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The Bible Breakdown
Jeremiah 25: Slow But Dependable
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The More We Dig. The More We Find.
Hello everybody, welcome back to the Bible Breakdown podcast with your host, pastor Brandon. Today, jeremiah chapter 25, and today's title is Slow but Dependable, slow but Dependable. And what we're going to see today is it's really more of a negative thing, where God is telling them hey, this bad thing is on its way. But at the same time, if it's true in the negative, it can also be true in the positive, and we're going to get into that in just a moment. But if you have your Bibles want to turn with me to Jeremiah 25,? We're going to jump into God's word and as we do that, if you're new here, we'd love for you to like, share and subscribe to the YouTube channel and the podcast. Make sure you leave us a five star review on the podcast it really helps us out a lot getting the word out and make sure you're going to the Bible Breakdown Discussion on Facebook, because we are getting devotions out there every day. There's an amazing team doing an amazing job and then, when we dig, then what we find, like I said, jeremiah chapter 25 is where we're going to be today and we're going to be reading out the New Living Translation, and the overall theme of Jeremiah is God gives us a future and a hope is finding God's light in darkness. God gives us a future and a hope is finding God's light in darkness. And what we talked about is Jeremiah is telling the nation of Judah that conquering is coming. You know, the enemy is on its way. Justice is going to happen, like all these bad things, and he is telling them this is going to happen. However, it's not going to last forever. There's going to be a season of exile and then I'm going to bring you back again. And so God is telling them, like this is coming and then and you can believe it, even though it delays, it's going to happen. But then, at the other side, even though you're going to be in this bad situation, it's going to be slow, but just as dependable, as the first time is going to come back around again.
Speaker 1:And it reminds me of when I was a kid. I lived close to these railroad tracks and we would watch these, these uh trains that would come by and, man, they would be moving so slowly and they would be so slow that you would be like, are they ever actually going to get here? And we would watch them come. But the thing is we had to realize is, even though they were slow, you needed to get out of the way Because, even though they were slow, you were not going to stop them. You didn't have the power to stop them. They were coming and when they got there they were going to keep on going. You were just in the way, and I think sometimes, seeing God's will on our lives feel like that. It seems like it's always a little bit slower than we'd want it to be, but you can count on him and he's not going to change his mind about these things. He's going to do these things, and so we're going to read this and he's going to be talking about the 70 years of captivity and exile, but there's an end on its way. Let's read this together and see what God's word has to say to us today.
Speaker 1:Jeremiah 25, verse 1, says this this message for all the people of Judah came to Jeremiah from the Lord during the fourth year of Jehoiakim's reign in Judah. This was the year when King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon began to reign. Jeremiah, the prophet, said to all the people in Judah and Jerusalem for the last 23 years, from the 13th year of the reign of Josiah, son of Ammon, king of Judah, until now the Lord has been giving this message. I have faithfully passed them on to you, but you have not listened. Again and again the Lord has sent you his servants, the prophets, but you have not listened or even paid attention. But you have not listened or even paid attention Each time the message was this turn from the evil road you are traveling and from the evil things you are doing. Only then will I let you live in the land that the Lord gave to you and to your ancestors forever. Do not provoke my anger by worshiping idols that you made with your own hands. Then I will not harm you, but you would not listen to me, says the Lord. You have made me furious by worshiping idols that you made with your own hands, bringing on yourselves all the disasters you now suffer.
Speaker 1:And now the Lord of heaven's army says because you have not listened to me, I will gather together all the armies of the north under King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, whom I have appointed as my deputy. I will bring them all against this land and its people and against the surrounding nations. I will completely destroy you and make you an object of horror and contempt and ruin forever. I will take away your happy singing and laughter. The joyful voices of bridegrooms and brides will no longer be heard. Your millstones will fall silent and the lights in your homes will go out. The entire land will become a desolate wasteland. Israel and her neighboring lands will serve the king of Babylon for 70 years.
Speaker 1:Then, after the 70 years of captivity are over, I will punish the king of Babylon and his people for their sins, says the Lord. I will make the country of the Babylonians a wasteland forever. I will bring upon them all the terrors I have promised in this book and all the penalties announced by Jeremiah against the nations. Many nations and great kings will enslave the Babylonians, just as they have enslaved my people. I will punish them in proportion to the sufferings they cause my people. This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, said to me.
Speaker 1:Take from my hand this cup filled to the brim with my anger and make all the nations to whom I send you drink from it. They will drink from it and they will stagger, crazed by the warfare I will send against them. So I took the cup of anger from the Lord and made all the nations drink from it, every nation to which the Lord sent me. I went to Jerusalem and to the other towns of it, every nation to which the Lord sent me. I went to Jerusalem and to the other towns of Judah, and their kings and officials drank from the cup. From that day until this, they have been a desolate ruin, an object of horror, contempt and cursing.
Speaker 1:I gave the cup to Pharaoh, king of Egypt, his attendants and his officials and all his people, along with all the foreigners living in that land. I people, along with all the foreigners living in that land. I also gave it to all the kings of the land of Uz and the kings of the Philistine cities of Ashkelon, gaza, ekron and the remains of Ashdod. Then I gave the cup to the nations of Edom, moab and Ammon and to the kings of Tyre and Sidon and the kings of the regions across the sea. I gave it to Dedan, tima, buz and to the people who live in distant places. I gave it to the kings of Arabia, the kings of the nomadic tribes of the desert, and to the kings of Zimri, elam and Media. I gave it to the kings of the northern countries, far and near, one after the other, all the kingdoms of the world and finally, the king of Babylon himself drank from the cup of the Lord's anger.
Speaker 1:Then the Lord said to me Now tell them this is what the Lord of heaven's armies, the God of Israel, says Drink from this cup of my anger, get drunk and vomit, for I will fall to rise no more, for I am sending terrible wars against you. And if they refuse to accept the cup, tell them. The Lord of heaven's army says you have no choice but to drink from it. I have begun to punish Jerusalem, the city that bears my name. Now, should I let you go and punish, should I? No, you will not escape from disaster. I will call for war against all the nations of the earth.
Speaker 1:I, the Lord of heaven's armies, have spoken Now prophesy all these things and say to them the Lord will roar against his own land and his holy dwelling, and from his holy dwelling in heaven, he will shout like those who tread grapes, and he will shout against everyone on earth. He will cry for judgment and will reach the ends of the earth, for the Lord will bring his case against all the nations. He will judge all the people of the earth, slaughtering the wicked with the sword. I, the Lord, have spoken. This is what the Lord of Heaven's armies says Look, disaster will fall upon nation after nation. A great whirlwind of fury is rising from the most distant corners of the earth.
Speaker 1:In that day, those the Lord has slaughtered will fill the earth from one end to the other. No one will mourn for them or gather up their bodies to bury them. They will be scattered on the ground like manure. Weep and moan. You evil shepherds. Roll in the dust. You, leaders of the flock. The time of your slaughter has arrived. You will fall and shatter like a fragile vase. You will find no place to hide, there will be no way to escape. And listen to the frantic cries of the shepherds Well, isn't that a nasty thing?
Speaker 1:Like a strong lion seeking its prey, and their land will be made desolate by the sword of the enemy, the Lord's fierce anger. Well, isn't that a nasty rain cloud? I mean, man, judgment's on the way, and this is how bad it's going to be right? Yeah, absolutely, and it is. It's horrible. These are terrible things that are happening, and even in reading that I stumbled over some of my words because I'm just like. This is horrible.
Speaker 1:But here's the thing just like the slow but inevitable, dependable judgment of God will come, so does his rescue notice. God's Word said Judgment is coming, but it will not last forever. And God is slow but dependable. Now, when I say slow, I mean slow according to our standards. He's right on time, he operates by his clock. We should never expect God to operate by ours, because he's God, you know, and we're not. And so he's never early, he's never late, he's always right on time. But at the same time, he's always dependable. God is not frantic, god is not nervous. God is not frantic, god is not nervous, god is not undecided. God is on time and all the things that he says and does and wills. And our job is not to try to figure out what it is he is doing so we can change his mind. Our job is to figure out what he's doing so we can plan our lives accordingly. And just like he's saying all these bad things are happening and all these bad things are on the way, at the same time he is also telling us it will not last forever.
Speaker 1:Good days are coming, and so here's my question for you today have you given up on a better day coming? If so, first of all, that makes you human, makes you normal. But to realize that just because God doesn't move in our time frame doesn't mean he's not moving. It just means he's moving according to a different time frame. But difficult seasons don't last forever. Maybe that's God's word for you today. Difficult seasons don't last forever. Maybe it's not just for you, maybe it's for somebody else.
Speaker 1:Maybe you know someone in your life who's going through a difficult, difficult season and maybe they have said man, if God's faithful, why am I going through this? How long am I going to have to go through this? And the honest truth is we don't always know why God does what he does. We don't always know how long God is going to do what he's going to do. The good news is, with Jeremiah is Jeremiah told them it's going to be for 70 years. Now, here's the thing it's going to be a long, 70 years. But even when we say that, it means it's going to feel long, but it's not going to be. One day, over 70 years, deliverance is coming.
Speaker 1:And so maybe for you or maybe for someone you know, god's word for them is yes, you're going through a difficult season and it's okay to say I don't know why, I don't know how long, but I do know God is faithful and you will not be in that difficult season one second longer than what he has planned for you. God is faithful, god is sovereign, god is with you more than you can imagine. And can I tell you that's hard, because most of the time we don't want to know God's faithful. We want God to get us out right now. But here's the thing what if the greatest miracle of your life is on the other side of one more day? What if we have no idea God does? And so if God hasn't moved you out of that yet, it means there's something beautiful on the way. Can you trust him in the middle of a difficult season? Let's pray together, god.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for today. Thank you, god, that you have times and places and all those things laid out. Our job is to live in your reality and to trust you, god. That doesn't mean we don't pray and we don't ask and we don't seek and we don't knock. You tell us to do those things, but on the other side of that, we trust you and we trust that you are always doing more than we can see. I pray you'll open our eyes today to see you more clearly and help us to trust you more in all things. In Jesus' name, we pray amen and what God's word says in Jeremiah, chapter 29, verse 13,. If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me. My prayer for you is that you find God more in your everyday life. Today. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow. For Jeremiah, chapter 26.
