Theological Commentary: Click Here
This is a
most interesting chapter. Put yourself
into the shoes of the people in Jerusalem as Nebuchadnezzar comes to conquer
your city. You go to a prophet who is known
for talking with God. You ask him to
inquire of God. God gives a response,
which is very simple. God says that He Himself
with fight against the city to ensure the Hebrew people go into captivity.
In fact, it
is worse than that. God said that those
who surrender to the Babylonians will live, while those who stay in the city will
not survive the ordeal. Imagine hearing
God say that He is fighting on the other side and the only way to survive is to
voluntarily go into captivity. This is a
bleak message indeed.
Naturally,
this confirms what we’ve been told all along.
God has had it with the rebellion of Hebrew people. He’s turning to captivity to teach the people
about faithfulness.
This brings
us to an even harder lesson to swallow.
Some lessons can’t be learned except through the hard way. Another way of saying this is that sometimes
spiritual captivity is the only way to learn what God has to tell us. Sometimes our own human arrogance becomes
such a hindrance to God’s message that the only way to tear it down is
captivity.
This is a
bleak message for a bleak time. There is
always hope, though. Remember, God isn’t
using captivity to destroy the people.
God is using captivity to reform them and to restore them. It’s a bleak message, but it isn’t a hopeless
one. With God’s ways, there is no such
thing as a hopeless plan.
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