Asked to Inquire of the Lord by a King
Prophet Abijah for King Jeroboam – 1 Kings 14:2
Prophet Micaiah for Jehoshaphat – 1 Kings 22:7
Prophet Elisha for King Joram – 2 Kings 6:21
Prophet Isaiah for King Hezekiah – 2 Kings 19:2
Prophetess Huldah for King Josiah – 2 Kings 22:13-15
Prophet Jeremiah for Zedekiah – Jeremiah 37:17
Prophet Daniel for Belteshazzar - Daniel 5:13
Surprisingly, evil King Zedekiah asked Jeremiah to inquire of the Lord with the hope that if he did, the Babylonian army would withdraw from Jerusalem.
The Jamieson Fausset Brown Commentary suggests that Zedekiah’s concern is that the Egyptian army has withdrawn from the area, and the Babylonian will return.
About 120 years prior to King Zedekiah’s rule, God did a wondrous work for his forefather King Hezekiah. In 2 Kings 19:35-36, God sent a destroying angel to slay 185,000 enemy soldiers in one night. The mighty army surrounding Jerusalem was destroyed by God.
But wait, Hezekiah had a relationship with the Lord. Prior to the attack, he already had a prayer relationship with the Lord. Hezekiah had worked harmoniously with God’s servant Isaiah the prophet. He purged the land of idols. He called all his people to observe the Passover. He restored worship at the Temple. He made strategic defense modifications to Jerusalem.
Zedekiah did not have such a relationship with the Lord. Isaiah 59:1-2 says, “Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; nor His ear heavy, that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear.” Zedekiah had not repented of his sins and sought God’s forgiveness.
Can you imagine how exasperated Jeremiah must have felt? He found himself caught between the throne of God and the throne of man. Again!
For years, the rulers of this king and this city wanted nothing to do with God or His messengers. As bucking broncos buck off rodeo riders, these men wanted God off their backs. They expected God to act as though the abuse never happened. They mistreated God’s servant Jeremiah and then expected him to give them a good word. Jeremiah stuck with God’s Word.
“Then Jeremiah said to them, ‘Thus you shall say to Zedekiah, thus says the Lord God of Israel: behold, I will turn back the weapons of war that are in your hands, with which you fight against the king of Babylon and the Chaldeans who besiege you outside the walls; and I will assemble them in the midst of this city.’” Jeremiah 21:3-4
I am sure that the king’s messengers, Pashhur and Zephaniah, were shocked when Jeremiah told them to tell the king that God was for his enemies. The Jerusalemites would use their weapons to fight the Babylonians “outside the walls.” The Babylonians would use the king’s weapons against him “in the midst of this city” within its walls.
While in Jerusalem, Jesus told its corrupt leaders a parable of a king who invited people to his son’s marriage feast. They refused his invitations. As time went on, they even arrested his servants, tortured, and killed them. The king burned that city down. (Matthew 22:1-7)
Zedekiah refused to come to the Lord’s table despite being repeatedly invited to do so. Now, he wanted the Lord’s help. The Lord doesn’t work that way. It is no coincidence that Jesus used a parable about a marriage feast when He spoke to corrupt leaders. They wanted subjection from others but scoffed at being subject to God or to anyone else.
“I Myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and with a strong arm, even in anger and fury and great wrath.” Jeremiah 21:5
Isaiah 63:10 says, “They rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit; therefore He turned Himself to become their enemy, He fought against them.”
“I will strike the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast; they shall die of a great pestilence.” Jeremiah 21:6
Love has two sides to it. Love protects. Love also attacks. Attacks fraudsters like a ferocious mother bear robbed of her cubs! Such leaders decimate a nation.
“And afterward, says the Lord, I will deliver Zedekiah king of Judah, his servants and the people, and such as are left in this city from the pestilence, the sword, and the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of those who seek their life; and he shall strike them with the edge of the sword. He shall not spare them or have pity or mercy.” Jeremiah 21:7
The Babylonians forced King Zedekiah to watch the execution of his sons and officials. Then, they put out his eyes and allowed him to live.
After the Lord brought the people of Egypt, He warned them against breaking covenant with him. He told them via Moses in Deuteronomy 28:49-50, “The Lord will bring a nation against you from afar, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flies, a nation whose language you will not understand, a nation of fierce countenance, which does not respect the elderly nor show favor to the young.”
“Now you shall say to this people, ‘Thus says the Lord: behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death.’” Jeremiah 21:8
LIFE if they humbled themselves before the Lord and obeyed Him. DEATH if they stiffened their necks and persisted in resisting unconditional surrender to the Babylonians.
“He who remains in this city shall die by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence; but he who goes out and defects to the Chaldeans [Babylonians] who besiege you, he shall live, and his life shall be as a prize to him.” Jeremiah 21:9
Sword, famine and pestilence are God’s red flags to those who break covenant with Him. As God created nerve endings to help our body sense heat when it is close to fire, so God allows pain when we are near to hell’s fire. He allows a lesser pain to save us from a greater pain.
Old Covenant keepers were to obey God’s commandments and to sacrifice the blood of bulls and sheep to atone for their sins. New Covenant keepers are to love as Jesus loved us and to profess faith in the blood of Christ for the forgiveness of all our sins.
“For I have set My face against this city for adversity and not for good, says the Lord. It shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.” Jeremiah 21:10
When circumstances begin to go downhill, we should stop and ask the Lord to place our sins under His atoning blood. To forgive us! Even if our circumstances seem unrelated to our behavior, turning to the Lord in humility is a good move. Peter wrote in 1 Peter 5:5-7, “All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble. Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.”
“And concerning the house of the king of Judah, say, ‘Hear the Word of the Lord, O house of David! Thus says the Lord: execute judgment in the morning; and deliver him who is plundered out of the hand of the oppressor, lest My fury go forth like fire and burn so that no one can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.” Jeremiah 21:11-12
To execute judgment in the morning means to do it with promptness. Oppression has to do with being held down by spiritual forces of wickedness so that you cannot be who God created you to be. The Lord wants us as His servants, that is those of us with His authority, to rebuke spiritual forces of wickedness that enslave people. Rebuke the spirits in the Name of the Lord.
In Matthew 28:19-20, the Lord Jesus called the Church via His great commission to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and to teach disciples to obey everything that He commanded us. This is our primary directive. After I prayed and fasted, about my calling, He sent me to China.
The highest form of deliverance from oppression is salvation. There is no greater poverty than being in hell forever. The only escape from such poverty is to hear and believe the Gospel.
In Romans 10:14-15, Paul wrote, “How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!’”
Someone who opens his or her heart to Jesus Christ is like a very beautiful flower’s blossom.
The Lord used the great commission to inspire me to take the Gospel to China. Then, on the very night that I sailed on a ship from Hong Kong to Guangzhou, I inquired of the Lord for further guidance. He led me to Exodus 3:12, “And God said, ‘I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.’” The Lord was with me. He helped me to lead some of the people in Guangzhou to become His worshippers. Praise the Lord!
Sometime later, when I was reading the Book of James, God gave me further guidance. James 1:27 says, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” I prayed, “Lord, if this is Your will, please let me meet an orphan or widow today.” That night, at a Bible study, prayer requests were taken from the participants. One of the sisters said that her father passed away and that the coming Sunday was her mother’s birthday. After the meeting ended, I asked her if my family and I could visit her mother on her birthday. She said, “Yes!” Three daughters had lost their father and their mother was a widow. Thus, the Lord answered my prayer that day. Not only that, but later, the Lord opened a door for me and my family to develop a weekly volunteer services ministry to orphans in Guangzhou. Praise the Lord!
All this to say that “executing judgment” among oppressed orphans and widows was God’s way of helping me to fulfill my great commission calling in China. Many missionaries were detained and blacklisted from China within months or a year of beginning to witness for Christ there, but the Lord blessed me with eight years of divinely protected ministry in that city. Glory to God!
“Behold, I am against you, O inhabitant of the valley, and rock of the plain,’ says the Lord, ‘Who say, who shall come down against us? Or who shall enter our dwellings? But I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings, says the Lord; I will kindle a fire in its forest, and it shall devour all things around it.” Jeremiah 21:13-14
The people of Jerusalem felt secure. They lived on a plateau overlooking a valley. They said, “Who can come against us? Who can enter our refuge?” They looked every which way but up. They did not consider God’s position towards them. God was going to punish them according to the fruit of their doings. He had blessed them to be a city on a hill. A light in the darkness! Salt of the earth! But they preferred to be as a dry branch toward Him. Kindling for fire!
2 Chronicles 36:19 says that when the Babylonians came, “They burned the house of God and broke down the wall of Jerusalem and burned all its fortified buildings with fire and destroyed all its valuable articles.” It will even worse for souls today who know not the Lord.
Were prophets like Jeremiah meant to be anomalies among God’s people or the norm? In Numbers 11:29, Moses said to Joshua, “Oh, that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them!” In 2 Peter 1:3, Peter wrote, “His divine power has given us everything we need for godliness through our knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness.” God doesn’t want a few good men. He wants all men, women, boys and girls to believe in His Son and to be filled with His Holy Spirit. It is not our names on a paper or a council of people that provides for us a platform to speak and act for God. No, it is His Spirit within us like a fire in our heart and bones that we cannot contain. Not a few masked and caped heroes, but a multitude of mild mannered people, who when so moved by God’s Spirit are more than enough for any situation that God sets before them.
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