Theological Commentary: Click Here
Discipleship Focus: Authority
- Authority: Our calling. This comes from God as king. Because He calls us as His representatives, He gives us authority to go and do His will.
This is a
neat chapter in which we can view authority.
At first pass, who does it look like has all of the authority? Of course, the answer is Zedekiah. After all, isn’t he king? Isn’t Zedekiah the one who locks up
Jeremiah? Isn’t he the one who gives
edicts and decrees? Isn’t he the one to
whom Jeremiah is brought when he is accused of deserting? At first glance, it looks like Zedekiah has
all the power and authority in the story.
However,
look at what Zedekiah does. Zedekiah
comes and asks Jeremiah if there is any word of the Lord. Even if Zedekiah won’t humble himself to God,
he still is capable of demonstrating that God has authority.
Furthermore,
if Zedekiah actually had authority over Jeremiah, would Jeremiah be able to
speak to the king in the manner that he does?
Of course not! If Zedekiah had
any authority at all, Jeremiah would be in trouble. Another way of saying this is that since
Jeremiah speaks this way to Zedekiah, Jeremiah is enforcing the idea that he
really has no authority over Jeremiah’s life.
So often
this is true in the world. People think
that they have authority. People pretend
to have the power to rule over others.
But nobody has authority outside of what God has ordained for them. In fact, we really only have genuine
authority when we humble ourselves before God as we have seen Jeremiah do in
this whole book.
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