Jeremiah 25

Jeremiah 25:1

B. The Seventy-year Captivity in Babylon Predicted (25:1-11)Jeremiah had warned all the people of Judah for twenty-three years; other men of God had not ceased to call them to repentance. Because they would not listen, they would be taken captive by God’s servant, Nebuchadnezzar, and remain in exile for seventy years. The reason the captivity lasted seventy years and God told the Jews in advance how long it would last is indicated in 2Ch_36:20-21 : And those who escaped from the sword he carried away to Babylon, where they became servants to him and his sons until the rule of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her Sabbaths. As long as she lay desolate she kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years. Lev_25:3-5 teaches that the land was to lie fallow every seventh year. The people had disobeyed this law.

Jeremiah 25:12

C. The Babylonian Captors to Be Judged (25:12-38)25:12-29 The hope of a speedy return was therefore a lie. After the seventy years, God would direct His wrath against the Chaldeans (Babylonians). Under the symbol of a cup of wine, Jeremiah is told to pronounce God’s fury on Judah and on other nations to be crushed by Nebuchadnezzar, and finally upon Nebuchadnezzar himself (king of Sheshach). By his prophetic utterances, Jeremiah should tell these nations that they must drink . . . the cup of God’s wrath. If God punishes Jerusalem first, the nations can hardly expect to escape. 25:30-38 These verses amplify the terrors of the cup of God’s fierce anger, using such descriptive and poetic words as roar, shout, and noise to describe it. The leaders of the flock of Jews will wail because the LORD has plundered their pasture.