Jeremiah · chapter 16 of 52
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Jeremiah 16 shows the prophet turned into a sign by his own life: the Lord forbids him to marry, attend funerals or enter houses of feasting, because death and the silence of joy are coming on the land. God explains that exile is the result of idolatry, yet he promises that one day the people will be brought back, and that the nations will recognize their idols as lies.
Jeremiah 16 is a chapter in which the message is lived out in the prophet's body and social life. His singleness, his absence from mourning and his refusal of celebrations were meant to speak to the people of what was coming. It is a hard chapter, but it ends with one of the clearest flashes of hope: a second exodus greater than that from Egypt.
The Lord tells Jeremiah not to take a wife or have sons or daughters in this place, for those born here and their parents will die of deadly diseases, unmourned and unburied, and be like dung on the ground. He also forbids him to enter a house of mourning to lament or comfort, for the Lord has taken away his peace, steadfast love and mercy from this people. And he is not to enter a house of feasting to sit and eat and drink with them, for the Lord will silence in this place the voice of mirth and gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the bride.
When the people ask why the Lord has pronounced this great disaster, Jeremiah is to answer that their fathers forsook him, went after other gods and did not keep his law; and they have done worse than their fathers, each following his own stubborn heart. So he will hurl them out into a land that neither they nor their fathers have known, and there they will serve other gods day and night, for he will show them no favor.
Yet days are coming, says the Lord, when it will no longer be said, as the Lord lives who brought the people of Israel up out of Egypt, but as the Lord lives who brought them up out of the north country and out of all the lands where he had driven them. He will bring them back to their land. But first he will send many fishers and hunters to search them out from every mountain and rock, for his eyes are on all their ways and he will repay their iniquity double.
The chapter closes with Jeremiah's prayer: O Lord, my strength and my stronghold, my refuge in the day of trouble, to you the nations will come from the ends of the earth and say that their fathers inherited nothing but lies and worthless things. Can man make for himself gods? Such are not gods. So the Lord will make them know his power and his might, and they will know that his name is the Lord.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
The Lord forbids Jeremiah to marry and have children in this place. His life without a family is a public sign that a time is approaching when raising a family in this land will be a tragedy.
The Lord will silence in this place the voice of mirth and gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the bride. The silence of weddings and feasts describes the effect of judgment on everyday life.
Days are coming when people will no longer swear by the Lord who brought Israel out of Egypt, but by the one who brought them out of the north country. The return from exile will be a new deliverance that eclipses the memory of the exodus.
Jeremiah calls the Lord his strength and refuge in the day of trouble, and foresees that the nations will come to him admitting the falseness of their idols. In the midst of judgment, the prophet looks toward a universal hope.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: To take a wife and have sons and daughters in this place. — Jeremiah 16:2
Answer: The house of mourning and the house of feasting. — Jeremiah 16:5-8
Answer: The voice of mirth and gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the bride. — Jeremiah 16:9
Answer: Because their fathers forsook him and they did worse, following their stubborn hearts. — Jeremiah 16:11-12
Answer: As the Lord lives who brought Israel out of the north country and out of all the lands where he had driven them. — Jeremiah 16:14-15
Answer: That their fathers inherited lies, worthless things in which there is no profit. — Jeremiah 16:19
Jeremiah paid the cost of his message with his own life: loneliness, no family, renouncing celebrations. Some servants of God today also bear real and not always visible costs. A group can think about how to accompany and support those who serve sacrificially, and how to value their dedication.
The announcement of the new exodus reminds us that judgment is not the last word. Even when everything seems lost, God prepares a return. For someone going through a personal exile, an illness or a loss, the text invites us to wait on a God who gathers and restores.
Jeremiah 16 ends with the promise that the nations will know the Lord's name. Chapter 17 continues with sin engraved on the heart, the image of the tree by the water and the complaint that the heart is deceitful.
It was a prophetic sign: a time was approaching when the children of the land would die in great numbers, and the prophet had to show by his life that there was no family future in that place. It is not a general teaching about marriage or singleness but a special command for Jeremiah.
It is a promise that God will bring his people back from exile as he brought them out of Egypt, so much so that this new deliverance will be the one remembered. The book develops it in later chapters, and Christians see a fuller fulfillment in the work of Christ.
They are images of the enemies God will send to search out the guilty throughout the country, leaving no place to hide. Some commentators see in them the Babylonian invaders; the text does not name them here.