The first time I truly understood what “hope” meant, I was a middle school summer camp counselor. The theme for camp that year was hope. I’ll never forget when the camp speaker gave students a definition for hope. “Hope,” she said, “is confident expectation that God keeps His promises.” With that definition, I finally understood that hope in God is different than hope in anything else in this world. You see, unlike hope in things of the world that are uncertain, hope in God is certain. Why is hope in God certain? It is certain because God always keeps His promises.
We have been studying the story of Jeremiah this week, and today we will read his last recorded message to the people of Judah. So far, this message from Jeremiah has looked bleak for Judah. The Babylonians were going to capture Judah and even take some people captive because of their sin. This was a bleak, bleak situation, and many listening to Jeremiah’s prophesies may have felt hopeless. Jeremiah’s message did not end on a bleak note, however. He ended his message by letting the people of Judah know that they would not be able to get away with their violence toward them. Babylon would face the consequences for their actions toward Judah. This was the end of Jeremiah’s messages: “This is what the Lord Almighty says: “Babylon’s thick wall will be leveled and her high gates set on fire; the peoples exhaust themselves for nothing, the nations’ labor is only fuel for the flames.” In other words, God was still fighting for His people, and, one day, they would be freed from Babylonian captivity. He was still working. He was still moving. There was still hope.
There is still hope for you as well. As dark as your situation may seem, God is still working in your life. He is still good. There is still hope. In the end, if you have placed your faith in Him, you know that this world is not your home, and you have eternal life in Him. This is the promise you have in Him. Remember, you can have hope, confidently expecting that God keeps His promises.
Take time today to read some of the promises of God that are found in the Bible. If some promises immediately come to your mind, read the verses where those promises are found. If none come to mind, do a google search of promises of God to find references to look up where God’s promises can be found. As you read through these verses, make a list of these promises and thank God for each one of them.
This is what the Lord says:
“I will stir up a destroyer against Babylon
and the people of Babylonia.[a]
Foreigners will come and winnow her,
blowing her away as chaff.
They will come from every side
to rise against her in her day of trouble.
Don’t let the archers put on their armor
or draw their bows.
Don’t spare even her best soldiers!
Let her army be completely destroyed.[b]
They will fall dead in the land of the Babylonians,[c]
slashed to death in her streets.
For the Lord of Heaven’s Armies
has not abandoned Israel and Judah.
He is still their God,
even though their land was filled with sin
against the Holy One of Israel.”
Flee from Babylon! Save yourselves!
Don’t get trapped in her punishment!
It is the Lord’s time for vengeance;
he will repay her in full.
Babylon has been a gold cup in the Lord’s hands,
a cup that made the whole earth drunk.
The nations drank Babylon’s wine,
and it drove them all mad.
But suddenly Babylon, too, has fallen.
Weep for her.
Give her medicine.
Perhaps she can yet be healed.
We would have helped her if we could,
but nothing can save her now.
Let her go; abandon her.
Return now to your own land.
For her punishment reaches to the heavens;
it is so great it cannot be measured.
The Lord has vindicated us.
Come, let us announce in Jerusalem[d]
everything the Lord our God has done.
Sharpen the arrows!
Lift up the shields![e]
For the Lord has inspired the kings of the Medes
to march against Babylon and destroy her.
This is his vengeance against those
who desecrated his Temple.
Raise the battle flag against Babylon!
Reinforce the guard and station the watchmen.
Prepare an ambush,
for the Lord will fulfill all his plans against Babylon.
You are a city by a great river,
a great center of commerce,
but your end has come.
The thread of your life is cut.
The Lord of Heaven’s Armies has taken this vow
and has sworn to it by his own name:
“Your cities will be filled with enemies,
like fields swarming with locusts,
and they will shout in triumph over you.”
A Hymn of Praise to the Lord
The Lord made the earth by his power,
and he preserves it by his wisdom.
With his own understanding
he stretched out the heavens.
When he speaks in the thunder,
the heavens roar with rain.
He causes the clouds to rise over the earth.
He sends the lightning with the rain
and releases the wind from his storehouses.
The whole human race is foolish and has no knowledge!
The craftsmen are disgraced by the idols they make,
for their carefully shaped works are a fraud.
These idols have no breath or power.
Idols are worthless; they are ridiculous lies!
On the day of reckoning they will all be destroyed.
But the God of Israel[f] is no idol!
He is the Creator of everything that exists,
including his people, his own special possession.
The Lord of Heaven’s Armies is his name!
Babylon’s Great Punishment
“You[g] are my battle-ax and sword,”
says the Lord.
“With you I will shatter nations
and destroy many kingdoms.
With you I will shatter armies—
destroying the horse and rider,
the chariot and charioteer.
With you I will shatter men and women,
old people and children,
young men and young women.
With you I will shatter shepherds and flocks,
farmers and oxen,
captains and officers.
“I will repay Babylon
and the people of Babylonia[h]
for all the wrong they have done
to my people in Jerusalem,” says the Lord.
“Look, O mighty mountain, destroyer of the earth!
I am your enemy,” says the Lord.
“I will raise my fist against you,
to knock you down from the heights.
When I am finished,
you will be nothing but a heap of burnt rubble.
You will be desolate forever.
Even your stones will never again be used for building.
You will be completely wiped out,”
says the Lord.
Raise a signal flag to the nations.
Sound the battle cry!
Mobilize them all against Babylon.
Prepare them to fight against her!
Bring out the armies of Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz.
Appoint a commander,
and bring a multitude of horses like swarming locusts!
Bring against her the armies of the nations—
led by the kings of the Medes
and all their captains and officers.
The earth trembles and writhes in pain,
for everything the Lord has planned against Babylon stands unchanged.
Babylon will be left desolate without a single inhabitant.
Her mightiest warriors no longer fight.
They stay in their barracks, their courage gone.
They have become like women.
The invaders have burned the houses
and broken down the city gates.
The news is passed from one runner to the next
as the messengers hurry to tell the king
that his city has been captured.
All the escape routes are blocked.
The marshes have been set aflame,
and the army is in a panic.
This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies,
the God of Israel, says:
“Babylon is like wheat on a threshing floor,
about to be trampled.
In just a little while
her harvest will begin.”
“King Nebuchadnezzar[i] of Babylon has eaten and crushed us
and drained us of strength.
He has swallowed us like a great monster
and filled his belly with our riches.
He has thrown us out of our own country.
Make Babylon suffer as she made us suffer,”
say the people of Zion.
“Make the people of Babylonia pay for spilling our blood,”
says Jerusalem.
The Lord’s Vengeance on Babylon
This is what the Lord says to Jerusalem:
“I will be your lawyer to plead your case,
and I will avenge you.
I will dry up her river,
as well as her springs,
and Babylon will become a heap of ruins,
haunted by jackals.
She will be an object of horror and contempt,
a place where no one lives.
Her people will roar together like strong lions.
They will growl like lion cubs.
And while they lie inflamed with all their wine,
I will prepare a different kind of feast for them.
I will make them drink until they fall asleep,
and they will never wake up again,”
says the Lord.
“I will bring them down
like lambs to the slaughter,
like rams and goats to be sacrificed.
“How Babylon[j] is fallen—
great Babylon, praised throughout the earth!
Now she has become an object of horror
among the nations.
The sea has risen over Babylon;
she is covered by its crashing waves.
Her cities now lie in ruins;
she is a dry wasteland
where no one lives or even passes by.
And I will punish Bel, the god of Babylon,
and make him vomit up all he has eaten.
The nations will no longer come and worship him.
The wall of Babylon has fallen!
A Message for the Exiles
“Come out, my people, flee from Babylon.
Save yourselves! Run from the Lord’s fierce anger.
But do not panic; don’t be afraid
when you hear the first rumor of approaching forces.
For rumors will keep coming year by year.
Violence will erupt in the land
as the leaders fight against each other.
For the time is surely coming
when I will punish this great city and all her idols.
Her whole land will be disgraced,
and her dead will lie in the streets.
Then the heavens and earth will rejoice,
for out of the north will come destroying armies
against Babylon,” says the Lord.
“Just as Babylon killed the people of Israel
and others throughout the world,
so must her people be killed.
Get out, all you who have escaped the sword!
Do not stand and watch—flee while you can!
Remember the Lord, though you are in a far-off land,
and think about your home in Jerusalem.”
“We are ashamed,” the people say.
“We are insulted and disgraced
because the Lord’s Temple
has been defiled by foreigners.”
“Yes,” says the Lord, “but the time is coming
when I will destroy Babylon’s idols.
The groans of her wounded people
will be heard throughout the land.
Though Babylon reaches as high as the heavens
and makes her fortifications incredibly strong,
I will still send enemies to plunder her.
I, the Lord, have spoken!
Babylon’s Complete Destruction
“Listen! Hear the cry of Babylon,
the sound of great destruction from the land of the Babylonians.
For the Lord is destroying Babylon.
He will silence her loud voice.
Waves of enemies pound against her;
the noise of battle rings through the city.
Destroying armies come against Babylon.
Her mighty men are captured,
and their weapons break in their hands.
For the Lord is a God who gives just punishment;
he always repays in full.
I will make her officials and wise men drunk,
along with her captains, officers, and warriors.
They will fall asleep
and never wake up again!”
says the King, whose name is
the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.
This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies says:
“The thick walls of Babylon will be leveled to the ground,
and her massive gates will be burned.
The builders from many lands have worked in vain,
for their work will be destroyed by fire!”
Jeremiah’s Message Sent to Babylon
The prophet Jeremiah gave this message to Seraiah son of Neriah and grandson of Mahseiah, a staff officer, when Seraiah went to Babylon with King Zedekiah of Judah. This was during the fourth year of Zedekiah’s reign.[k] Jeremiah had recorded on a scroll all the terrible disasters that would soon come upon Babylon—all the words written here. He said to Seraiah, “When you get to Babylon, read aloud everything on this scroll. Then say, ‘Lord, you have said that you will destroy Babylon so that neither people nor animals will remain here. She will lie empty and abandoned forever.’ When you have finished reading the scroll, tie it to a stone and throw it into the Euphrates River. Then say, ‘In this same way Babylon and her people will sink, never again to rise, because of the disasters I will bring upon her.’”
This is the end of Jeremiah’s messages.
