WWUTT 2574 Judah Sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven (Jeremiah 43:1-44:30)

Jeremiah has once again told the people the way that is pleasing to the Lord, and the people once again have gone away from the Lord. We need to be convicted in our hearts and walk in the way of righteousness when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we feature New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday.

Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

Recap of Judah's Rebellion and the Flight to Egypt

Thank you, Becky. In our study of the book of Jeremiah, we come to chapters 43 and 44 today. But before getting to our text, let's do a little bit of recap. In chapter 41, King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon appointed Gedaliah to be the governor over the region of Judah after the exiles had been taken away.

Gedaliah was struck down by Ishmael, who was then defeated by Johanan. And Johanan, being a military leader, rallied many Jews behind him. In chapter 42, they went to the prophet, to Jeremiah, and said, Seek the Lord on our behalf.

What does God want us to do? And Jeremiah reports back to them something that's been pretty familiar in the book of Jeremiah. God said, If you will remain in the land, then I will bless you, and you will be prosperous.

But if you disobey this word and you try to go to Egypt, then God would judge them and strike them down. So as we come into chapter 43 today, Johanan and those who are with him are going to respond like many of the other leaders in Judah have responded.

They're going to say to Jeremiah, No, the Lord didn't really tell you this. And they are going to disobey the word of God. So here is Jeremiah 43, and I'm going to read through the entire chapter because it's just 13 verses.

Hear the word of the Lord. When Jeremiah finished speaking to all the people, all these words of the Lord their God, with which the Lord their God had sent him to them, Azariah the son of Hoshea and Johanan the son of Kereah, and all the insolent men said to Jeremiah, You are telling a lie.

The Lord our God did not send you to say, Do not go to Egypt to live there. But Baruch the son of Neriah has set you against us to deliver us into the hand of the Chaldeans that they may kill us or take us into exile in Babylon.

So Johanan the son of Kereah and all the commanders of the forces and all the people did not obey the voice of the Lord to remain in the land of Judah. But Johanan the son of Kereah and all of the commanders of the forces took all the remnant of Judah who had returned to live in the land of Judah from all the nations to which they had been driven.

The men, the women, the children, the princesses, and every person whom Nebuchadnezzar the captain of the guard had left with Gedaliah the son of Ahikam son of Shaphan. Also Jeremiah the prophet and Baruch the son of Neriah.

And they came into the land of Egypt for they did not obey the voice of the Lord. And they arrived at Tapanes. Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah in Tapanes. So just a break here for a moment.

So everybody now has been taken out. Johanan has even shown himself to be a tyrant as he is forcing everybody out of the land and to go to Egypt. Even Jeremiah is supposed to go with them and he is subjecting them to certain judgment for the Lord God had said you will not go into the land of Egypt.

But the Lord is going to use this as a judgment even upon Egypt. So let me pick up reading here in verse 8. Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah in Tapanes. Take in your hands large stones and hide them in the mortar in the pavement that is at the entrance to Pharaoh's palace in Tapanes in the sight of the men of Judah and say to them, Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel.

Behold, I will send and take Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, my servant and I will set his throne above these stones that I have hidden and he will spread his royal canopy over them. He shall come and strike the land of Egypt giving over to the pestilence those who are doomed to the pestilence to captivity those who are doomed to captivity and to the sword those who are doomed to the sword.

I shall kindle a fire in the temples of the gods of Egypt and he shall burn them and carry them away captive and he shall clean the land of Egypt as a shepherd cleans his cloak of vermin and he shall go away from there in peace.

He shall break the obelisks of Heliopolis which is in the land of Egypt and the temples of the gods of Egypt he shall burn with fire. Well, now Johanan and everybody that he has brought with him is in quite a state because they thought they could come to Egypt to escape from Babylon.

They thought the Babylonians will surely come back into Judah. They will conquer this place. They will carry us away with them. We would be better off in Egypt. But God has revealed to them no, I had always intended that the king of Babylon was going to conquer Egypt as well.

So you have just subjected yourselves to sudden doom. You would have been saved back in Judah. That's where the Lord would have protected the people. But now they've come to the place of judgment and they themselves will be judged right along with Egypt.

Judah's Idolatry and the Queen of Heaven

So now we come into Jeremiah chapter 44 and here we read a judgment for the people's idolatry. Beginning in verse 1. The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the Judeans who lived in the land of Egypt at Migdal, at Toppenes, at Memphis and in the land of Pathros.

Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel. You have seen all the disaster that I brought upon Jerusalem and upon all the cities of Judah. Behold this day they are a desolation and no one dwells in them because of the evil that they committed provoking me to anger in that they went to make offerings and serve other gods that they knew not neither they nor you nor your fathers.

And this expression serving other gods that they knew not. We've seen this come up several times in the Old Testament. They served other gods that they did not know. That expression's even been said in the book of Jeremiah.

That simply means that they did not know those gods. They worshiped gods that they didn't know. There was no personal relationship with these gods. This is something that I've been teaching with my church Sunday school class as well.

We've been in the book of Exodus and one of the things that God says about the law that he gives to the people is that the law will be the envy even of all the nations that are around them. I think in the sermon that had just aired on Sunday which would have been at the start of Romans chapter 9 I believe I mentioned this in that sermon as well.

The one that you would have heard on this podcast. Anyway, the Lord God of Israel said there are nations around you they're going to be jealous of the law that I give you because their gods don't speak to them.

They don't know their gods. There's no relationship with their gods because their gods are nothing. They are worshiping idols. Things that had been fashioned by man's hand. There's nothing to them. There's nothing in them.

They have no relationship with these false gods that they worship because they don't even really exist. You cannot know them. You cannot relate to them. They don't relate to you. There is nothing there to relate to.

And so that's why you have this expression here of you have served other gods that they knew not neither they nor you nor your fathers. There's nothing there to know. But the Lord God, the true God is the relational God.

He is the one who has revealed himself to these people. None of the false gods had ever even revealed themselves to them. But God has revealed himself and has shown his faithfulness to them though they have been ridiculously unfaithful and have been doing this for hundreds of years.

Various periods of repentance and coming back to God and then falling away again. And here this people is rebelling once again after God had brought judgment upon the land and they had seen the judgment that had come upon the land.

That's what God is bringing out to them. You saw all the disaster that I brought upon Jerusalem and yet you have chosen to disobey my word anyway. Jeremiah has proven himself to be right over and over again.

He is truly a prophet of God. What he says is what God says and what he says comes to pass. Remember the test for a false prophet that's given to us in Deuteronomy 13 and 18. If anyone tells you something that God has said and it doesn't come to pass well God has not spoken to that man and what are you supposed to do with that guy?

You were supposed to stone him to death. He is a false prophet. Now we've seen many people wanting to do that to Jeremiah because they did not like the word that he said. But that's totally different than Jeremiah saying something that God did not really say.

The Lord has spoken through Jeremiah and the people continue to ignore it and though they have seen the judgment that has come upon the people for their rebellion against God here they have walked right into it.

They have walked right into the judgment that will come upon the land of Egypt. The Lord goes on to say through Jeremiah in verse 4 yet I persistently sent to you all my servants the prophets saying oh do not do this abomination that I hate but they did not listen or incline their ear to turn from their evil and make no offerings to other gods.

Therefore my wrath and my anger were poured out and kindled in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem and they became a waste and a desolation as at this day. And now thus says the Lord God of hosts the God of Israel why do you commit this great evil against yourselves to cut off from you man and woman infant and child from the midst of Judah leaving you no remnant.

All the remnant that was there that God had left there in Judah they've now left with. There is no one there. And God has even pointed that out to them. This day they are a desolation. No one dwells in them.

And you who were left there as a remnant and unto the name of God well they've even left and they've gone back to the place that God had rescued them from. It's like everything has come full circle now all these hundreds of years later a thousand years later now.

They've gone back to Egypt. Why would you do this to yourselves?

Verse 8.

Why do you provoke me to anger with the works of your hands making offerings to other gods in the land of Egypt where you have come to live so that you may be cut off and become a curse and a taunt among all the nations of the earth.

So this leaving Judah and coming into the land of Egypt wasn't just to abandon the land that God had given to them. It wasn't just a rebellion against God in the sense that they did not obey him. It was also a rebellion in the sense that they've now come to worship the false gods of the land.

Have you forgotten the evil of your fathers God says the evil of the kings of Judah the evil of their wives your own evil and the evil of your wives which they committed in the land of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem.

They have not humbled themselves even to this day nor have they feared nor walked in my law and my statutes that I set before you and before your fathers. Therefore thus says the Lord of hosts the God of Israel.

Behold.

I will set my face against you for harm to cut off all Judah. I will take the remnant of Judah who have set their faces to come to the land of Egypt to live. And they shall all be consumed in the land of Egypt.

They shall fall by the sword and by famine. They shall be consumed. They shall become an oath a horror a curse and a taunt. I will punish those who dwell in the land of Egypt as I have punished Jerusalem with the sword with famine and with pestilence so that none of the remnant of Judah who have come to live in the land of Egypt shall escape or survive or return to the land of Judah to which they desire to return to dwell there.

For they shall not return except some fugitives. So once again even in this in this judgment in telling them that they will not be able to return yet the Lord has preserved for himself a remnant they shall not return except some fugitives.

There will be some who will come back into the land and those even who had obeyed God and had gone into exile into Babylon they will be restored. And they will come back into the land. We've read that previously in the book of Jeremiah.

So God had a word to those who though they were being punished because of their wickedness they obeyed God and submitted to Nebuchadnezzar God will restore them back to the land of Judah. But these who have disobeyed and gone into Egypt they will.

Perish there.

The People's Defiance and the Queen of Heaven

And so verse 15 then all the men who knew that their wives had made offerings to other gods and all the women who stood by a great assembly all the people who lived in Pathos in the land of Egypt answered Jeremiah.

And here was their response as for the word that you have spoken to us in the name of the Lord we will not listen to you but we will do everything that we have vowed make offerings to the Queen of Heaven and pour out drink offerings to her as we did both we and our fathers our kings and our officials in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem.

For then we had plenty of food and prospered and saw no disaster. What odd logic that these guys are using. So it was good for us when we worship these false gods and we poured out offerings to the Queen of Heaven because during that period of time we had plenty of food and we prospered and we saw no disaster.

So we're going to go back to worshipping those false gods. We know it would be better for us instead of worshipping the God that you claim to speak in. So now verse 18. But since we left off making offerings to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her we have lacked everything and have been consumed by the sword and famine.

And the women said when we made offerings to the Queen of Heaven and poured out drink offerings to her. Was it without our husband's approval that we made cakes for her bearing her image and pouring out drink offerings to her.

What rebellion. These wives are making as well. And I would hope you would be able to see the interesting modern connection that that response has as well the Queen of Heaven who is called the Queen of Heaven today.

Largely around the world she is referred to as the Queen of Heaven.

Mary.

The mother of Jesus in the Roman Catholic Church they call her the Queen of Heaven. Now it's not really Mary. It is a false goddess that they worship that they have named Mary. It wouldn't even matter if it was the real Mary.

They are praying to someone other than God. They are lifting offerings up to someone other than God. But even when you look throughout the cultures that Roman Catholicism has come into and they have using syncretism united some of the Christianese of Roman Catholicism with whatever paganism was in that land.

So you can see all these different varieties of Mary. And the Mary's and all those different cultures. Sure look like the previous goddesses that those cultures were worshipping because someone in that Roman Catholicism had said to them well you thought that you were worshipping this goddess but who it really was was Mary appearing to you.

This is the case with Our Lady of Guadalupe who previously was a goddess that was worshipped by the natives there until that goddess was made into Mary. And they said well see you were worshipping the mother of God the entire time.

And then it was this false idol that had led all these people in Latin America to Roman Catholicism. Not to Christ which the Roman Catholic Church claims but to this false goddess. And it's interesting that the women here state in verse 19 we made offerings to the Queen of Heaven and poured out drink offerings to her.

Was it without our husband's approval that we made cakes for her.

What?

Bearing her image? And poured out drink offerings to her? What do we see practiced in the Roman Catholic Church? There is worship though they may call it veneration that's given to these objects in which they will claim the image of Mary has appeared.

Almost.

The exact same sin that was going on here in Jeremiah 44 that these women were doing worshipping the Queen of Heaven and then baking cakes with her image in it. We go on to verse 20. Then Jeremiah said to all the people men and women all the people who had given him this answer as for the offerings that you offered in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem you and your fathers your kings and your officials and the people of the land did not the Lord remember them?

Did it not come into his mind? The Lord could no longer bear your evil deeds and the abominations that you committed. Therefore your land has become a desolation and a waste and a curse without inhabitant as it is to this day.

It is because you made offerings and because you sinned against the Lord and did not obey the voice of the Lord or walk in his law and in his statutes and in his testimonies that this disaster has happened to you as at this day.

And my.

Friends the sin that you are in and those things that you covet which is idolatry as said in Colossians 3 5 though judgment may not come upon you today it will eventually. And you must repent and worship and serve the Lord only and be obedient to his word.

As Jesus said in John 14 15. If you love me you will obey my commandments. Our obedience doesn't save us but it will be the demonstration of the salvation that we have received in Christ. Let me finish this out.

Verses 24 to 30. Jeremiah said to all the people and to all the women. Hear the word of the Lord all of you in Judah who are in the land of Egypt. Thus says the Lord of hosts the God of Israel you and your wives have declared with your mouths and have fulfilled it with your hands saying we will surely perform our vows that we have made to make offerings to the queen of heaven and to pour out drink offerings to her.

Then confirm your vows and perform your vows. Therefore hear the word of the Lord all you of Judah who dwell in the land of Egypt. Behold I have sworn by my great name says the Lord that my name shall no more be invoked by the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt saying as the Lord God lives.

Behold I am watching over them for disaster and not for good. All the men of Judah who are in the land of Egypt shall be consumed by the sword and by famine until there is an end of them. And all those who escape the sword shall return from the land of Egypt to the land of Judah few in number.

And all the remnant of Judah who came to the land of Egypt to live shall know whose word will stand mine or theirs. This shall be the sign to you. Declares the Lord that I will punish you in this place in order that you may know that my words will surely stand against you for harm.

Thus says the Lord behold I will give Pharaoh king of Egypt into the hand of his enemies and into the hand of those who seek his life as I gave Zedekiah king of Judah into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon who was his enemy and sought his life.

Friends.

The only safe place for you is near the throne of God through Jesus Christ our Lord as said in Psalm 2 12 kiss the son lest he be angry and you perish in the way for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

Heavenly Father we thank you for what we have read here today and if there be any wicked way in us any covetousness which is idolatry convict our hearts may we turn from that to the Lord Jesus Christ cleanse us from all unrighteousness and lead us in the straight paths that are pleasing to you for the sake of the name of Christ in whose name we pray.

Amen.

This has been when we understand the text of Pastor Gabriel Hughes. For all of our podcasts, episodes, videos, books and more visit our website at www .utt .com. If you'd like to submit a question to this broadcast or just send us a comment, email whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com and let your friends know about our ministry.

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