Jeremiah 6:18 - Meaning and Application

Here, God calls on the surrounding nations, yes, the whole world, to judge whether his actions against Judah and Jerusalem are fair (Jeremiah 6:18-19). He says, “Hear, you nations,” and even calls on the “assembly of the nations,” the great men who watch the affairs of states. They can see what is happening to Judah and Jerusalem, and they may wonder why God would bring disaster on a people bound to him by covenant, a people who had his worship and his favor. They may ask, as in (Deuteronomy 29:24), why the Lord has done this to the land.

The answer is plain. Their ruin grew out of their own plans, the fruit of their own thinking. They thought foreign alliances would make them strong, but those very plans weakened them and left them exposed. Their punishment was also the just result of their rebellion. God was only carrying out the curse promised in his law, because they would not listen to his words or his law. They rejected everything he said, so no one can fairly say they were treated wrong.

God also rejects their claim that their outward worship could make up for their sins (Jeremiah 6:20). He asks what good their incense and sweet cane, burned on the golden altar, could do for him, even if it was the best and brought from far away. Their burnt offerings and sacrifices could not profit God, as (Psalm 50:9) says, and they did not please him unless they came from an upright heart. Sacrifice and incense were meant to awaken repentance, point them to a Mediator, one who stands between God and people, and help their faith in him. Used that way, they were acceptable. But if people offered them while thinking they could buy God’s favor and keep on sinning, those gifts became an insult to him.

He then foretells the desolation that was coming. God says he will place stumbling blocks before this people, meaning troubles that will trip them up, not lead them into sin. When God marks people for destruction, he confuses their plans and blocks the ways they try to save themselves (Jeremiah 6:21). The enemy’s bands, found wherever they went, would be like stones in the road. Fathers and sons would fall together, and neither age nor strength would rescue them. Neighbors and friends would also perish, unable to help each other.

God would use the Chaldeans, the Babylonians, as his instruments. He always finds fit tools for the work he means to do. This army came from the north, from the far edges of the earth. Babylon itself lay far to the north, and some lands under Babylon were even farther away. They would be used in this attack because they were a great nation, a warlike people, a cruel people, and a people set on Judah and Jerusalem (Jeremiah 6:22-23).

They were numerous, which made them more frightening. They were skilled with bow and spear, and they rode horses, so they could move quickly and strike hard. They were also merciless and hungry for plunder, and they loved to terrify everyone around them. Their roar was like the sea. But they had a special aim, the daughter of Zion, Jerusalem itself, because they hoped to grow rich from its spoil. The sins of God’s professing people often make them easy prey for those who are enemies both of God and of them.

Then the prophet describes the terror that would seize Judah and Jerusalem when this enemy drew near (Jeremiah 6:24-26). As soon as they heard the news, their hands would grow weak and they would lose heart. They would be in anguish, like a woman in labor. Guilt leaves people with little courage when trouble comes. What can those hope to do for themselves who have made God their enemy?

They would also shut themselves up in their houses, afraid to go out. They would know the enemy would find them eventually, but they would rather die quietly at home than risk fighting or fleeing. They would warn one another not to go out into the field, not even to fetch food, and not to walk along the road. The sword and the fear of it would be everywhere, and the highways would be empty, as in the days of Jael (Judges 5:6). When we can travel safely and no one makes us afraid, we should thank God for public peace.

The prophet then calls them to deep mourning. He himself was a man of sorrow, and he urges the people to join him in lamenting the coming ruin. They should hear God’s call to weeping and mourning and answer it fully. They should not only wear sackcloth for a day, the rough clothing of grief, but keep it on as a constant sign of sorrow. They should not only put ashes on their heads, but roll in ashes, as one overwhelmed by loss. They should mourn with the deepest sincerity, like parents grieving for an only son, feeling life itself has become empty. This is how they should lament the destroyer who would suddenly come upon them.

Though the judgment has not yet come, it is on the way, because the decree has already gone out. So they should face it with real sorrow. Just as believers can rejoice in hope of God’s mercy, even before they see it fulfilled, sinners should grieve in fear of God’s warnings, even before they see the punishment.

God now sets the prophet up as a judge over this people, who are standing on trial. As in Jeremiah 1:10, God said, “I have set you over the nations,” so here he makes him a tower, a watchman on a tower, among his people, watching their behavior so he can know and test their way (Jeremiah 6:27). God did not need the prophet to inform him, because the prophet himself knew only a little compared with what God knew, except by the Spirit of prophecy. But God lets the prophet see their character for himself, so he will be fully convinced that God’s actions are fair and will warn them with greater confidence.

God set him as a tower, open to everyone’s view and exposed to attack, but also made him a fortress. He gave him courage to stand against the flood of opposition and bear the force of their anger. Those who are faithful in correcting others need to be firm like fortresses. As he tests their way, he finds two things.

First, they are deeply corrupt. They are all stubborn rebels, rebels of rebels, the worst kind of rebels. Their hearts have turned away, they have turned away deeply, and they keep turning farther from God. They seemed to begin well, but they fall back. They walk in slander, making little of lies and backbiting against one another. Worse, they make a habit of it. They live by slander, and they use the bad reports they hear to guide their feelings, hating people they have heard badly spoken of, even when the reports are false. They are like brass and iron, base metals, with nothing valuable in them. They were once like silver and gold, but they have degenerated. And because they are rebels themselves, they also corrupt others. They work to drag others down with them, even to make them far worse than they are. This often happens, because sinners soon become tempters.

Second, they will never be changed. It is useless to keep trying to reform them, because many methods have already been tried, and none have worked (Jeremiah 6:29, Jeremiah 6:30). They are like ore that was thought to contain good metal, so the refiner put it into the furnace and used all his skill and effort, but it turned out to be all dross, with nothing of value in it. God had used the right means to refine this people and cleanse them from their sin, through his prophets and through his providences, meaning the events and troubles he sent into their lives. Yet it all failed. Through constant preaching and a long line of troubles, they had been kept in the fire, but it changed nothing.

The bellows had been used so long to blow the fire that they were burned up by the heat, or worn out and thrown into the fire as useless. The prophets had worn out their voices crying out against Israel’s sins, but the people still refused to understand and humble themselves. The lead used in refining silver had been consumed by the fire and still had not done its work. The founder, the one who melts and purifies metal, labored in vain, because the wicked would not be separated from the precious, and the old leaven would not be removed. They would not be cut off from fellowship in a way that would stop them from infecting others. Or, as some read it, their wickednesses are not removed. They are still just as bad as before, and nothing can separate them from their sins. They will not turn from idolatry and moral evil, even after hearing God’s warnings and feeling his anger.

So this verdict is given: they will be called reprobate silver, useless and worthless, silver that looks like it may be valuable but has no real worth in it. For that reason, the Lord has rejected them. He will no longer own them as his people, or expect good from them. He will sweep them away like dross (Psalm 119:119), and he will prepare a consuming fire for those who would not be purified by a refining fire.

This shows, first, that God takes no pleasure in the death and ruin of sinners. He tries every proper way to stop their destruction and make them fit for salvation. Both his commands and his providences aim to separate them from their sins, yet with many people all this effort is wasted. “We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a funeral song, and you did not mourn.”

Second, God will be proven right in the death of sinners, and the blame will rest on them alone. He did not reject them until he had used every proper means to reform them. He did not cast them off while there was still hope. He did not treat them as dross until it became clear that they were reprobate silver.