Year 6, Day 82: Jeremiah 29

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Prophet

• Prophet: A prophet is one of the fivefold ministry categories that is used throughout the Bible and especially lifted up in Ephesians 4:11. The prophet is primarily concerned with whether or not the people are hearing the voice of God.  The prophet is also concerned about whether or not the people are responding to God’s voice.

The prophet brings God’s truth to the people around him or her.  That is the job and the duty of the prophet.  They are concerned with whether or not the people are actually hearing from God.

Or at least they should be.

You see, that is the very problem that Jeremiah’s letter discusses.  Apparently there are prophets in Babylon who are telling the captives that the captivity is going to end shortly.  There are prophets that are telling the people that God told them that the captivity would end in a small amount of time.  The problem with this is that God never said such a thing.  We know that God wouldn’t have said it because the captivity lasted 70 years!  Why would God tell the prophets that the captivity would end in a few years and then drag it on for several decades?

Instead, what we have happening is a group of prophets who are saying what the people want to hear and using God’s name as reason for the people to believe it.  They aren’t listening to God; they are getting their cues from the people!  They aren’t proclaiming God’s truth; they are proclaiming what the people want to hear so that they can have the esteem and the honor of the people.  They aren’t prophets, they are con men!

This is why Jeremiah sends the letter that we have in this chapter.  God wants the people to know that He never gave the message of a short captivity.  God has not ordained that path.  God’s truth is in Jeremiah.  Jeremiah wants to make sure that the people of God hear the words of God.

The problem is that many of the people just can’t be made to want to hear God’s truth.

<><