate the most is the book of daniel and the reason why is daniel was writing his book somewhere around the time of jeremiah not that much later than jeremiah and so jeremiah made all kinds of prophecies that were crazy he said that the medes and the persians were going to come and then after the meeting in person we'll come the greeks with alexander the great and even talked about alexander the great not by name but by there's going to be a strong authoritative man who will come and lead uh and he'll have the four generals you know alexander will come and after alexander will come another empire the the rome the legs uh you know of iron and you know and then you know the last uh nations of the world like daniel told how it was all gonna so you know ancient people even said that this was a forgery pophary was an ancient historian who said book of daniel had been writing it written in 90 a.d because that's what you have to date daniel as because he wrote so much stuff with so much clarity they're saying it has to have been written in 90 a.d like after jesus even but the reason i love it when they say that and you college students just savor the moment if your prof starts saying the book of daniel is a forgery because there's no way he could have known what was coming so it hadn't been written written in 98. man you've got them college students don't let your profs just sit there and say book of daniel's a forgery like my profs did in my college of that godly institution southern oregon state university minnie berkeley is really what it was but um but if they say that you've got to because guess what the every numskull knows that the old testament was translated into the greek the hebrew bible you know the whole testament was translated into greek in like 270 bc and that's not even arguable like nobody's arguing that one because it's so provable and what book is included in the septuagint the book of daniel so so at least you can't say that it was at 90. you have to go all the way back to 270 because it was included there and nobody even debates that um and what's so great is some of those prophecies that daniel spoke of many of them would come after the 270 date and it proves that daniel knew stuff that nobody else knew why because the lord was giving him his word so watch out these guys will try to take a scripture like this well jeremiah is a forgery because he said the medes and that they they hadn't even formed a strong army yet no big deal this is god who the bible says god is the only one who knows the beginning from the end he knows the end of the story and the beginning of the story um god's perspective you know we look at this world like we're sitting at the rose parade like we used to when we went out in people groups and actually saw things and people but when we'd see the rose parade you'd see things go by there's the you know tualatin high school marching band there's the the you know float and the parade and the roses and all that and it'll go by and you see it linearly but if you get up in the coin chapter chopper and you look and you see from the beginning burdenside to whatever you know you see the whole parade the whole enchilada that's god's view god sees the whole thing the beginning from the end and and that's how he in his bible tells us prophetic events makes the bible separate from all other books all of the religious writings the bible is far superior just because of its prophecy that's just one one thing well so this is all jeremiah and we'll see a few more things that he'll predict as well verse 13. o thou that dwellest upon many waters abundant in treasures thine end is come and the measure of thy covetousness the reason why babylon is called the ones that dwell on many waters because it's got the whole euphrates river uh to water the city so that the babylonians were under the impression that if they were besieged by another nation they could live in the walls of babylon comfortably without even feeling a moment of stress for 20 years so if you were going to besiege babylon you had to be in for the long haul good luck with that 20 years um so they said we have enough water but the lord says it's not going to work verse 14 the lord of hosts hath sworn by himself saying surely i will fill thee with men as with caterpillars and they shall lift up a shout against thee he hath made the earth by his power he has established the world by his wisdom and has stretched out the heaven by his understanding boy that's something to meditate on um and uh it is interesting because some of the scientific brains that are also christians they see language here that i don't honestly and especially when you look at the hebrew text about the way god created the heavens and the earth and there's uh mysterious ways of putting things about how god created stuff so for you guys with minds that think like that you might do a little word study in this little section about like this when it says that the lord stretched out the heaven by his understanding there's some there's some kind of mysterious things about creation there that might just be tucked into this passage verse 16 when he uttereth his voice there is a multitude of waters in the heavens and he causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth and he maketh lightnings with rain and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasures every man is brutish by his knowledge every founder is confounded by the graven image for his molten image as falsehood and there's no breath in them they are vanity the work of errors in the time of their visitation they shall perish the portion of jacob is not like them for he is the former of all things and israel is the rod of his inheritance the lord of hosts is his name or jehovah is the word there the lord jehovah of hosts is his name so it's saying the lord stretched out the heavens of the earth that's what sets him apart from all the other fake gods of the babylonians they did nothing and the person who makes them is stupid perhaps you're not supposed to call people stupid the bible calls people stupid so i call people stupid uh the king james the king james says it right here verse 17 if you look it up it says every man is brutish by his knowledge or you know thinking he's smart but he's actually brutish brutish is a nice way of saying stupid if you look up the word brutish in the hebrew dictionary it says stupid like seriously get your dictionary out and it's pretty funny so the bible calls people brutish all the time there is such thing as a stupid person and as it turns out there are such things as stupid questions uh so be careful about that but anyway it says the person that thinks that he's really smart oftentimes is a brutish or stupid man do we see stupidity today people that think they're so smart man you know they killed mr potato head and dr seuss all in one week because they're so smart and they know things what do they know i don't i think they're brutish it's really funny to watch what people get all up in a tizzy about these days but there's a lot of stupidity going around um and man we call it wise you know the bible in the last days talks about how we'll call good evil and evil good you know it's amazing to me what we're doing today well all that to say the portion of jacob which is god he's going to still be there while those other gods are going to be gone the lord of hosts is his name and this is just god telling through jeremiah your gods of babylon are going to fail you because they're stupid and the people that make them are stupid but you can't say that remember the psalmist said those who make them are like them uh and the brutish man is the one who makes the idol and follows after idols now before we're too hard on the babylonians and yeah they're a bunch of stupid people do we have idols today well the answer is yes brett are you talking about like when i like to watch american idolatry i mean american idol i mean that's such a great show it's my favorite show hey listen it's funny because we we do make idols and i don't have a problem with that show but i do have a problem we have our own versions of idols don't we and and here's the thing that's most dangerous it's not that we call them certain names but there there are um spiritual sinful things associated with each idol for example um you know asteroth was associated with fertility and sexuality and so people that worship sexuality in our culture and are you know really into that which is so much of our culture we've fallen for the goddess extra who's behind astroth but brett you said those idols are nothing they can't speak or hear or do anything that's true but what's behind those idols um demonic entities i believe satan is alive and well wanting to sort of lure people with the goddess of astroth just like they did in those days or baal was a god of prosperity we have the same thing we want we're materialists and we we tend to be greedy and we worship at the altar of bill we just don't call it that it's the same notion so is god gonna judge these gods that's the question i have for you tonight brett if they're nothing and they're just wood or stone or gold or silver gods will god judge them the answer we'll see it's coming tonight so verse 20 thou art my battle axe and weapons of war for with thee will i break in pieces the nations and with thee will i destroy kingdoms this was you know the babylonians god used them as his own weapon and with thee will i break in pieces of the horse and his rider and with thee will i break in pieces of the chariot and his rider with thee also will i break in pieces man and woman and with thee will i break in pieces old and young and with thee i will break in pieces of the young man and the maid i will also break in pieces with thee the shepherd and his flock and with thee i will break in peace as the husbandman and his yoke of oxen and with thee will i break in pieces the captains and the rulers and i will render unto babylon and to all the inhabitants of the chaldea and all their evil that they have done in zion in your sight saith the lord behold i'm against thee o destroying mountain saith the lord which destroys all the earth and i will stretch out mine hand upon thee and roll thee down from the rocks and i will make thee a burnt mountain and they shall not take of thee a stone for a corner nor a stone for foundations but thou shalt be desolate forever saith the lord interesting you know paul would use this stone cornerstone to talk about jesus as well as big parts of the old testament that jesus is the cornerstone that is enduring and lasting but in babylon the city that they thought was built by stones that would never fall apart the lord says yeah you're going down and you're going to be crushed interesting that they would be desolate because babylon today is desolate if you go there today it's just really not that big a deal like i told you a few weeks ago nebuchadnezzar of the modern day was saddam hussein he called himself nebuchadnezzar and he was going to rebuild babylon that was his goal before he got strung up interesting story there with old saddam hussein he really thought himself of the new babylon and the same symbols of ancient babylon the lion and all that stuff it was all part of his rebuilding and we have soldiers in our church that were part of the uh army that went in or the military that went in to when during the iraq war to uh go and subdue ancient babylon we've had eighth greekers who've walked through saddam hussein's palaces that he was building uh to and they just sit there empty and desolate really for the most part um and that's the way it's gonna sit the big question is and man we don't have time for this tonight because it says it'll be desolate forever saith the lord but in the last days there's going to be a rebuilding of babylon the bible says um and it's going to be a mighty babylon and in the book of revelation remember how it says oh babylon babylon you know you'll fall in in just a half a a day like it's just going to it's gonna fall the question is is the ain't the ancient babylon going to be rebuilt in the last days or is it is it talking about more of a spiritual babylon because we know there's a religious babylon there's an economic babylon in the end times and god refers to it that way and so we have some work to do and we'll we'll talk more about that and what we what the possibilities are when we get to daniel we're getting there in a few weeks or you can go listen to our teachings in the book of daniel or revelation we talk about babylon and all that well verse 27 set e up a standard in the land blow the trumpet among the nations prepare the nations against her call together against her the kingdoms of arat minai and achines appoint a captain against her cause the horses to come up as the rough caterpillars um now by the way the caterpillars we've talked about a few times like not the caterpillars they're so scary some of your translations and some scholars believe this better translates as locust you guys been following the news on the locust in the middle east this week it's crazy they're saying this could be some of the worst of in the world's history uh the plague of locusts that's hitting the middle east right now as we speak kind of interesting kind of end times-ish maybe we'll talk about that on friday night at the prophecy update uh but that's probably what we're talking about the destruct you know we we don't fathom uh what a locust can do but if you study locusts they're basically grasshoppers that for whatever reason and science is not completely sure about how this all works out you might say where do these locus come from and how does this happen a swarm all sudden so big it's bigger than a whole country and how do they destroy suddenly and then where do they go it has to do with these normal grasshoppers that for some reason go through a season of abnormalcy where they grow and they have a whole different personality they're normally sweet little grasshoppers kids could go and stick on a hook and catch a trout like i did when i was a kid but uh what happens is they sort of change they metamorphosize for a season and they become super aggressive and super hungry and they grow really huge and they usually last for a short season then those big ones kind of die off and they get back to more their normal size and it's this really strange process but isn't it interesting the lord used locust in ancient times plagues of locusts to judge nations it kind of cracks me up you know when you think about it as much as you know a plague of locusts eats everything that's green or edible so that people die of starvation what happens after a plague of lucas is people die in famine because the locust ate everything but isn't it amazing the lord can use a little bug to destroy a nation i mean egypt was the most powerful nation in the world at the time that the jews were there enslaved and is it an amazing story that the lord used some bugs to destroy a nation who's going to deliver you out of my hand yo brinner said and pharaoh and moses the lord will show you his hand here in just a minute all sudden ribbit frogs covering the land oh the land stinks please get rid of these frogs okay never mind we want our slaves forget it the frogs are gone whatever okay here's some flies bugs and the lord bugged pharaoh and he bugged him and he bugged him lice and flies and until he finally got his people free lord could use a little bug to destroy a powerful nation do you ever feel like um humanity we think we're pretty great up until there's an ice storm and we don't have internet anymore what are we gonna do we don't have internet and power uh we become pretty feeble pretty quick without our power um and uh we think we're so great but i think those little moments of ice storms like we had a couple weeks ago just remind us that we could be toast so fast and it could be some natural event like it was such a weird thing i remember on the ice storm that we had and those of you guys that live here in oregon they're watching online it was a weird deal i mean we've seen ice storms before but this one just lasted and i remember stepping outside the door at midnight just and we live out in kind of the country out by aurora and i remember just listening about midnight and you could just hear the silence broken every three or five seconds off in the woods in the distance you hear this and then now if you drive down the roads here it looks like we went through world war iii here in the portland area like trees laying all over the roads and and they're still cleaning up the 205 was jammed up today because they were trying to get trees still pulled off the highways and stuff like it's it was an amazing thing and just a quiet little ice storm things were just kind of chilly and it rained a little bit and and the weight of that ice on those branches and trees i saw trees that were six feet in diameter just split right down the middle i mean it's amazing the power that the lord can just say oh let's use a few raindrops that kind of freeze and build up to where that weighs ten thousand pounds worth of ice and crushes everything um we were driving out to estacada we saw a house with just a crushed roof a tree went right through like it's amazing the damage and destruction um so remember this you know when we start putting our trust and all of our wealth and our power and our roof over our heads and we were talking the other day about the book of revelation i'm way of course uh i still have a lot of verses um we were talking about in the book of revelation uh how it says there's going to be 100 pound hailstones that will fall and hit this planet do you think your roof's going to help you on that one picture this a 90 pound bag of cement being dropped from 10 000 feet falling on your house how's your house going to do with that um unfortunately if you're a christian we're not going to be here for that uh that's we're going to be taken up to be with the lord in the rapture of the church but again i am way off course so uh we got this caterpillar issue where where did i leave off 28 oh man we got to hurry okay here we go verse 28 prepare against her the nations with the kings of the medes the captains thereof and all the rulers thereof and all the land of his dominion and the land shall tremble and sorrow for every purpose of the lord shall be performed against babylon to make the land of babylon a desolation without an inhabitant the mighty men of babylon have foreborn to fight they have remained in their holds their might hath failed they became as women and have sorry ladies and um i know this is very not politically correct uh the men became like women in her dwelling places her bars are broken um the bar is broken uh um do you guys remember how the medes and the persians led by uh darius and cyrus how did they get into babylon the impenetrable city anybody remember right they dried up the euphrates river and then they broke the bars uh that were the great that was the water that went into the city and they just broke those up and went in on dry ground and took over the city that way while bill chaser was partying their handwriting on the wall it's an amazing story so again prediction by jeremiah years before it would happen verse 31 one post shall run to meet another excuse me and one messenger to meet another to show the king of babylon that his city has taken at one end and that the passengers are stopped and the reeds they have burned with fire and the men of war are frightened for thus saith the lord of hosts the god of israel the daughter of babylon is like a threshing floor it is time to thresher yet a little while and the time of her harvest shall come nebuchadnezzar the king of babylon hath devoured me hath crushed me he hath made me an empty vessel he has swallowed me up like a dragon he have filled his belly with my delicacy you know delicates and hath cast me out the violence done to me and to my flesh be upon babylon shall the inhabitant of zion say and my blood upon the inhabitants of chaldea shall jerusalem say therefore thus saith the lord behold i will plead thy cause and take vengeance for thee and i will dry up her sea and make her springs dry that's exactly what happened the meads of the persons dried up the euphrates river two miles upriver from babylon verse 37 and babylon shall become heaps a dwelling place for dragons and astonishment and hissing without an inhabitant they shall roar together like lions they shall yell as lions whelps in their heat will i make their feasts and i will make them drunken that they may rejoice and sleep a perpetual sleep and not awake saith the lord they're going to drink till they're drunk and then they're going to die what happened to belshazzar he got drunk remember when he got drunk that night that's what happened this is all very specific verse 40 i will bring them down like lambs to the slaughter like rams with he goats how is she shack taken and how is the people how is the praise of the whole earth surprised how is babylon become an astonishment among the nations the sea has come up upon babylon she is covered with the multitude of the waves thereof her cities are a desolation a dry land and a wilderness a land wherein no man dwelleth neither doth any son of man pass thereby and i will punish bell in babylon and i will bring forth out of his mouth that which he hath swallowed up and the nation shall not flow together any more unto him yea the wall of babylon shall fall so there's the answer to the question will god punish the gods of babylon even though they're just rocks and stones remember there's demonic entities behind them so it says here and i will punish bell that's the god of babylon and the lord says i'm going to punish that god and he's going to go down to be remembered no more verse 45 my people go ye out of the midst of her there again get out of babylon when you can and deliver ye every man his soul from the fierce anger of the lord and lest your heart faint and ye fear for the rumor that shall be heard in the land a rumor shall both come one year and after that in another year shall come a rumor and of and violence in the land ruler against ruler therefore behold the days that come that i will do judgment upon the graven images of babylon and her whole land shall be confounded and all her slain shall fall in the midst of her and the heaven and the earth and all that is therein shall sing for babylon for the spoilers shall come for her from the north saith the lord as babylon hath caused the slain of israel to fall so at babylon shall fall the slain of all the earth ye that have escaped the sword go away stand not still remember the lord afar off and let jerusalem come into your mind we are confounded because we have heard reproach shame hath covered our faces for strangers are come into the sanctuaries of the lord's house wherefore behold the days come saith the lord that i will do judgment upon her graven images and though pardon me through all her land and wounded shall be the wounded shall groan so again reminder to the jews don't forget jerusalem let jerusalem come into your mind it says here in verse 50. uh this is the word for jeremiah to these people that are in captivity now verse 53 though babylon should mount up to heaven and though she should fortify the height of her strength yet from me shall spoilers come into her saith the lord a sound of a cry cometh from babylon and great destruction from the land of chaldeans because the lord hath spoiled babylon and destroyed out of her the great voice when her waves do roar like great waters a noise of their voice is uttered because the spoilers come upon her even upon babylon and her mighty men are taken every one of their bows is broken for the lord of the lord god of recompenses shall surely requite and i will make her drunk princes um i will make drunker princess and her wise men her captains and her rulers and her mighty men and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep it's a nice way of saying dead and not wake saith the king whose name is the lord of hosts thus saith the lord of hosts the broad walls of babylon shall be utterly broken her high gates shall be burned with fire and the people shall labor in vain and the folk in the fire they shall be weary the word which jeremiah the prophet commanded sarah the son of neriah the son of messiah and he went with zedekiah and the king of judah into babylon in the fourth year of his reign and this sarah was a quiet prince so jeremiah wrote in a book so jeremiah wrote in a book all the evil that should come upon babylon even all these words that are written against babylon and jeremiah said to sariah when thou cometh to babylon and shalt see and shall read all these words then shalt thou say o lord thou spoken against this place to cut it off that none shall remain in it neither man nor beast but it shall be desolate forever and it shall be when thou hast made an end of reading this book that thou shalt bind a stone to it and cast it in the midst of the euphrates and thou shalt say thus shalt babylon sink and shall not rise from the evil and i will bring upon that i will bring upon her and they shall be weary thus far are the words of jeremiah now right here seems like a great place to end the book the end now here's the thing that we see is we see i hope you're getting the picture the picture is this amazing king of all kings lord of all lords saying babylon's toast and the world the world would have said okay that's not going to happen babylon's amazing but god's saying just watch and when all this comes to pass this dude's sirai or whatever his name is verse 39 who was taken into captivity with zedekiah he's going to read the words that he's going to take it and throw it in the river and say that's what's going to happen to babylon as you see the sink of the river the end your toast the mighty lord of lords now let me just say a couple things one this is all about babylon during the time of jeremiah but some might say you can glean some interesting things about the destruction in the fall of babylon as it's written in the book of revelation in the future and there's some interesting correlations and we'll go over those in a future date because it'll make more sense and what have you um now what was the scripture i i missed last week's scripture it was fifth chapter 50. turn back a page or two i've got a few verses i left out accidentally but it's more destruction of babylon are you excited about this chapter 50 go back there verse 35 uh to the end we left that out because i ran out of time last week so uh let's let's go ahead and finish that up verse 35 and then we'll finish up the last chapter don't worry it won't take long we already covered a huge part of last the last chapter but in verse 35 of chapter 50 it says a sword upon the chaldeans saith the lord and upon the inhabitants of babylon and her princes and upon her wise men by the way the chaldeans was a sect of the babylonians but they're often associated with the wise ones of babylon so remember when nebuchadnezzar called the chaldeans and the soothsayers the magicians and all that the chaldeans were always numbered among the wise ones but they're also going down verse 36 a sword upon the liars they shall dote a sword is upon her mighty men and they shall be dismayed a sword is on their horses and upon their chariots upon the mingled people that are in the midst of her and they shall become as women a sword is upon her treasures and they shall be robbed this is basically a poly ethnic group but some babylonians they were as close to a um the melting pot as the united states was not as much but close uh the united states is a melting pot of a bunch of different people groups from all over the world because we all came here but in babylon they destroyed everybody and they they saved some of the people and mixed them all up that's this mixed mingled people verse 38 a drought is upon her waters they shall be dried up for it is the land of graven images and uh they are mad upon their idols they're crazy upon their idols verse 9 therefore the wild beasts of the desert with the wild beasts of the islands shall dwell there and the owls shall dwell therein and it shall no more be inhabited forever neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation as god overthrew sodom and gomorrah the neighbor cities thereof saith the lord so shall no man abide there neither shall any son dwell of man dwell therein behold the people shall come from the north a great nation and many kings shall be raised up from the coasts of the earth and they shall hold the bow and lance they are cruel and will not show mercy their voice shall roar like the sea they shall ride upon horses everyone put in a ray like man to the battle against the o daughter of babylon the king of babylon hath heard the report of them and his hands waxed feeble anguish took hold of him and pangs as a woman in travail behold he shall come up like a lion from the swelling of jordan and to the habitation of the strong but i will make them suddenly run away from her and who is a chosen man that i may appoint over her for who is like me and who will appoint me at the time and who is this that shepherd that will stand before me therefore hear ye the council of the lord that he that hath taken against babylon and his purposes and he purposed against the land of chaldeans surely the least of the flock shall draw them out surely he shall make their habitation desolate with them as at the noise of the taking of babylon the earth is moved and the cry has heard among the nations why would the lord spend so much time chapter 50 51 these hugely long chapters usually yeah they're long and brutal uh why would the lord spend so much time talking about babylon he only gave little sections to moab am and all these the reason why is babylon stands for something more than just any old city and it goes all the way back to the book of genesis at the tower of babel where babylon started and if you remember the reason the lord scattered the people in the nations at that time was because that was going to be man's effort to pretty much replace god um you know they were going to pretty much build this tower this ziggurat or whatever that would reach to the heavens and they would it had very pagan uh and and uh was linked to the god marduk by the way of babylon um but isn't it interesting that babylon from all the way back in the book of genesis all the way to the book of revelation it's always talked about and you and i don't think much about babylon today because it sits there over in iraq and nobody cares about it right now but spiritually it started in genesis it's going to end in the book of revelation and a lot of this destruction that's mentioned here is sort of foretelling kind of the end of humanity and humanity's wisdom so there's much here when we read about the fall and destruction of babylon you can also sort of realize that that's synonymous with the destruction of humanity in general but the lord's going to take his people out of babylon just like he's going to take us out of this world and he's going to save us from the destruction of babylon so the bad news is babylon's going down the good news is we're not part of that group so heavy chapters let's finish up chapter 52 quickly now like i said the end of chapter 51 looks like it was going to be over um but now we have this appendix as many scholars call it and the funny thing is almost word for word you're going to recognize the wording of this we've already read much of this chapter in parts of jeremiah and parts of chronicles and second kings second chronicles even in jeremiah 39 jeremiah 52 they all kind of correla correlate with each other and some of them word for word why are they here at the end i believe it's inspired by god to remind us of what happened to these people zedekiah first um if you're john now notes we see number one the the king dethroned the king to throne zedekiah was one and 20 years old when he began to reign he reigned 11 years in jerusalem his mother's name was hamuto the daughter of jeremiah of libya different jeremiah by the way and he did that which was evil in the eyes of the lord according to all the jehoiakim had done for though the anger for me through the anger of the of the lord it came to pass in jerusalem and judah until he had cast them out from his presence that zedekiah rebelled against the king of babylon against jeremiah the prophet's counsel if you recall and verse four it came to pass in the ninth year of his reign the tenth month tenth day of the month that nebuchadnezzar king of babylon came he and all his army against jerusalem and pitched against it and built forts against and round about it the dating here and this you know all this stuff about the uh 10th month and the 10th day of the months why is it so detailed four times the bible gives us this very day on the calendar because it's the destruction of babylon or apartment jerusalem it's a big deal according to the lord so verse 5 the city was besieged through the 11th year of king zedekiah and in the fourth month and the ninth day of the month the famine was sore in the city so that there was no bread for the people to the land um then the city was broken up and all the men of war fled and went forth out of the city by night by the way of the gate between the two walls which was by the king's garden now the chaldeans were by the city round about and they went by the way of the plane but the army of the chaldeans pursued after the king and overtook zedekiah in the plains of jericho and all his army was scattered from him they took the king and carried him up the king of babylon to rib ribla in the land of hamath where he gave judgment upon him and the king of babylon slew the sons of zedekiah before his eyes he slew all the princes of judah and ribla then he put out the eyes of zedekiah the king of babylon bound him with chains and carried him into babylon put him in prison until the day of his death does that sound familiar did we read that already yes several times it's it's written in the bible about this um the blinding of the eyes is something that's an interesting idiom in the bible samson's included zedekiah but i think jesus gave us a little bit of a commentary on this idea of blinding what sin does it binds you up we talked about that on sunday but it also blinds you like samson but also zedekiah listen to what jesus said in john chapter 12 he says but though he had done so many miracles before them yet they believed not on jesus so first of all they would not believe on jesus that saying of isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled which was spake of the lord who hath believed our report to whom the lord arm of the lord been revealed therefore they could not believe because isaiah said again he hath blinded their eyes and hardened their heart that they should not see with their eyes nor understand with their heart and be converted zedekiah is a picture of those who know that god exists but they would not believe so that the lord hardens their heart so that they could not believe and then or you know should not believe or see so that they eventually could not um that's the way it works and it sounds harsh and brutal but the lord says listen i want you to see and i want you to be saved but if you harden your heart against the lord the spirit of the lord will not always strive with man zedekiah is a picture of that hardened sinner who says yeah whatever i'm not going to believe in god and there's eventually a time like with zedekiah the lord will say well you don't want to see what jeremiah said you don't want to see what i've shown you zedekiah so you won't see and that's what happens to the non-believer there's a point of no return now the tough news is you and i don't know what that is i think the lord does it on purpose so that we always share the lord with people even if we think they're the most lost sinner and that they would never come to christ there's people i've seen come to christ that were the last people on the earth i would have thought come to christ so don't ever give up sharing the good news with people but the lord knows and there's a time where he can harden someone's heart and you can share the gospel till you're blue in the face but they will not see because they've made that choice zedekiah is the picture of that which is really a sad story so the first thing we see is a king de throne secondly we see the city demolished verse 12. now in the fifth month of the tenth day of the month which was the 19th year of nebuchadnezzar king of babylon excuse me came nebuchadnez nebus are adam captain of the guard which served the king of babylon in jerusalem and he burned the house of the lord of the king's house and the houses of jerusalem and the houses of the great men burned he with fire and they and all the army of the chaldeans that were with the captain of the guard break down all the walls of jerusalem round about uh they wanted to destroy it so that it would never be rebuilt again one of the most fascinating archaeological digs in jerusalem right now as they're building up digging up these ruins right now and they've found the palaces of david all the way back to david's time it's really something and when we go to israel that's one of the fun places we stopped to see so that is the city demolished number two number three the people deported verse 15. then nebus are adam the captain of the guard carried away captive certain of the poor of the people and the residue of the people that remained in the city and those that fell away that fell to the king of babylon and the rest of the multitude but nebu zaradan the captain of the guard left certain of the poor of the land for vin vine dressers and for husband remember the poor people he left and they took over the lake oswego homes we talked about that number uh four section worship denied verse 17. also the pillars of brass that were the house of the lord the bases and the brazen sea that's the labor and that was in the house of the lord the chaldeans broke and carried all the brass of them to babylon the cauldrons also the shovels the snuffers the bowls the spoons the vessels the brass where they ministered and took away the basins and the fire pans and the bowls and the cauldrons and the candlesticks and the spoons and the cups which was of gold in the in gold and that which was of silver in silver took the captain of the guard away the two pillars in one sea and 12 brazen bulls that were under the bases uh which king solomon had made in the house of the lord the brass of all these vessels was without weight in other words immediate immeasurable and concerning the pillars the height of one pillar was 18 cubits 18 cubits a cubit is 18 inches about the tip of your finger to your elbow so these were huge pillars two pillars you guys remember the pillars had uh two names that were given to them by the lord anybody remember uh it's jkin and boaz which means strength and counsel and so there's symbology going on here as these pillars are crushed down strength and counsel's gone that's what you lose when you sin strength and counsel so the pillars it says there were 12 cubits did compass it and the thickness was four fingers it was hollow and the chapter or the crown of these pillars was of brass upon it the height of one chapter was five cubits with the network of pomegranates and up the chapters roundabout of all brass the second pillar also the pomegranates were like these and they were the 90 and six pomegranates on the side and all the pomegranates where the network were 100 round about we covered this by the way when we were building the temple uh during the solomon era of our bible study and we talked about the pomegranates and the pillars and all their meanings all this is now crushed which has great meaning basically their toast to say the least uh the fifth section of this so so far we have the king dethroned secondly the city demolished thirdly the people deported um fourthly worship denied and then fifthly we have the leaders are destroyed it says in verse 24 the captain of the guard took sarah the chief priest of z and zephaniah the second priest and the three keepers of the door he took also out of the city a eunuch which had the charge of the men of war and seven men of them that were near the king's person which were found in the city and the principal scribe of the host who mustered the people of the land and three score men of the people of the land that were found in the midst of the city so nebu zaradan the captain of the guard took them and brought them to the king of babylon to ribla ribla by the way is the place where everything bad happens if you find yourself in ribla as a jew during this time you're pretty much dead that's where zedekiah gets his eyes poked out and his son's killed but it's also what happens here verse 27 and the king of babylon smote them and put them to death in ribla in the land of hamath thus judah was carried away captive out of his own land and then this then this uh then is the people whom nebuchadnezzar this is the people who nebuchadnezzar carried away captive in the seventh year 3 000 jews 3 and 3 and 20 in the 18th year of nebuchadnezzar he carried away captive from jerusalem 832 uh persons and in three and twelfth year of nebu nebushar adan the captain of the guard carried away captive of the jews 745 persons all the persons were four thousand and six hundred remember these are numbers uh that were kind of different the way we would number it they were numbers of men of war men that could fight um so you kind of have to do the different kind of counting if you count women children and elderly the only thing that mattered to them is how many men could kill you you know who could fight and that's how they numbered these people finally uh this is the last several verses here we covered on sunday let's finish and then we'll call tonight it came to pass in the seventh and thirteenth uh pardon me seventh and thirtieth year of the captivity of jehoiachin king of judah in the twelfth month and the five and twentieth day of the month that evil merida king of babylon in the first year of his reign lifted up the head of jehoiachin king of judah and brought him forth out of prison and spake kindly unto him and set his throne above the throne of the kings that were with him in babylon and changed his prison garments and he did continually eat bread before him all the days of his life and for his diet there was a continual diet given him of the king of babylon every day a portion until the day of his death all the days of his life there it is good job you guys we made it through jeremiah if you missed our study on sunday i think there's a profound correlation with how the king of kings treats us the way this jehoiachin who didn't deserve one good thing gets all kinds of good stuff it's you and me that's a great picture so we have the book of lamentations starting next week it sounds depressing uh it is but there's there's actually some really great stuff there too so i'm looking forward to uh lamentations there's some glorious scriptures in there so we'll be looking at that next week lord this reminder of the greatness of this world and the most powerful thing this world can muster up and the beauty that we build and all the glory of babylon is nothing in your sight lord that you are able to take and put down the mightiest of nations and lord we see how this world is becoming a babylon in and of itself the whole world as largely we reject you and rebel against you lord we see now in the last days you're going to pour out your wrath even as you do upon babylon and all these other nations we see how you're going to do it in the last days as well but how thankful we are first thessalonians 5 says we are not appointed unto that wrath but to obtain salvation through jesus christ our lord how thankful we are that you protect us that you preserve us that you love us that you save us lord i pray that we would have a heart to speak the gospel to those that won't believe um lord give us a boldness to speak the truth that others might know you and your love and your compassion that they not be part of that judgment and wrath that is coming so give us wisdom help us to be more like jeremiah in days that are like the days of jeremiah or we find ourselves in similar predicaments help us to be faithful help us not to be afraid help us to not be cowardly when it comes to speaking the truth and we pray you're covering upon your people in these days in jesus name amen

Channel: Athey Creek

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Keywords: Brett Meador, Bible, Church, Teaching, Study, Christian, Jesus, Oregon, Through the Bible, Athey Creek, Athey Creek Church, Athey Creek Christian Fellowship

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Length: 71min 28sec (4288 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 04 2021