JEREMIAH by F. D. Starr

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Dec 14, 1904

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 30, No. 49.

JEREMIAH

By F. D. Starr

BY F. D. STARR.

“Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and Thy Word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart.” Jer. 15:16. This will be the jubilant expression of every one who gives due study and consideration to the contents of this book. He who has tasted the good word of God as uttered through the mouth of this holy prophet, will realize that there is no joy on earth equal to the joy to be found in learning the thoughts of God, as contained in His revealed will.

This book has fifty-two chapters, just the number of weeks in the year, and if one chapter a week would be studied, one year would be found none too long to dwell upon the interesting volume.

For full forty years the voice and pen of this noted prophet were active in warning and encouraging the people of God and surrounding nations.

To show the esteem in which the prophet Jeremiah was held by the people in the time of Christ, we note that when the question was agitated as to who Jesus really was, some said He was Jeremiah, or one of the prophets, thus placing Jeremiah at the head of the list of prophets, as it were. Matt. 16:14. Jeremiah lived and wrote more than a generation this side of Isaiah, for his prophetic office began about 70 years after Isaiah’s ceased.

It is very interesting to compare the two books. The possibility of human forgetfulness is mentioned by both in a very striking manner. In Isa. 49:15, we read: “Can a women forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.” In Jer. 2:32 occurs this statement: “Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? yet my people have forgotten Me days without number.” The obvious reply to this question would be in the negative, that it is not possible for a maiden to forget her ornaments. This, coupled with the former assertion that she may forget her child, constitutes a sad commentary on the perverted mental condition of humanity. Yet who can say that to-day children are not more neglected than the outward adorning placed upon them and other members of the family to which they belong? That the body is more than raiment is a truth too often ignored.

The reluctance with which both these prophets entered upon their appointed life-work is worthy of note. Said Isaiah: “Wo is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips.” Jeremiah’s feelings are thus expressed: “Then said I, Ah, Lord God! behold, I can not speak; for I am a child.” But both of these impediments were promptly provided for, and the Lord fitted these messengers up, as He will every one upon whom He places such great responsibilities.

Perhaps the most important topic that the book contains is the prediction concerning the New Covenant, found in chapter 31. This chapter should be studied in connection with the eighth and tenth chapters of Hebrews.

When the new covenant was introduced, as explained in Matt. 26:26-29, it was not an unheralded event, no one need to have been confused over the matters of the two covenants now. Yet there is a vast amount of error in the minds of the people quite generally concerning this important question. Many seem to have imbibed the idea that the new covenant was made with the Gentiles and not with the Jews; that the covenant involves a change of the law, or the abolition of the law, and other strange ideas concerning the matter. Upon examining these scriptures that speak of the new covenant, we find that the new was made with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, just as the first or old covenant was made with their fathers; that instead of the law being set aside under the new covenant, it is to be given a more conspicuous place, that greater attention is to be given to it than under the old covenant. Mark the statement: “But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, saith the Lord, I will put My law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts.” All who are members of the new covenant will, like Him who is the Mediator of the new covenant, have the law of God enshrined in the heart, and will say as He said when He came to take away the first covenant that He might establish the second, “I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart.” See Heb. 10:9: Ps. 40:7, 8.

The striking point of difference between the new covenant and the old, was that the blood of beasts offered in sacrifice under the old, could never take away sin, but rather brought sin to remembrance (see Heb. 10:3), whereas, under the new covenant, by virtue of the blood of Christ, sins are forever blotted out and forgotten. “I will remember their sins no more,” is the promise. Now there is a vast difference between remembering a thing, and forgetting that same thing. It was by virtue of the provisions of the new covenant that sins committed under the old covenant were forgiven. Heb. 9:15. If we are Jews inwardly, (Rom. 2:29), and of Abraham’s spiritual seed (Gal. 3:29), then we have the benefits of this new covenant.

The many brilliant lessons, and the many absorbing topics that glisten from the various chapters of this book, like the stars in the sky, must be passed by, by our simply calling attention to their existence. But do not fail carefully to consider the temperance chapter of this book—chapter thirty-five.

Let us follow the noble example of Daniel, who gave careful and prayerful study to this scroll. He says: “I Daniel understood by books the number of the years, whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet.” Jeremiah was contemporary with Daniel. If his writings were so interesting then, how much more so now, when we are so near the final termination of mortal events, predicted in Jer. 4:23-27. Hear ye the Word of the Lord.