First light on the temple height of Jerusalem seen from across the Kidron valley: the long plain stone temple with its two bronze pillars above flat-roofed houses, small figures climbing the stepped lanes toward its gates.

The temple gate

Jeremiah 7

Most likely early in Jehoiakim’s reign, about 609 BC. Can a place of worship become a hiding place?

34 verses≈ 7 minBSB

Images are artistic interpretations.

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Where we are

1The callJosiah’s thirteenth year (about 627 BC): a prophet to the nations
2–6Return to MeBroken cisterns, faithless Judah, disaster from the north
7–10The temple gateThe temple sermon, a weeping prophet, the living GodChapter 7
11–20Covenant and complaintThe broken covenant, the potter, Jeremiah’s confessions
21–29Shepherds and prophetsKings judged, the Branch, seventy years, the yoke, the letter
30–33The Book of ComfortRestoration, the new covenant, a field bought in a siege
34–39The last days of JudahThe scroll burned, the cistern, Jerusalem falls (586 BC)
40–45After the fallGedaliah at Mizpah, the flight to Egypt, a word for Baruch
46–51The nationsEgypt to Babylon: the LORD is Judge of all the earth
52Jerusalem fallsThe record of 586 BC, and a king released

Jeremiah’s Message at the Temple Gate

God

God

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, “Stand in the gate of the house of the LORD and proclaim this message: Hear the word of the LORD, all you people of Judah who enter through these gates to worship the LORD.

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God

Thus says the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: Correct your ways and deeds, and I will let you live in this place.

Jeremiah 7:3

God

Do not trust in deceptive words, saying:

‘This is the temple of the LORD,

the temple of the LORD,

the temple of the LORD.’

God

God

For if you really correct your ways and deeds, if you act justly toward one another, if you no longer oppress the foreigner and the fatherless and the widow, and if you no longer shed innocent blood in this place or follow other gods to your own harm, then I will let you live in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers forever and ever.

God

But look, you keep trusting in deceptive words to no avail. Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, burn incense to Baal, and follow other gods that you have not known, and then come and stand before Me in this house, which bears My Name, and say, ‘We are delivered, so we can continue with all these abominations’?

God

Dusk at the mouth of a limestone cave in a wilderness ravine: inside in the half-dark, the ashes of a cold fire, sacks of stolen goods, a bridle and a heap of fine cloth; no one there.

Has this house, which bears My Name, become a den of robbers in your sight? Yes, I too have seen it, declares the LORD.

God

God

But go now to the place in Shiloh where I first made a dwelling for My Name, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel.

God

Evening in the temple’s outer court: the paving empty, the great altar cold with no smoke, long shadows of the two bronze pillars across the stones, one wooden door of the court standing ajar.

And now, because you have done all these things, declares the LORD, and because I have spoken to you again and again but you would not listen, and I have called to you but you would not answer, therefore what I did to Shiloh I will now do to the house that bears My Name, the house in which you trust, the place that I gave to you and your fathers. And I will cast you out of My presence, just as I have cast out all your brothers, all the descendants of Ephraim.

0:27

Narrated by Bob Souer · BSB audio, public domain

Question

Quick question

Jeremiah stood at the temple gate and named the words the crowd kept repeating. Look back at 7:4.

What did the people keep saying as if it would keep them safe?

The temple sermon

Whiteboard

The house would not save them. Only a changed life would.

Judah’s Idolatry Persists

God

As for you, do not pray for these people, do not offer a plea or petition on their behalf, and do not beg Me, for I will not listen to you.

God

Dusk in a family courtyard in Jerusalem: a boy carries an armful of sticks, his father kneels to light a clay oven, a mother kneads dough, small flat cakes laid in a row on a cloth, the first evening star bright above the roofs.

Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? The sons gather wood, the fathers light the fire, and the women knead the dough to make cakes for the Queen of Heaven; they pour out drink offerings to other gods to provoke Me to anger.

God

But am I the One they are provoking? declares the LORD. Is it not themselves they spite, to their own shame?

God

Therefore this is what the Lord GOD says: Behold, My anger and My fury will be poured out on this place, on man and beast, on the trees of the field and the produce of the land, and it will burn and not be extinguished.

God

God

This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: Add your burnt offerings to your other sacrifices and eat the meat yourselves! For when I brought your fathers out of the land of Egypt, I did not merely command them about burnt offerings and sacrifices, but this is what I commanded them: Obey Me, and I will be your God, and you will be My people. You must walk in all the ways I have commanded you, so that it may go well with you.

God

Yet they did not listen or incline their ear, but they followed the stubborn inclinations of their own evil hearts. They went backward and not forward. From the day your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have sent you all My servants the prophets again and again. Yet they would not listen to Me or incline their ear, but they stiffened their necks and did more evil than their fathers.

God

When you tell them all these things, they will not listen to you. When you call to them, they will not answer. Therefore you must say to them, ‘This is the nation that would not listen to the voice of the LORD their God and would not receive correction. Truth has perished; it has disappeared from their lips.

God

Dusk on a bare windswept hilltop: a long dark braid of cut hair lies on the gray stones, a little dust blowing over it, the empty hills falling away below.

Cut off your hair and throw it away. Raise up a lamentation on the barren heights, for the LORD has rejected and forsaken the generation of His wrath.’

The Valley of Slaughter

God

For the people of Judah have done evil in My sight, declares the LORD. They have set up their abominations in the house that bears My Name, and so have defiled it. They have built the high places of Topheth in the Valley of Ben-hinnom so they could burn their sons and daughters in the fire—something I never commanded, nor did it even enter My mind.

God

So behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when this place will no longer be called Topheth and the Valley of Ben-hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. For they will bury the dead in Topheth until there is no more room. The corpses of this people will become food for the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth, and there will be no one to scare them away.

God

Dusk in an empty lane of Jerusalem: a door left open, a clay lamp unlit on the step, a wilted garland of myrtle on the doorstep, no one anywhere.

I will remove from the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem the sounds of joy and gladness and the voices of the bride and bridegroom, for the land will become a wasteland.”

Pray

LORD of Hosts, I do not want to hide in Your house while I keep my sins. Search my ways. Teach me to obey Your voice, to defend the foreigner, the fatherless and the widow, and to walk forward, not backward. Amen.

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Jeremiah 7

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A verse to carry with you

Thus says the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: Correct your ways and deeds, and I will let you live in this place.

Jeremiah 7:3

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