A couple of years ago Lili and I decided that we would ask Michael what he wanted to do for his birthday. After all, he was a pretty big fan of the playground at McDonalds or Chick-fil-a, and we decided that we’d even be willing to splurge for Chuck E. Cheese if he wanted to go. We’d been a bit tight with him for a few birthdays, but for this one he was going to get what he most wanted – assuming it was as affordable as I was estimating it would be. So, the big moment came when I asked Michael what he wanted to do more than anything in the world on his birthday, and without hesitation he answered that he wanted to . . . go underground!
Now, at first, as you can imagine, I was caught off guard, thought there’s no way we could do this, and wondered what I’d done as a parent in raising a son who’s greatest dream was to go underground. But then, I remembered that on our way home from Louisville to Jackson, we’d pass by Mammoth Cave. So, off we went, to go underground in celebration of my oldest son’s birthdays.
I’m not sure if the trip lived up to his expectations. It probably wasn’t exactly what he had in mind, and I’m not sure it’s a trip he’ll never forget. But I can tell you that on that day there was a story told that stuck in my mind.
There was a point in our tour where our guide told us all to stay still or hold hands or something like that because they were about to turn off the lights. He said that we’d never seen darkness until we saw darkness from the depths of a cave. And when they shut off the lights, I thought he was probably right. It was dark and completely silent. You felt alone and anxious for someone to talk or lights to come back on even in those few seconds. And that’s when the guide told us the story of a man who’d once wondered off from the group, lost track of where he was, and was all alone when the lights were shut off for the day.
So, that darkness and silence and solitude that we all felt even in our clustered little group, he experienced all alone – not knowing when or if he’d be found. And he stayed that way for about a twenty-four hour period (if I remember correctly). When they found him, he said that he’d spent the whole time singing so that he might distract his mind from the darkness, silence, and solitude that was his in the depths of that cave.
As our guide told that story, I thought to myself, “I can’t imagine what that’d be like, especially not knowing if or when you’d be found.” I mean, were you trying to keep your sanity for an hour, a day, a week? Or had he gotten so far off the beaten path that he’d simply not be found before it was too late? And, if he decided to try to move, would it end up in him finding his way out or deeper away? Would it end with him tripping and injuring himself to the point that he would die?
But, on the other hand, if there is no darkness darker than the darkness in the depth of a cave, can you imagine his joy as he saw the first sign of light and realized it was moving toward him? All of the sudden, he’d realize that there was hope. Even the smallest ray of light that day had to be screaming within him, “Rejoice, there is hope.”
That ray of light in darkness or cause for hoping in the midst of despair is what we find in Jeremiah 30-33. You’ve seen the way these first twenty-nine chapters have gone. As I mentioned in the first week, the book reads like a prosecuting attorney detailing the defendant’s crime and a judge pronouncing his condemnation. Well, chapters 34 and following continue that theme in large part. But right in the middle of this book is a ray of light in darkness, a message of hope in the midst of despair. These chapters scream to a people who have been given terrible news, “Stop your weeping and rejoice.”
Jeremiah 30-33 forms a unit of four chapters that has been called the book or messages of hope. And there are really two aspects that make up this message of hope. On the one hand, the word is declared that God will bring his people back into their land. He will deliver them from captivity. Chapter 30 begins with a command for Jeremiah to write down all of the words that the Lord was telling him, and so we read:
“Write in a book all the words that I have spoken to you. For behold, days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will restore the fortunes of my people, Israel and Judah, says the LORD, and I will bring them back to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall take possession of it” (30:2-3)
Now, of course, this doesn’t happen without doing something to the one who holds them captive, does it? So, the Lord promises that he will exercise his might against their captor. We read in 30:8-9,
“And it shall come to pass in that day, declares the LORD of hosts, that I will break his yoke from off your neck, and I will burst your bonds, and foreigners shall no more make a servant of him. But they shall serve the LORD their God and David their kind, whom I will raise up for them.”
Nor will they wonder back into their land but never be able to rebuild the city. Rather, the Lord promises restoration of their fortunes, saying,
“Behold, I will restore the fortunes of the tents of Jacob and have compassion on his dwellings; the city shall be rebuilt on its mound, and the palace shall stand where it used to be” (30:18).
In chapter 32, the Lord has Jeremiah buy a field from his cousin, which is an odd thing to do when you’re the one declaring the land would be destroyed. You don’t brag that the underdog in a sporting event is going to pull the upset and then go and place a bet on the favorite winning. I mean, there isn’t a worse time to buy real estate than right before a city is about to be destroyed and its inhabitants taken captive.
But that’s what Jeremiah does. And when Jeremiah asks the Lord why it is that he has done such a thing, the Lord declares,
“Just as I have brought all this great disaster upon this people, so I will bring upon them all the good that I promise them. Fields shall be bought in this land of which you are saying, ‘It is a desolation, without man or beast; it is given into the had of the Chaldeans.’ Fields shall be bought for money, and deeds shall be signed and sealed and witnessed, in the land of Benjamin, in the places about Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah, in the cities of the hill country, in the cities of the Shephelah, and in the cities of the Negeb; for I will restore their fortunes, declares the Lord” (32:42-44).
And the message is repeated through chapter 33 so that we read in 33:7 and 11,
“I will restore the fortunes of Judah and the fortunes of Israel, and rebuild them as they were at first. . . . For I will restore the fortunes of the land as at first.”
So the first part of the message of hope is a promise that Israel and Judah, the northern and southern kingdom, will be restored to their land. They will be brought back into their land, and they will rebuild the city as before.
But that would be short-lived if that’s all that happened, wouldn’t it? I mean, consider why Israel and Judah were being judged in the first place. Israel was destroyed and Judah was about to be destroyed because they had sinned against God. And, as the Lord has asked already in this book, “Can a leopard change its spots or the Ethiopian the color of his skin?” Of course not. It is their genetic makeup the same way mine is to be awkwardly tall and thin.
So what is needed then is for the Lord to bring a transformation in the hearts of the people as well. And this is the second part of the message of hope. God will not only restore the people to the land but (more importantly and fundamentally), he will restore the people to himself, giving them new hearts and forgiving them of their sins.
That second part of the message of hope is found mainly in Jeremiah 31 and there is most clearly seen in the promise of the new covenant so that we read in 31:31-34,
“Behold, the days are coming, declare the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, thought I was their husband, declares the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sins no more.”
These are the two parts to the message of hope in Jeremiah 30-33 – restoration to the land and restoration to the Lord. And though on this Christmas Sunday I do want you to leave knowing the content of theses four chapters – the two-pronged message of hope – that is not all I want for us. I want us to see, be reminded of, or perhaps learn some truths from these chapters that apply to us as God’s people. The first of these is that for God’s children suffering is not the last word.
The Lord makes Judah’s coming suffering clear. He’s taken the first twenty-nine chapters to do it, and he’ll repeat it in the chapters following this unit. And Jeremiah is no exception. In fact, to this point in the book, his suffering has been worse than those against whom he has been prophesying. This is why I highlighted from the first twelve chapters of Jeremiah that obeying Christ and following him as our Lord means suffering. But these chapters remind us that for the believer, suffering is not the last word.
God’s end for us, his goal for us is good. Consider the Lord’s heart at this point in the book. Jeremiah is telling the people that they are going to go into captivity and should surrender to Nebuchadnezzar as one executing judgment against them, and they don’t believe him. Let that soak in for a second. They don’t believe Jeremiah. They don’t think they’re going into captivity. They think he’s telling them lies. They want to kill him because of it, and the king even imprisons him or puts him in stocks because of it.
So, what does God then do? Does he say, “Fine, if you’ll not believe my prophet who is declaring my words, then I’ll speed up the process; you’re going to face destruction today”? That’s not what he does in chapters 30-33. Instead, he tells Jeremiah to make sure that the people know that God will bring them back into their land. He declares in 31:28,
“And it shall come to pass that as I have watched over them to pluck up and break down, to overthrow, destroy, and bring harm, so I will watch over them to build and to plant, declares the LORD.”
And they’re not even in captivity yet. Sure, some have been taken captive, but they’ve seen nothing yet. They’re not there, and they don’t believe it’s coming. Yet God is giving them a word of hope to hold to in the darkness. In fact, God makes clear that this is why he’s giving them this word. After telling them that he’ll one day judge in his wrath the enemies of his people, he ends chapter 30 saying,
“In the latter days you’ll understand this” (30:24).
This is who our God is. He not only does good, but as he says in 32:41, “I will rejoice in doing them good.” He is so good to his children that he wants us to know that our end is good, even when he’s disciplining us in our rebellion against him. He’s not telling a people here who are going to be suffering for obeying him but those who are suffering because they are disobeying him. He wants them to know that his purpose and plans for them is to bring them back, even if they don’t understand it now.
Can you imagine the hope and the encouragement that this provided for God’s people in the midst of their exile? Can you imagine how much it meant to them knowing that suffering was not God’s final word? We at least know one individual who drew encouragement from this promise, don’t we? In Daniel 9 we read that Daniel was reading the book of Jeremiah while he was in exile, and he read of this promise of deliverance and prayed, acknowledging that they were in exile because of their sin and asking God to redeem them because of his great mercy. He prayed that way because God had given him hope.
Now, consider this for a moment. This is not simply a reflection of God’s specific plan for a specific people but this is a reflection of God’s heart, of his nature, of his ways. He too wants us to know that his end for us is good. He wants us to know that he’s working every tragedy, even stupid decision, every sin, and his discipline against us for our good. He wants us to know in the midst of our suffering that this suffering is not worth comparing to the glory that is to be revealed to us.
In this time of year where we often find ourselves reflecting on the suffering that has come to us – whether it is spending another Christmas without our spouse or another Christmas without ever having a spouse in the first place, without our child or having never celebrated Christmas with a child in the first place though we desperately long to – God reminds us that suffering is not the final word for us.
I don’t know what tomorrow holds or even the rest of our life. Suffering could be the label that characterizes the rest of our lives as we pursue obedience to our Lord. But suffering is not the last word. One day, Christ will come and call our names, and we’ll be glorified before him. On that day we will not have to fight against sin, or Satan, or death anymore. On that day, we’ll no longer find ourselves crying because of our sin or the sin of others against us or against those whom we love. On that day there’ll be no more loneliness, pain, fear, or hurt. On that day, we’ll know that to say all the suffering in this life was worth it will be an understatement. Rather, we’ll see that the deepest suffering in this life was but momentary light affliction preparing for us an eternal weight of glory.
That must be what we hold to in the midst of our suffering – especially in the midst of the suffering we face as we seek to obey Christ. Paul tells us that if there is no resurrection, then we are to be of all men most pitied, but because there is a coming resurrection, we do not have to fear even the one who can kill our bodies. Think this Christmas and set your focus on the good – on the coming glory – that is ours in Christ, for suffering is not the last word for the believer.
Second, not only is suffering not the last word for God’s children, but God’s children have truly experienced forgiveness and guilt.
You see, Israel and Judah’s chief problem was not just coming exile. It was their sin against God. Had all the nations been against them, but they had God, all would be well. But between them and the Lord was their glaring sin and guilt. And there was nothing they could do about it. In fact, the Lord points this out in 30:12-15,
“For thus says the LORD: Your hurt is incurable, and your wound if grievous. There is none to uphold your case, no medicine for your wound, no healing for you. All your lovers have forgotten you; they care nothing for you; for I have dealt you the blow of an enemy, the punishment of a merciless fore, because your guilt is great, because your sins are flagrant. Why do you cry out over your hurt? Your pain is incurable. Because your guilt is great, because your sins are flagrant, I have done these things to you.”
There it is. Their problem is God. They are guilty before him. There is none to plead their cause. And they’ve prostituted themselves, sinning against the Lord who was as a faithful husband to them. So, what is their hope, for God is their judge?
The hope is that God himself will forgive them and cleanse them, that he would respond in mercy. And that’s what he does. We see it most clearly in Jeremiah 31, as the Lord now speaks of his love and devotion to his people. He says in 31:1,
“I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.”
We read of God’s devotion to Israel, as he says in 31:20,
“Is Ephraim my dear son? Is he my darling child? For as often as I speak against him, I do remember him still. Therefore my heart yearns for him; I will surely have mercy on him, declare the LORD.”
God is going to forgive their sin, cleanse their guilt, and bring them back to him. We read in 33:8,
“I will cleanse them from all the guilt of their sin against me, and I will forgive all the guilt of their sin and rebellion against me.”
We read in 31:34 the Lord saying,
“I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”
You see, God is a God who forgives sin and cleanses guilt. But does he really do it? Consider this. Throughout this whole book God has referred to Israel and Judah as a whore, as a prostitute. So, does their forgiveness mean that God will stop punishing them but keep holding to their sin? No. He says he’ll forgive and remember their sin no more. Well, it at least means that Israel is forever tainted, right? I mean, even if they’re forgiven, they’re damaged goods, right?
Well, listen to what God says in 31:4,
“Again I will build you and you shall be built, O virgin Israel.”
And again in 31:21,
“Set up road markers for yourself; make yourself guideposts; consider well the highway, the road by which you went. Return, O virgin Israel, return to these cities.”
Do you see? The whore is called the virgin. Now, we know that’s impossible, don’t we? I mean, if you have premarital sex, we might say you can be forgiven, but you can’t be a virgin. If you commit adultery, we might say you can be forgiven, but you can’t be called faithful. But if we consider the Lord’s forgiveness to be like that, then we have missed what forgiveness means.
The reason we are forgiven of our sins is both because Christ bore our guilt and punishment for us and because we are credited with his righteousness. You see, God does not forgive you and yet forever hold you in contempt for your sin, forever relegating you to a certain place whereby you shall never rise above because of your sin. All of God’s children are hopeless on the basis of our own righteous but declared perfectly righteous because we have been credited with the righteousness of Christ. Therefore, as we said when we looked at Rahab in Joshua 2, among the people of God who have found forgiveness in Christ, there is no second-class citizenship. God forgives and uses us as his children who have been credited with Christ’s righteousness through faith in him.
Therefore, this morning, repent of your sins and delight in the complete and thorough forgiveness that is yours in Christ. Christ did not die and rise so that we might forever be bound to our own hopes and efforts for righteousness, but so that we might be clothed in his.
So, on the one hand, there is a glorious hope that awaits us so that suffering is not the last word, and in the present, we can truly have forgiveness of sin and guilt because the one against whom we sinned has pardoned us through faith in Christ. But there is one final truth I want us to see in this text, namely, God wants us to know the certainty of our hope and forgiveness.
You see, God could just say, “I’m going to forgive you and cleanse you.” But he does more than that in this chapter. He says, “I’m going to make a new covenant with you.” You see, the covenant he had made with his people when he brought them out of Egypt, they had broken by their adultery. Like a marriage covenant can be broken by adultery, so they had broken the covenant. Therefore, God says that he is going to make a new covenant with them, and this covenant will not be like the one he made with the house of Israel when he brought them out of the land of Egypt, the one that they broke.
“But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sins no more” (31:33-34).
And part of his covenant promise is sending one to come and save us as King and Shepherd over his people. Thus we read in 33:14-22,
“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David, and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will dwell securely. And this is the name by which it will be called: 'The Lord is our righteousness.' \"For thus says the Lord: David shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel, and the Levitical priests shall never lack a man in my presence to offer burnt offerings, to burn grain offerings, and to make sacrifices forever.\" The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: \"Thus says the Lord: If you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that day and night will not come at their appointed time, then also my covenant with David my servant may be broken, so that he shall not have a son to reign on his throne, and my covenant with the Levitical priests my ministers. As the host of heaven cannot be numbered and the sands of the sea cannot be measured, so I will multiply the offspring of David my servant, and the Levitical priests who minister to me.\"
This is what we celebrate at Christmas. This promised offspring of David came. He was born of a virgin in Bethlehem, the city of David. He lived perfectly so that his righteousness could be credited to those who believe in him. He died to pay the penalty for the sins of those who believe in him.
There is a text that is quoted by Matthew from Jeremiah when he tells of Jesus’ birth. It is Jeremiah 31:15. There we read, “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.”
Ramah was the place of Rachel’s burial. She was the mother of Benjamin and Judah, the tribes that made up the southern kingdom of Judah. And, she was the grandmother of Ephraim, which was oftentimes spoken of as representing the whole northern kingdom of Israel. Therefore, as Israel and Judah is led off into exile, the Lord says that it’s as if Rachel is weeping in her tomb for her children because they are no more. They are in exile. Interestingly, Matthew quotes this text in Matthew 2 when he describes the slaughtering of the Hebrew boys at the time of Jesus’ birth. He quotes the text and says that as these infant boys were murdered the text by Jeremiah was fulfilled, and then he quotes Jeremiah 31:15.
What he’s saying it seems is that this slaughtering of the Hebrew boys is the continuation of exile. The people have not yet experienced the true promised deliverance. They are still killed. They are still ruled over by a foreign ruler. They still battle with their sin. Yet, I also believe that Matthew quotes this text so that we might also remember the whole context of Jeremiah 31. For the verses immediately following tells Rachel,
“Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work . . . There is hope for your future” (31:16-17).
And eventually that chapter leads us to God’s promise of the new covenant, which will seal the forgiveness of our sins. Matthew is telling us that with the birth of Christ, the hope has arrived. The light has shown in the midst of great darkness. And it is not by mistake that when Jesus ate the last meal with his disciples – this meal we celebrate every week as we come to the table – he took the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22:20). He wanted us to know that the covenant promises were certain, for they were sealed with the very blood of the Son of God incarnate.
Thus, every time we celebrate the Lord’s supper, we remember that God’s covenant promises are sure and certain. Our eternal hope is certain. Our forgiveness from sin and guilt is certain. And God has made a covenant sealed with the blood of Christ so that we might rest in that hope. Amen.