©Laura Haverkamp
Chapter 7:27-8:3 (ESV) - “So you shall speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you. You shall call to them, but they will not answer you. And you shall say to them, ‘This is the nation that did not obey the voice of the LORD their God, and did not accept discipline; truth has perished; it is cut off from their lips.
‘Cut off your hair and cast it away;
raise a lamentation on the bare heights,
for the LORD has rejected and forsaken
the generation of his wrath.’
“For the sons of Judah have done evil in my sight, declares the LORD. They have set their detestable things in the house that is called by my name, to defile it. And they have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, which I did not command, nor did it come into my mind. Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when it will no more be called Topheth, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter; for they will bury in Topheth, because there is no room elsewhere. And the dead bodies of this people will be food for the birds of the air, and for the beasts of the earth, and none will frighten them away. And I will silence in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, for the land shall become a waste.
“At that time, declares the LORD, the bones of the kings of Judah, the bones of its officials, the bones of the priests, the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem shall be brought out of their tombs. And they shall be spread before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven, which they have loved and served, which they have gone after, and which they have sought and worshiped. And they shall not be gathered or buried. They shall be as dung on the surface of the ground. Death shall be preferred to life by all the remnant that remains of this evil family in all the places where I have driven them, declares the LORD of hosts.”
Question to consider: What is the measure of a successful ministry?
As spoken earlier in chapter seven, Jeremiah was made to understand that though he was to speak all of the LORD’s words to the people, they would fall on deaf ears. It had to be deeply frustrating and sad for Jeremiah to realize that his efforts would not change the hearts and minds of people. I’m sure the prophets who were willing to tickle the itching ears of the people of Judah thought they were anointed and special because they drew crowds and kings who were eager for their message.
The success of a ministry should not be judged by its popularity but by the fidelity of its teacher to the word of God. As is often the case, ministries that become popular during a rebellious generation are ones where the truth has perished and been cut off from their lips.
The people of Judah defiled the house of YHWH and built the high places of Topheth. The Valley of Hinnom was a valley south of Jerusalem where the remains of sacrifices and garbage was burned. We know it best as Gehenna— the place that represented the fires of hell. The “high places” weren’t exceptionally tall structures but small stone altars where people sacrificed their young children. Thus, the LORD would bring judgment upon the people so fierce that the place would be renamed the Valley of Slaughter because of the bodies that would be dumped into it since there would be no room to bury them.
The land of Judah which was once filled with mirth and gladness would be made desolate and silent, and even the bones of the kings would be unearthed and desecrated. If they were so intent on worshiping the sun and moon, they could be spread out before them like dung.
Those who survived would wish they were dead as they were scattered throughout the nations and made to be slaves of the gods they had served. As I’ve mentioned previously, this judgment was actually the LORD giving the people over to the natural outworking of their sinful desires. They rejected Him in order to worship after these false gods, and after years of trying to convince them this was a bad idea, the LORD finally granted them their prayers.
Dear heavenly Father, this image of a nation who sacrificed their children to obtain worldly success and pleasure seems eerily familiar to the time in which we live. Please give us ears to hear Your warnings and to turn to Christ for our righteousness while there is still time to do so. Amen.