Jeremiah · chapter 5 of 52
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Jeremiah 5 shows the Lord asking that someone search the streets of Jerusalem for a single person who practices justice and seeks truth. No one is found, neither among the poor nor among the great. So the Lord announces that he will bring a distant nation with an unknown language to devour the harvest, and he denounces prophets who prophesy falsely while the people love it that way.
Jeremiah 5 belongs to the early messages of the book, before the great judgment of 586 BC. After the chapters that announce the destroyer from the north, this chapter explains why the Lord can be just in sending him. It is a kind of investigation: God opens the case of Jerusalem, looks for evidence and finds no one who answers.
The Lord sends someone through the streets and squares of Jerusalem to see whether there is one person who does justice and seeks truth; if there is, he will pardon the city. Though they say as the Lord lives, they swear falsely. Jeremiah supposes it must be the poor, who do not know the way of the Lord, and goes to the great, but they too have broken the yoke. So a lion from the forest, a wolf from the desert and a leopard watch their cities.
God asks how he could pardon a people who forsook him, swore by those who are no gods and, when he fed them to the full, committed adultery. They say of the Lord that he will do nothing and that no harm will come. But the Lord puts his words in Jeremiah's mouth as fire, and these people as wood. He will bring on them a nation from afar, an ancient nation whose language they do not know, which will devour their harvest, their children and their fortified cities. Even so, in those days he will not make a full end. As they served foreign gods in their own land, they will serve strangers in a land not theirs.
The Lord reproaches them for not fearing him, who placed the sand as the boundary of the sea. The people have a stubborn and rebellious heart and do not say they will fear the Lord who gives rain in its season. Their houses are full of deceit like a cage full of birds, and they have grown rich and fat. They do not defend the cause of the fatherless or the rights of the needy.
The chapter closes with something horrible: the prophets prophesy falsely, the priests rule by their own authority, and my people love to have it so. The Lord asks what they will do when the end comes.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
The Lord sends a search through Jerusalem's streets for one person who does justice and seeks truth, and promises to pardon the city for his sake. The search recalls Abraham's plea for Sodom and shows God's grace even inside judgment.
The Lord says he puts his words in Jeremiah's mouth as fire, and that the people will be like wood. God's word is not mere information: it has power to consume whatever opposes it.
God asks whether they will not fear him, who put the sand as the boundary of the sea. Creation obeys his order while his people do not. The contrast shows how absurd rebellion is.
Jeremiah calls the situation appalling and horrible: the prophets prophesy falsely, the priests rule on their own authority, and the people prefer it so. The worst of it is that people like being lied to.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: One person who does justice and seeks truth. — Jeremiah 5:1
Answer: They swear falsely. — Jeremiah 5:2
Answer: Fire, and the people will be like wood. — Jeremiah 5:14
Answer: A nation from afar, an ancient nation whose language they do not know. — Jeremiah 5:15
Answer: The sand, by a perpetual decree. — Jeremiah 5:22
Answer: The prophets prophesy falsely and the priests rule by their own authority, and the people love it so. — Jeremiah 5:31
The chapter invites us to examine what kind of message we want to hear. Jeremiah denounces that the people liked prophets who said pleasant things. Today the temptation remains to look for teachers and messages that confirm what we already want to believe. A group can ask whether it is willing to hear what corrects as well.
The chapter also points to social responsibility: the people did not defend the fatherless or the poor. True faith is measured by how we treat those who cannot repay us. A Sunday school class can think about which neighbor in its own area is being left without a defender.
Jeremiah 5 ends with the question of what they will do when the end comes, and chapter 6 answers with a new alarm: the army from the north draws near to Jerusalem, and the Lord calls the watchmen to sound the trumpet.
The search recalls Abraham's intercession for Sodom. It shows that God would be willing to pardon the whole city for one faithful person. It also makes clear that his judgment is not arbitrary: before punishing, he examines.
Inside the announcement of judgment, the Lord repeats that he will not carry out a complete extermination. A remnant will remain. This theme grows through the book and prepares the hope of the chapters on restoration.
In Hebrew thought the sea stood for chaotic and threatening forces. That the Lord holds them back with a mere boundary of sand shows his power over creation. Jeremiah uses it to contrast nature's obedience with the people's rebellion.