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The Bible Breakdown
Jeremiah 13: Life Lessons With Dirty Underwear
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The More We Dig. The More We Find.
Well, hello everybody. Welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, pastor Brandon, today, jeremiah, chapter 13. Listen, I don't know what to tell you. Look, the title today is Life Lessons with Dirty Underwear. Okay, life Lessons with Dirty Underwear. If you can do better, please let me know down in the comments below. That's all I got. You're going to understand all that in just a moment. But if you like what we're doing here while you are preparing to figure out what in the world this chapter is about, make sure you like, share and subscribe to the YouTube channel and the podcast. Make sure you leave us a five-star review on the podcast and make sure you're going to the Bible Breakdown Discussion on Facebook, where there's an amazing group of people doing devotions every day and we're just learning more about God's word, because the more we dig, the more we find. And look, that's true about today.
Speaker 1:Okay, first of all, don't forget, the overall idea of Jeremiah is a future and a hope, god's light in darkness. And, if you remember, jeremiah is man. He is battling every day because during his lifetime, the nation of Israel, like, what's left is Judah, you know, and it's the Hebrew. People are still there, but Israel is gone. There's two kingdoms. Go back and look at 1 and 2 Kings. He'll kind of break that down for you. They are not following God, are not following God. However, even though he lives in Jerusalem and he goes to the temple, the priests and the prophets at the temple they're lying to the people and they're saying everything's okay, everything's awesome, serve your other gods, it's all good. Jeremiah is one of the lone voices that's saying guys, this is not good, judgment's coming because we're not going to turn around. But at the same time, he's saying but God is still faithful, he's not going to wipe us out completely, it's going to be okay. And he just just all this, all this, and God is using these different ways of trying to get the people's attention, and today he's going to get everybody's attention with what he's going to do.
Speaker 1:And one of the things I love is when I was, when I was first in school, one of the things that you would teach us for people who wanted to public speakers, preachers is to use illustrations, to kind of put flesh and bone on an abstract topic. Right, and you look at the ministry of Jesus. He constantly did this. He was always using these different metaphors and analogies and examples to help us get our minds around complex spiritual principles. Well, today God is going to use dirty drawers, okay, dirty underwear. Let's just read it. Okay, we're going to go to Jeremiah, chapter 13. If you have your Bibles, or if you want to look on the screen with me, if you're watching on YouTube, let's just go for it. You ready? Here we go. Chapter 13,.
Speaker 1:Verse 1 says this this is what the Lord said to me go and buy a linen loincloth and put it on, but do not wash it Now. Pause. Now a loincloth is kind of lost on us. Or if you've ever watched a movie about Adam and Eve or Tarzan, you see these loincloths. Basically, it's underwear, it's an undergarment. That's what he said. Go, put on a linen pair of underwear, but do not wash it. Already we got a problem, but God said so here's the thing. First of all, pause Any of you guys if your wives get onto you because of your underwear, all you got to do, god said. God said I shall not wash my underwear. Praise the Lord, all right. Verse two so I bought a loincloth, as the Lord directed me, and I put it on. Verse three Then the Lord gave me another message Take the linen loincloth you are wearing and go to the Euphrates River and hide it there in a hole in the rocks.
Speaker 1:So I went and I hid it by the Euphrates River as the Lord had instructed me, not my fault. God told me to do it A long time afterward, oh Lord. The Lord said to me go back to the Euphrates and get the loincloth. I told you to hide there. Back to the Euphrates and get the loincloth. I told you to hide there, you imagine. So I went to the Euphrates and I dug it out of the hole where I had hidden it, but now it was rotting and falling apart. The loincloth was good for nothing. Praise the Lord, verse 8,.
Speaker 1:Then I received this message from the Lord, verse 9,. This is what the Lord says. This shows how I will rot away the pride of Judah and Jerusalem. Now I highlighted this. Verse 10,. These wicked people refuse to listen to me. They stubbornly follow their own desires and worship other gods. Therefore, they will become like this loincloth good for nothing. Thanks Jesus, verse 11,.
Speaker 1:As a loincloth clings to a man's waist, so I created Judah and Israel to cling to me, says the Lord. They were to be my people, my pride, my glory and honor to my name, but they would not listen to me. So tell them this is what the Lord says. The God of Israel, may all your jars be filled with wine. And they will reply of course, jars are made to be filled with wine. Then tell them no, this is what the Lord means. I will fill everyone in this land with drunkenness, from the king sitting on David's throne to the priests and the prophets, right down to the common people of Jerusalem. I will smash them against each other, even parents against children, says the Lord. I will not let my pity or my mercy or my compassion keep me from destroying them.
Speaker 1:Listen and pay attention. Do not be arrogant, for the Lord has spoken. Give glory to the Lord, your God, before it's too late. Acknowledge him before he brings darkness upon you, causing you to stumble and to fall on the darkening mountains. Four, then, when you look for light, you will find only terrible darkness and gloom. And if you still refuse to listen, I will weep alone because of your pride. My eyes will overflow with tears Because the Lord's flock will be led away into exile. Say to the king and his mother Come down from your thrones and sit in the dust, for your glorious crowns Will soon be. Come down from your thrones and sit in the dust, for your glorious crowns will soon be snatched from your heads. The towns of the Negev will close their gates and no one will be able to open them. The people of Judah will be taken away as captives. All will be carried into exile. Open your eyes and see the armies marching down from the north. Where is your flock, your beautiful flock that he gave you to care for? What will you say when the Lord takes the allies you have cultivated and appoints them as your rulers?
Speaker 1:Pains of anguish will grip you, like those of a woman in labor. You may ask yourself why are all these things happening to me? It is because of your many sins. That is why you have been stripped and raped by invading armies. Wow, can an Ethiopian change the color of his skin? Can a leopard take away his spots? Neither can you Start doing good, for you have always done evil. I will scatter you like chaff that is blown away by the desert winds. This is your allotment, the portion I have assigned to you, says the Lord, for you have forgotten me, putting your trust in false gods. I myself will strip you and expose you to shame. I have seen your adultery and lust and your disgusting idol worship out of the fields, in the fields and on the hills. What sorrow awaits you, jerusalem? How long before you are pure, wow.
Speaker 1:So he starts off being funny, talking about dirty laundry, and he ends with saying man, judgment's coming, judgment's coming, judgment's coming, judgment's coming. And I'm brokenhearted. That is one of the things about the book of Jeremiah that, if I'm honest with you, they call Jeremiah the weeping prophet, by the way, because he watches the downfall of his beloved Jerusalem. Jeremiah loves his people, he loves Jerusalem. He's talking about this and talking in this way because he hungers to see Jerusalem set free, but he sees that they're continually going the wrong way.
Speaker 1:But what I love about this is, even though God is mourning over what's going to happen, he doesn't want it to happen. There's never a moment where God is smiling about this. He's saying I don't want the bad things to happen. Please turn back to me, please turn back to me over and over and over again. And can I tell you that's what God is saying to all of us today, verse 10,. Remember when he says they will become like that linen loincloth, they're going to become good for nothing. In other words, all the things that they have got in their life, all the things that they think are supposed to matter, all the things that they're going for, those things are not going to profit them in the end. God is warning us over and over again please make me first in your life. Come back to me, because I see the bad things coming and I'm not going to stop them, because if that's the only thing that will bring you back to me, I love you more than I love your comfort. That's hard, I just tell you that's hard.
Speaker 1:Thank goodness he started off talking about dirty laundry, because he finished it off just telling us what's up. And here's the thing. There's a couple of takeaways from this chapter. First of all, husbands or wives, I don't know. I just I can speak from the point of view of a husband. A husband, if your wife ever says are you ever going to wash that underwear? You can say thus, says the Lord, and you quote her Jeremiah chapter 13 and just see what she does with it. All right, so there's the first thing from now on, you wash that underwear whenever you want to. And it is gross. Okay, I'm not going to lie.
Speaker 1:But the other thing is this God loves us more than he loves our comfort. Therefore, god will let us walk down bad paths if that's the only thing that will cause us to come back to him. Now, I don't like that, but I'm not God, so I don't get to choose how he does what he wants to do. And the thing is is that God doesn't like that. You hear the mourning in his heart over and over again. God wants good things for us. He wants us to succeed. He wants all these good things, but he knows what's going to work, and sometimes it's the stick, not the carrot, that works. It's the stick, not the carrot, that works.
Speaker 1:And so here is the question for you how long are you going to play around with God? Maybe you're not, and if not, then this is a celebration for you. God, I'm so thankful that you've helped me to get my life where it needs to be and you just celebrate this, and this is just a celebration. But if not, if you're playing around with your relationship with God, if you're not taking God seriously, how long what's going to have to happen before you realize that God is truly all you need? Because God loves us more than he loves our comfort and he will let us slowly walk our way into destruction, and he'll warn us the whole way. Please don't go there, please don't do that. Please come back this way, but he won't stop us if that's all that will reach us. So, before that happens, is there anything in our lives that we need to turn over to him? Is there any sin that is slowly destroying us? What would it look like today If you allow God to whisper to your heart what that is?
Speaker 1:Confess it to him, repent of it and then go tell somebody hey, will you help me? I don't wanna be in this anymore, I wanna be free. I'll tell you what happened A miracle, and that's what I'm excited about. Let's pray together. God, thank you so much for today. Thank you that you're with us and you're for us, and you love us. I pray today, god. You help us to fall more in love with you. Every day, in Jesus name, we pray Amen, and then we'll don't forget. Jeremiah, chapter 29, verse 13, says if you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me. My hope for you is that every day, you will come to know God more and more and more. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow for Jeremiah, chapter 14.
