Jer 11:13-23 Pray Not for This People

[Study Aired June 20, 2021]

Jer 11:13  For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to burn incense unto Baal.
Jer 11:14  Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up a cry or prayer for them: for I will not hear them in the time that they cry unto me for their trouble.
Jer 11:15  What hath my beloved to do in mine house, seeing she hath wrought lewdness with many, and the holy flesh is passed from thee? when thou doest evil, then thou rejoicest.
Jer 11:16  The LORD called thy name, A green olive tree, fair, and of goodly fruit: with the noise of a great tumult he hath kindled fire upon it, and the branches of it are broken.
Jer 11:17  For the LORD of hosts, that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee, for the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have done against themselves to provoke me to anger in offering incense unto Baal.
Jer 11:18  And the LORD hath given me knowledge of it, and I know it: then thou shewedst me their doings.
Jer 11:19  But I was like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter; and I knew not that they had devised devices against me, saying, Let us destroy the tree with the fruit thereof, and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered.
Jer 11:20  But, O LORD of hosts, that judgest righteously, that triest the reins and the heart, let me see thy vengeance on them: for unto thee have I revealed my cause.
Jer 11:21  Therefore thus saith the LORD of the men of Anathoth, that seek thy life, saying, Prophesy not in the name of the LORD, that thou die not by our hand:
Jer 11:22  Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts, Behold, I will punish them: the young men shall die by the sword; their sons and their daughters shall die by famine:
Jer 11:23  And there shall be no remnant of them: for I will bring evil upon the men of Anathoth, even the year of their visitation.

Here are the last two verses of our previous study and a few words of that commentary:

“Jer 11:11  Therefore thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will bring evil upon them, which they shall not be able to escape; and though they shall cry unto me, I will not hearken unto them.
Jer 11:12  Then shall the cities of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem go, and cry unto the gods unto whom they offer incense: but they shall not save them at all in the time of their trouble.

“Yes indeed! That is exactly how it is when we are on the raging seas of our rebellious, carnal life, and being brought to our wits’ end. That storm is not our doing. It is a work of the Lord Himself. That God-ordained storm in our lives is what it takes to drag us to “[our] wits’ end], and make us to cry out to the Lord, “Oh wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” At that time, the Lord Himself has forsaken us and does not hear us as we are brought to face the fact that our false doctrines, the idols of our hearts, are doing nothing to give us any relief from the desperate straits in which we find ourselves.” (End Quote)

The “gods unto whom they offer incense: but they shall not save them at all in the time of their trouble” refers to our heart’s idols (Eze 14:1-9). The false doctrine of a secret rapture or a place of safety will not save us from the day of the Lord’s wrath upon the kingdom of our old man.

We concluded that study with the recognition that it is through the Lord’s judgments we learn righteousness:

Isa 26:8  Yea, in the way of thy judgments, O LORD, have we waited for thee; the desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee.
Isa 26:9  With my soul have I desired thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early: for when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.

The only way we “will learn righteousness” is “in the way of [our Lord’s] judgments”. We are told that all the judgments of the Old Testament are types of our own judgment:

1Co 10:11  Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples [G5179: ‘tupos’, types]: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.

Here is how this Greek word ‘tupos’ is translated in the Concordant Literal Version of verse 6 of this same chapter:

1Co 10:6 Now these things became types of us, for us not to be lusters after evil things, (CLV)

Being “types of us” obviously does not mean that we must literally eat of the physical tree of the knowledge of good and evil, commit physical adultery and then literally murder a man to cover up our adultery as King David did with Bathsheba. Nor does it mean that we each must literally kill the prophets or literally nail Christ to the cross. So, what is the meaning of “the way of thy judgments”?

Christ answers this question for us and makes clear “the way of [His] judgments”. First, He poses a couple of questions for us to contemplate:

Luk 13:1  There were present at that season some that told him of the Galilaeans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.
Luk 13:2  And Jesus answering said unto them,  Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things?
Luk 13:3  I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.
Luk 13:4  Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem?
Luk 13:5 I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.

Our Lord’s words, “Suppose ye…” indicate that is exactly what those who were telling Him of what Pilate had done to these men were “supposing”. That is just the way we all just naturally think. Why in the world would the Lord consider you or me to be worthy of the same deaths as those whose blood Pilate mingled with their sacrifices? Why would He consider you or me to be worthy of dying as untimely a death as those on whom the tower in Siloam fell?

The scriptures answer that question, and in doing so reveal the meaning of “the way of [His] judgments”.

This is “the way of His judgments”:

Mat 23:29  Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous,
Mat 23:30  And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
Mat 23:31  Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that  ye are the children of them which killed the prophets.
Mat 23:32  Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.
Mat 23:33  Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?
Mat 23:34  Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city:
Mat 23:35  That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.
Mat 23:36  Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.

There it is! The reason we are just as worthy of death as the men whose blood Pilate mingled with their sacrifices, and the reason we are just as worthy of death as the eighteen men upon whom the tower in Siloam fell is that we are no better than any of them, and “all the righteous blood shed upon the earth from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias… may be required of this generation” reading these words, as Luke tells us:

Luk 11:48  Truly ye bear witness that ye allow the deeds of your fathers: for they indeed killed them, and ye build their sepulchres.
Luk 11:49  Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute:
Luk 11:50  That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation;
Luk 11:51  From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation.

Notice that the word ‘some’ is in italics in the King James Version. Italics in the King James indicates that the word is not in the original Greek manuscripts and was added by the translators. I have emboldened that word to make the point that it simply does not belong in the 34^th verse of Matthew 23, or in the 49^th verse of Luke 11. As we will see in a few moments, Young’s Literal Version leaves out the word ‘some’ in Matthew 23:34, but even Young’s fails to catch this mistake in Luke 11:49.

Before we read Young’s version of these verses containing the word ‘some’, let’s look at this question which the first Christian martyr, Stephen, posed to this very same ‘generation’:

Act 7:52  Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them  which shewed before of the coming of the Just One; of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers:

The obvious implied answer to Stephen’s question is that there was not one single prophet of God who had not been rejected and persecuted by the established religious leaders of their day. It certainly was not “some of them”. No, it is every single true prophet who is always rejected and persecuted by the religious establishment of their day.

I used to read these verses stating that the blood of all the prophets would be required “of this generation” and I thought, “Wow, that must have been an exceptionally wicked generation into which Christ was born over 2,000 years ago!” Such thinking is that of a spiritual babe who has missed the entire point the Lord is making. That point is that the sins of all men of all time, from Adam to the great white throne judgment, are found within the flesh of every one of us who are “in Adam”. In that sense we are one and all guilty of the blood of all the prophets and the blood of Christ Himself. It is in that sense that you and I, along with all the rest of mankind, are guilty of all evil done from Adam to the great white throne judgment:

Luk 11:50  That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation;
Luk 11:51  From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation.

That is “the way of [His] judgments”.

It is you and I who say, “If I had lived in the days of our fathers, I would not have partaken of the blood of the prophets…. I am not as wicked as those men whose blood Pilate mingled with their sacrifice, nor the men on whom the tower in Siloam fell. If I had lived in Christ’s day, I would not have crucified Him.” Nothing is further from the Truth. All the wickedness that has happened from Adam until now, and all the wickedness which will happen from Adam to the great white throne judgment, is in your flesh and in my flesh, and it is in that sense we are all guilty of all of those sins, including a self-righteous spirit which tells us we would never in a thousand years be that wicked when this is the Truth of the Lord’s very elect before “judgment… begins with us”:

Lam 1:8  Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she is removed: all that honoured her despise her,  because they have seen her nakedness: yea, she sigheth, and turneth backward.
Lam 1:9  Her filthiness is in her skirts; she remembereth not her last end; therefore she came down wonderfully [“Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen…”]: she had no comforter. O LORD, behold my affliction: for the enemy hath magnified himself.

“Jerusalem [the Lord’s very elect] has [at first] sinned grievously… therefore she came down wonderfully [and] she had no comforter”. It was not “some of them” whom she had persecuted and killed. It was all the Lord’s Truths and all His prophets telling us of His judgments that we have rejected and killed. Young’s Literal Version caught the fact that the word ‘some’ did not belong in Matthew 23:34:

Mat 23:29  `Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the sepulchres of the prophets, and adorn the tombs of the righteous,
Mat 23:30  and say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
Mat 23:31  So that ye testify to yourselves, that ye are sons of them who did murder the prophets;
Mat 23:32  and ye–ye fill up the measure of your fathers.
Mat 23:33  `Serpents! brood of vipers! how may ye escape from the judgment of the gehenna?
Mat 23:34  `Because of this, lo, I send to you prophets, and wise men, and scribes, and of them ye will kill and crucify, and of them ye will scourge in your synagogues, and will pursue from city to city;
Mat 23:35  that on you may come all the righteous blood being poured out on the earth from the blood of Abel the righteous, unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the sanctuary and the altar:
Mat 23:36  verily I say to you, all these things shall come upon this generation. (YLT)

The religious world loves its own false prophets who speak only smooth things:

Isa 30:9  That this is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the LORD:
Isa 30:10  Which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits:

This world loves its own, but it is “of them”, of those few who are ‘faithful to the end’ to the Lord’s words, of whose blood we have all “taken part” in our own time, when we reject and persecute and hate them and their uncompromising fidelity to the Truth, “the way of [His] judgments” (Isa 26:8-9).

However, Young’s Literal Version fails to correctly translate this exact same Greek phrase in Luke:

Luk 11:49 Therefore, also, God’s Wisdom said, ‘I shall be dispatching to them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will be killing and banishing,'”
Luk 11:50 that the blood of all the prophets which is shed from the disruption of the world may be exacted from this generation,
Luk 11:51 from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the house. Yea, I am saying to you, It will be exacted from this generation!”

No, no, it is not ‘some of them’:

Act 7:52  Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them which shewed before of the coming of the Just One; of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers:
Act 7:53  Who have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it.

What happened to Stephen for simply pointing out that the rejection of “the ways of the Lord’s judgment” is a complete and total rejection from those who claim His name and claim to be His people:

Act 7:54  When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed on him with their teeth.
Act 7:55  But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,
Act 7:56  And said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.
Act 7:57  Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord,
Act 7:58  And cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man’s feet, whose name was Saul.
Act 7:59  And they stoned Stephen, calling upon  God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.
Act 7:60  And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

Are you and I above stoning Stephen? No, of ourselves we are not. Had we been on that Sanhedren council, you and I would have been the ones doing this vile act. “This generation” is not just the generation into which Christ was born:

Mat 23:34  Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city:
Mat 23:35  That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.
Mat 23:36  Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come  upon this generation.

No, it is rather “this generation…. whoso readeth [in every generation] let him understand”:

Mat 24:15  When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand)

With that understanding, we will continue to ask the Lord to help us to appreciate the depth of our apostasy and deception and “the [loving] way of His judgments” as revealed in today’s study:

Heb 12:6  For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
Heb 12:7  If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?

The Lord has made us err from His ways and has hardened our hearts from His fear for this very purpose:

Isa 63:17  O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from  thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

This is the depth of our apostasy. This is just how hard He has made our hearts to be. This is just how little we fear our own Creator:

Jer 11:13  For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to burn incense unto Baal.

According to “the number of your cities [and] according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem” is just another way of saying that our apostasy is complete and thorough to this extent:

Isa 3:1  For, behold, the Lord, the LORD of hosts, doth take away from Jerusalem and from Judah the stay and the staff,  the whole stay of bread, and the whole stay of water,
Isa 3:2  The mighty man, and the man of war, the judge, and the prophet, and the prudent, and the ancient,
Isa 3:3  The captain of fifty, and the honourable man, and the counsellor, and the cunning artificer, and the eloquent orator.
Isa 3:4  And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them.

“The… bread… and… the water” are both types and symbols for the Words and doctrines of Christ. We all apostatize just that thoroughly while we are in the grip of the great whore, Babylon.

As we read in our last study, God knows just how to deal with us at this point:

Jer 11:14  Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up a cry or prayer for them: for I will not hear them in the time that they cry unto me for their trouble.
Jer 11:15  What hath my beloved to do in mine house, seeing she hath wrought lewdness with many, and the holy flesh is passed from thee? when thou doest evil, then thou rejoicest.

There is a time in our lives when the Lord puts us out of His presence for the destruction of our flesh. It is a time of being tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and the Lamb.

This time of our judgment is called “the patience of the saints”. It is called the keeping of His commandments [to read, hear and keep the things written in this book (Rev 1:2)] and the faith of Jesus”:

Rev 14:6  And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people,
Rev 14:7  Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.
Rev 14:8  And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.
Rev 14:9  And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand,
Rev 14:10  The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:
Rev 14:11  And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.
Rev 14:12  Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.
Rev 14:13  And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them.

If we are His very elect in this present time, the Lord will “look on [our] affliction” and rebuke the adversary who exalts himself against us. These words of Jeremiah 11 are setting the stage for what this same prophet reveals to us about ourselves in the book of Lamentations, which I repeat:

Lam 1:8  Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she is removed: all that honoured her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness: yea, she sigheth, and turneth backward.
Lam 1:9  Her filthiness is in her skirts; she remembereth not her last end; therefore she came down wonderfully: she had no comforter. O LORD, behold my affliction:  for the enemy hath magnified himself.

Even our own old man despises the hypocrite we have become at this point in our lives. Thank the Lord for “the ways of [His] fiery judgments” (Isa 26:8-9):

Jer 11:16  The LORD called thy name, A green olive tree, fair, and of goodly fruit: with the noise of a great tumult he hath kindled fire upon it, and the branches of it are broken.
Jer 11:17  For the LORD of hosts, that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee, for the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have done against themselves to provoke me to anger in offering incense unto Baal.
Jer 11:18  And the LORD hath given me knowledge of it, and I know it: then thou shewedst me their doings.

“Their doings” are our doings. Until the day Christ brings us to appreciate our need for “the ways of [His] judgments”, we will continue to self-righteously place the blood of all the prophets upon others and deceive ourselves that we would never have partaken of their blood, nor ever refused the Lord’s words and doctrines, even as we do just that. That is why this next verse must first be required of you and me:

Jer 11:19  But I was like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter; and I knew not that they had devised devices against me, saying, Let us destroy the tree with the fruit thereof, and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered.

This is essentially what we first do to Christ when He sends His prophets to witness us of “the ways of [His] judgments”:

Mat 21:38  But when the husbandmen saw the son, they said among themselves, This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance.
Mat 21:39  And they caught him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him.
Mat 21:40  When the lord therefore of the vineyard cometh, what will he do unto those husbandmen?
Mat 21:41  They say unto him, He will miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their seasons.
Mat 21:42  Jesus saith unto them, Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner: this is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes?
Mat 21:43  Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.

When Jeremiah is speaking these words, he is applying them to “the men of Anathoth”, his home town:

Jer 1:1  The words of Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah,  of the priests that were in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin:

The men of Anathoth, like the men of Nazareth, symbolize our self-righteous, carnal-minded, Babylonian old man.

Jer 11:20  But, O LORD of hosts, that judgest righteously,  that triest the reins and the heart, let me see thy vengeance on them: for unto thee have I revealed my cause.
Jer 11:21  Therefore thus saith the LORD of the men of Anathoth, that seek thy life, saying, Prophesy not in the name of the LORD, that thou die not by our hand:

As ‘the men of Nazareth’ demonstrate, our self-righteous, judgmental old man wants Christ to “die… by our hand”. This is what you and I have done to Christ:

Act 8:32  The place of the scripture which he read was this, He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before his shearer, so opened he not his mouth:

This is the story of Philip’s witness to the Ethiopian eunuch, who was reading this verse of Isaiah when Philip approached his chariot:

Isa 53:7  He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.

In this verse of Jeremiah, the holy spirit is simply building upon what it had already revealed to King David of “the ways of [His] judgments”.

Psa 44:22  Yea, for thy sake are we  killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.

This theme will carry over into next week’s study:

Jer 12:3  But thou, O LORD, knowest me: thou hast seen me, and tried mine heart toward thee: pull them out like sheep for the slaughter, and prepare them for the day of slaughter.

Paul refers to just how thoroughly we reject the judgments of Christ and His Christ:

Rom 8:36  As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

This brings us to our last two verses of this 11^th chapter of Jeremiah and “the ways of the Lord’s judgments” against the self-righteous kingdom of Babylon within us:

Jer 11:22  Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts, Behold, I will punish them: the young men shall die by the sword; their sons and their daughters shall die by famine:
Jer 11:23  And there shall be no remnant of them: for I will bring evil upon the men of Anathoth, even the year of their visitation.

There will be no ‘remnant’ left to the kingdom of our self-righteous, carnal-minded old man who is enmity against God and “the ways of His judgments” (Isa 26:8-9).

That concludes our study for this week. In our next study we will “talk with [the Lord] of His judgments”:

Jer 12:1  Righteous art thou, O LORD, when I plead with thee: yet let me talk with thee of thy judgments: Wherefore doth the way of the wicked prosper? wherefore are all they happy that deal very treacherously?
Jer 12:2  Thou hast planted them, yea, they have taken root: they grow, yea, they bring forth fruit: thou art near in their mouth, and far from their reins.
Jer 12:3  But thou, O LORD, knowest me: thou hast seen me, and tried mine heart toward thee: pull them out like sheep for the slaughter, and prepare them for the day of slaughter.
Jer 12:4  How long shall the land mourn, and the herbs of every field wither, for the wickedness of them that dwell therein? the beasts are consumed, and the birds; because they said, He shall not see our last end.
Jer 12:5  If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee, then how canst thou contend with horses? and if in the land of peace, wherein thou trustedst, they wearied thee, then how wilt thou do in the swelling of Jordan?
Jer 12:6  For even thy brethren, and the house of thy father, even they have dealt treacherously with thee; yea, they have called a multitude after thee: believe them not, though they speak fair words unto thee.
Jer 12:7  I have forsaken mine house, I have left mine heritage; I have given the dearly beloved of my soul into the hand of her enemies.
Jer 12:8  Mine heritage is unto me as a lion in the forest; it crieth out against me: therefore have I hated it.
Jer 12:9  Mine heritage is unto me as a speckled bird, the birds round about are against her; come ye, assemble all the beasts of the field, come to devour.