Jeremiah 9:12-16
When God’s people abandon His revealed word and follow idols, the covenant consequences of judgment and exile follow.
12 Who is wise enough to understand this? Who is he to whom the mouth of Yahweh has spoken, that he may declare it? Why has the land perished and burned up like a wilderness, so that no one passes through?
13 Yahweh says, “Because they have forsaken my law which I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice or walked in my ways,
14 but have walked after the stubbornness of their own heart and after the Baals, which their fathers taught them.”
15 Therefore Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, says, “Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood and give them poisoned water to drink.
16 I will scatter them also among the nations, whom neither they nor their fathers have known. I will send the sword after them, until I have consumed them.”
When God’s people abandon His revealed word and follow idols, the covenant consequences of judgment and exile follow.
To explain the reason for Judah’s devastation by revealing that the nation abandoned the LORD’s law and followed idolatrous traditions instead.
Following the refining judgment announced in Jeremiah 9:7–11, this passage explains the reason for that judgment. The devastation of the land is tied directly to the nation’s rejection of God’s law.
Jeremiah identifies Judah’s abandonment of God’s law and pursuit of Baal worship as the primary cause of the Babylonian exile.
Let the One Who Boasts Boast in Knowing the LORD
Judah's falsehood, stubbornness, and uncircumcised heart bring devastating judgment, but the LORD reveals that true life is found in knowing him as the God who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness.