Jeremiah 36:20-26
Rejecting God’s word does not eliminate its authority but reveals the hardness of the human heart.
20 They went in to the king into the court; but they had laid up the scroll in the room of Elishama the scribe. Then they told all the words in the hearing of the king.
21 So the king sent Jehudi to get the scroll; and he took it out of the room of Elishama the scribe. Jehudi read it in the hearing of the king, and in the hearing of all the princes who stood beside the king.
22 Now the king was sitting in the winter house in the ninth month; and there was a fire in the brazier burning before him.
23 When Jehudi had read three or four leaves, the king cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the fire that was in the brazier, until all the scroll was consumed in the fire that was in the brazier.
24 The king and his servants who heard all these words were not afraid, and didn’t tear their garments.
25 Moreover Elnathan and Delaiah and Gemariah had made intercession to the king that he would not burn the scroll; but he would not listen to them.
26 The king commanded Jerahmeel the king’s son, and Seraiah the son of Azriel, and Shelemiah the son of Abdeel, to arrest Baruch the scribe and Jeremiah the prophet; but Yahweh hid them.
Rejecting God’s word does not eliminate its authority but reveals the hardness of the human heart.
To record King Jehoiakim’s rejection of the prophetic scroll and his deliberate destruction of God’s written word.
This section forms the dramatic climax of the scroll narrative. After the officials hear the prophetic message and bring it to the king, Jehoiakim responds with direct hostility toward the word of the Lord.
King Jehoiakim reacts violently against Jeremiah’s prophetic scroll during a time of political instability and Babylonian pressure.
The Scroll Written, Read, Cut, Burned, and Written Again
Jehoiakim can cut and burn the scroll, but he cannot destroy the word of the LORD; the rejected word is rewritten, expanded, and fulfilled in judgment.