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Dr. Manny Arango
Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast. Powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the journey. Let's be honest, a lot of us are still treating digital ministry like it's a backup plan from 2020. But discipleship isn't just happening on Sundays anymore. People need gospel centered connection every day of the week. And if you're stuck juggling five different platforms, one for giving, another for sermons, something else for events, it's no wonder engagement feels off. That's not ministry, that's a mess. Subsplash changes that one platform. Everything you need, media, giving, events, messaging, your app, your website built specifically for churches. No hacks, no workarounds, just clarity and simplicity. Because every day you wait, families scroll past your sermons, new guests click away from clunky sites, and real people miss real moments with Jesus. Don't waste another summer stuck in digital survival mode. Use it to get ahead, simplify, upgrade, get back to what matters. Head to subsplash.combible-dept and schedule a free no pressure demo. And let this be the summer your church gets focused and fully equipped family. Welcome to day 226 and we are in Jeremiah chapters 50, 51 and 52. We got three chapters left in the entire book of Jeremiah and we are done. I'm tempted to sing End of the Road by Boys to Men. I'm not gonna sing it though. We got a good chunk of reading to do today actually. I think that the reading is really, really exciting. And so if you've already done the reading, then everything that I'm gonna say is gonn perfect sense because you've got context for it. If you haven't done the reading, pause this video, stop the audio and go ahead and read Jeremiah chapters 50 to 52. Let me give you context. So this is a fantastic, just like resolution to the book. Okay. We would see maybe the fall of Jerusalem as like the climactic moment of the book. And so this is like the falling action. So this is a great, just conclusion to the book. In chapter 50 we are going to get our chapter 50 and 51, we're going to get the largest oracle of all the oracles against the nations. Okay, so this is going to be larger than the oracle against Egypt or Philistia or Edom or Ammon or Moab. This is going to be the oracle against Babylon. Okay, Babylon. So we are going back in time, and then we're going to go forward in time again. So if you've just kind of been tracking with the narrative, and obviously we've experienced the fall of Jerusalem already, but these oracles are given before that. Okay, all of the oracles, the oracles from yesterday and the oracle against Babylon for today are going to be given probably somewhere around 605 BC. So Jerusalem has not fallen yet. Jerusalem hasn't burned to the ground yet. But we are going to get there in Jeremiah, chapter 52, and I'll let you know. Hey, we're back in the present. So the focus of chapters 50 and 51 are that even at the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar's rise to power, God has already determined that he is gonna judge Nebuchadnezzar. All right? So God or Yahweh is not judging Nebuchadnezzar for something that he's gonna do in the future. God knows exactly what he's gonna do in the future. And moreover, he knows Nebuchadnezzar's heart. And so there's a prophecy that goes forward towards Nebuchadnezzar, even though he's being judged in the prophecy for things that he has not done yet. But that's how prophecy works, right? Let's think about it this way. What's gonna happen in Jeremiah chapters 50 and 51 is that Jeremiah's gonna prophesy, because you destroyed my temple, I'm gonna destroy your temple. Okay, so Yahweh, obviously Yahweh's temple is in Jerusalem. Has Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem yet? No, but Yahweh is saying, because you are going to destroy my temple in Jerusalem, I am going to destroy Babylon, the home of Bel, the home of Marduk, the home of Ishtar. I'm gonna destroy the home of your gods, since you are going to destroy the home of Yahweh, the God of Israel. And so these prophecies are going to. You kind of have to forget that you know, that these things have happened yet, or else it doesn't feel that predictive. But you know that, like, Jeremiah is a real prophet, because this is exactly what happens. Now. The difference between the prophecies against Judah versus the prophecies against Babylon is that Judah would be restored and allowed to go home. You can see this in chapter 50, verses 4 to 7, 16, 19. You can see this in verses 33 to 34. You can see this in Jeremiah 51, 5, 6, 10, 45, for the people of Babylon, there will be no restoration, no return to glory. You can see this in chapter 50, verses 39, 40, chapter 51, verse 26, verse 39, verse 57, verse 62. That the difference between God's oracles of judgment against Judah and God's oracles of judgment against Babylon is that Judah's going to get to have restoration. Judah is being punished momentarily, but then they're going to get brought back into the land, whereas Yahweh is going to destroy Babylon forever. And that's true. The Babylonian empire is gone. Okay? Like that there's nobody. You can't book a ticket to go to the Babylonian empire. It's out of here, okay? It's gone. The reason given above all for this judgment was vengeance. Babylon would destroy the temple of Yahweh, his house that Solomon had built and David had planned. Yahweh's throne on the earth had been destroyed by Babylon. And so Yahweh in return would destroy Babylon, the home of Bel Marduk, Ishtar, the and other gods of the Babylonians. This is clearly outlined in Jeremiah 50:28, Jeremiah 51, 11, 24, 50, 51. So that's the oracle against Babylon. Also, there's a lot of language here that John the Revelator is going to use in the Book of Revelation. Okay, Babylon is going to get featured a lot as a word to kind of describe Rome, that the modern day Babylon is Rome, the Roman Empire that John is a part of, and that the province of Judah or Judea is a part of. Some of the language that John is gonna borrow is stuff like verse 45, Jeremiah, chapter 51, verse 45, it says, come out of her, my people. Run for your lives. Run from the fierce anger of the Lord. That word come out of her. We're going to get that exact same imagery, metaphor, language when we get to the Book of Revelation. Obviously, it's easier to read, interpret and understand the Book of Revelation correctly when you've actually read the entire Bible, because John the Revelator has an incredible grasp on the Hebrew scriptures and is going to allude to or directly quote from the prophets and the entire Old Testament, I mean, like every other line. And so knowing the original context of where a lot of this stuff comes from is actually really, really helpful when you get to the Book of Revelation. Okay, let's get to the end of chapter 51, okay? Cause the end of chapter 51 is really, really fascinating. Chapter 51, verse 59. This is the message that Jeremiah the Prophet. This is kind of like a postscript. So it's probably not a part of the original oracle against Babylon, but it's. It actually. This is exactly where it should go. It's actually really cool. Okay, this is the message Jeremiah the prophet gave to the staff officer, Sariah, son of Neriah, the son of Messiah, when he went to Babylon with Zedekiah. Okay, Zedekiah goes to Babylon. I can actually tell you probably the exact. Yeah, there we go. The end of Chapter 51 records a diplomatic visit of Zedekiah to Babylon during the fourth year of his reign. So this is around 594bc okay, so Zedekiah is going to take a diplomatic visit to Babylon in 594 B.C. and in that visit, Jeremiah is going to see an opportunity to slip a scroll, to slip a prophecy to one of the officers that's accompanying Zedekiah. Okay, so verse 60, Jeremiah had written on a scroll about all the disasters that would come upon Babylon, all that had been recorded concerning Babylon. Verse 61. He said to Sariah, when you get to Babylon, see that you read all these words aloud, then say, lord, you have said you will destroy this place so that neither people nor animals will live in it. It will be desolate forever. When you finish reading the scroll, tie a stone to it and throw it into the Euphrates. Then say, so will Babylon sink to rise no more because of the disaster I will bring on her and her people will fall. The words of Jeremiah end here. So that's actually Baruch lets us know. The words of Jeremiah are done right here. Okay, we'll talk about chapter 52 in a moment. Now here's what's fascinating. Okay? So the prophecy is then tied to a stone and thrown in the Euphrates. And it's a sign act that in the same way that this stone has sank, Babylon is going to sink. Now, it's not a coincidence that this stone is thrown into the Euphrates, okay? Babylon is mighty, strong, great, majestic, glorious because of the Euphrates. This is actually true of every great city and definitely ancient cities, okay? Egypt is wealthy and powerful because it's on the Nile. It is the Nile that produces water is life. You begin to realize that, especially when you take a trip to Israel. Water is life. And even if you look at America like you look at the Mississippi, you look at most cities are situated on rivers because cities need a water source. Rivers are a strategic geographical location in terms of placing cities. So the Euphrates is what makes Babylon glorious. And in the same way that the Nile makes Egypt glorious. Now, why is that important? Because it is going to be the Euphrates that is going to be the source of Babylon's end. This is going to get picked up in the Book of Daniel because in the middle of Belshazzar's feast, as Daniel is telling him that the Babylonian days are numbered, what was actually happening to the Euphrates river right there at that moment is that Cyrus the Persian, okay, Cyrus the Persian was upriver damming the river, okay? Babylon thought it could never fall. Babylon, one of the mightiest empires of the ancient world, thought it could never fall. Cyrus is brilliant. He doesn't siege the city. All he does is he goes upstream of the Euphrates, dams the river so that there's no water that's flowing in the river, and then just. So what happens with the city walls is that there's walls surrounding the city, but you have to allow for gates to let the river actually run through the city. So when you build your city on a river, okay, your walls are keeping out anyone who's going to travel on land. And obviously, no one can jump in the river to go through the gates. And. But if they dam up the river, then guess what? They can walk on the riverbed and go through your gates and go straight into the city. That's exactly what Cyrus the Persian does. He dams up the river. He dams up the entire Euphrates river, and his entire army just walks through the gates because the whole river is they walking on dry ground, okay? The same way that the Nile became a source of plague and pestilence in the Exodus, the river that is their glory, the river that they worshiped, becomes a thing that is no longer the pinnacle of glory, but of horror. The same thing, that same reversal is going to happen with Babylon, okay? And so the same way that stone sinks to the bottom of the Euphrates, Babylon is going to sync and it's going to sink because Cyrus the Persian is going to dam up the Euphrates river and just walk in uncontested. He's literally going to defeat the entire Babylonian empire in a night gone. And so all the oracles against Babylon are going to be fulfilled in a single night. Then we get to chapter 52. Chapter 52 is essentially straight verbatim from two kings, okay? And it's going to end on the most hopeful note we're going to see. It's going to say we're going to get an entire recounting of the fall of Jerusalem. And then we're going to go all the way down to the bottom to verse 31. It's going to say this. In the 37th year of the exile of Jehoiachin, king of Judah, in the year of Awel, Marduk became king of Babylon. On the 25th day of the 12th month, he released Jehoiachin, king of Judah, and freed him from prison. This is literally two kings, chapter 25, copy and pasted. Okay, so two kings and Jeremiah are going to end with the exact same words. He spoke highly to him and gave him a seat of honor higher than any of those other kings that were with him in Babylon. So Jehoiachin put aside his prison clothes and for the rest of his life ate regularly at the king's table. The king of Babylon. The new king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar's. One of Nebuchadnezzar's heirs. Day by day, the king of Babylon gave Jehoiachin a regular allowance as long as he lived to the day of his death. Why is this so huge? It's because a son of David is released from captivity. This is massive. Jeremiah ends his entire book on a note of hope. Hope attached to a son of David. Judah had lost everything. Judah lost its land. It lost Jerusalem, it lost the temple. It lost their kings, everything that gave them their identity. But now their last true king is released from bondage. Yahweh was not finished with the house of David. Now you may be thinking to yourself, I memorized the list of the last five kings. It's Josiah, Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, and Zedekiah. What do you mean? Zedekiah is the last true king? No. Remember, Zedekiah is older than Jehoiachin. Zedekiah is Jehoiachin's uncle. So Jehoiachin is really considered the last living heir of David. The last king of David. Which means this last true king being released from bondage means that Yahweh is not finished with the house of David. There is still hope for David, and there is still hope for the Jewish people. If he was freed, they too could be freed. If he was restored and honored, they too could be restored and honored. In the bigger picture, this act of hope would lead to David's line restoring Israel. It was the grandson of Jehoiachin, Zerubbabel, who would lead the people home from exile, rebuild Jerusalem, and rebuild the temple. And of course, it was another of his descendants, the son of David, who would Bring hope and restoration to the world and build the new temple which was his body, the church and that heir of David is none other than than Jesus Christ family. The wait is over. My brand new book Crushing Chaos is out now and available everywhere. Books are sold. Literally. Today I walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books a million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you understand that the beauty of Scripture is actually knowing it in context, then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is going to be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode. Hey, are you looking for a really cool gift or just solid tools to support your faith and daily Life? Check out Mr. Pen. They've got no bleed Bible pens and highlighters that actually work on thin Bible pages. Journaling Bibles, Bible tabs and faith based journals. Even school supplies for parents, teachers and students. Mr. Penn was started by Christian teachers in Louisiana on a mission to serve the schools in their local community. And now They've got over 100,000 five star reviews on Amazon. I'm a huge fan of their Bible highlighters and pens. Super smooth and gentle enough to write notes in the margin of your Bible. Whether you're digging into scripture or stocking up for back to school. Mr. Penn has you covered. Shop the best Bible journaling supplies on the market and fantastic gifts for the ladies in your life@mrpen.com that's mrpn.com and guess what? Our audience here at the Bible Department gets a special discount. Use code DEPARTMENT10 at checkout to get 10% off your entire order. What is our Thomas Truth? Our Thomas Truth flows straight out of that last nerdy nugget. Jehoiachin's release is one of the great turning points in the biblical story. That's why it's in two places, copied and pasted. It's at the end of Jeremiah and it's at the end of 2 Kings. This is one of the great turning points in biblical history. This is one of those moments where you realize, oh, this is emphasized a lot. Like every time I've been in school for My undergraduate degree or my master's or my doctorate. And you study the Scriptures. These. This moment right here of Jehoiachin being released from prison, emphasized with. With a lot of emphasis. I know that's a funny sentence, emphasized with a lot of emphasis. But in church, not really talked about, not something that is emphasized at all in church. But this is a massive turning point in the biblical story. It tells us that even in such despair, exile, and imprisonment, that God had not abandoned his plans for the sons of David, that he had not abandoned his covenant with David. Jehoiachin would give the world a man by the name of Zerubbabel, and Zerubbabel would give the world Jesus. It is a reminder that God's promises for us never depend on our current situation and state of mind. They depend on the one who is always faithful, always righteous, whose steadfast love never ceases, whose words always come to pass. And with that, we end the entire book of Jeremiah. I think that that ending for the book of Jeremiah leaves on a hopeful note. And the same reason that 2 Kings chooses this ending is the same reason why Baruch probably chose this ending for the book of Jeremiah. To not leave on a note of despair, but to leave on a note of hope. To leave on an upward trajectory that although things look hopeless and although this man had been in prison for 37 years, no one is beyond hope. And if this man can be restored, then the entire nation can be restored. And if this man can be restored, you can be restored. I can be restored. Restoration is always God's goal, and it's always God, God's job. One last note about restoration. Restoration is a word that we use a lot in church. And sometimes when we use restoration in church, it's almost like, yep, here's where you were. Then there was a moral failure. We're gonna restore you to where you were right? And a lot of times, this doesn't even happen right. Pastors have moral failures. They don't really get restored. They have some lesser title than they had previously. And sometimes I get that there are real consequences that people have to actually deal with. But here's how God sees restoration. I was watching this show called Rust Valley Restorers that took old cars and restored them. You want to know what's funny? Is as they restored these cars, they didn't just take them back to their original value, but they became more valuable than the original value. They'd find a car from, like, the 1950s. And in the 50s, you know, this car was. It's $5,000. And they would find this car, it's worth nothing. You know, they buying it for pennies on the dollar. And then they put hard work, blood, sweat, and tears into these vehicles. And now all of a sudden, they're selling them for 50, 100, 150, $200,000. Because God's version of restoration is not just to bring you back to where you fell from, but to bring you higher and into a greater capacity from where you fell from. And so my hope and my prayer for you in our timeless truth as we end the book of Jeremiah is that God would restore you, that he would restore your finances, that he would restore your health, that he would restore your calling, that he would restore your confidence, that he would restore anything that has been broken as a result of. Of sin, disobedience, and rebellion. That God is a God of restoration. And with that, we wrap up the entire Book of Jeremiah. Tomorrow we've got day 227, and we're starting a brand new book of the Bible. We're gonna march our way into the Book of Ezekiel. We've already dropped Ezekiel's name as we've been talking about Jeremiah because Ezekiel got deported while Jeremiah was still in Jerusalem prophesying. So we've heard Ezekiel's name, but tomorrow we actually get to dive into the Book of Ezekiel. It's gonna be great. We've got the first three chapters of Ezekiel for us tomorrow to read. And I'll be doing what I always do. I'll be giving context clues, nerdy nuggets, and timeless truths. I'll see you right here tomorrow if you're on a streak. I'm so proud of you. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the@thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram hebibledepartment. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.