Jeremiah 13 Devotional
by Pastor Lawrence    

In our text this morning, Jeremiah performs some of the first sign acts in his lengthy ministry.  A sign act is a tool that is often employed by the prophets who are directed by God to give a type of visual aid to help bring home their message from God.  It is often a very peculiar action taken by a prophet in front of a crowd of Israelites that is later interpreted by the prophet to explain something of God’s will to his people.  Because God’s people often would not listen to God’s Word spoken plainly by the prophets, he would at times make the prophets perform these strange acts to gain their attention and to make His word ever so clear to them.  Oftentimes, the more urgent the message was, the more shocking the act would be.

For example, in Ezekiel chapter four, the Lord tells the prophet to lie down in the public square bound in ropes, first on his left side for 390 days, and then on his right side for 40 days.  And each day the inhabitants of the city would pass by the prophet and wonder what he was doing.  Of course, Ezekiel would then interpret his actions for them.  In a similar manner, in Isaiah chapter twenty, that prophet is told to walk around naked and barefoot in the city for three years and then provide the meaning of this act in order that the spectators might understand why he was doing it.

It is this same type of sign act that the prophet Jeremiah is told to perform before God’s people in our passage today.  The Lord tells the prophet to go and buy a linen cloth, a type of undergarment, and put it around his waist to wear in public.  We are not told for how long he was meant to do that, but at some point, he was told to then take that same loin cloth and hide it in a cleft of a rock near the Euphrates River.  Then later he was told to retrieve that same cloth from the rock, which he did, and it was spoiled and good for nothing, even though he did not wet the cloth at any time.

Afterwards the prophet gave the interpretation of this sign act to mean that the Lord would spoil the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem.  For although God had made them to cling to his waist, they refused to hear his words and stubbornly followed their own heart serving other gods and indulging in sexual immorality.

Then using a second sign act, the prophet fills a number of jars with wine.  And the Israelites watching this assume that it means that God will continue to fill their cup with many blessings.  But when the prophet explains the interpretation he tells them that the Lord will fill the inhabitants with drunkenness in order to dash them against one another in order to destroy them as a nation.   The reason given for this judgment points again to the fact that they are a proud people who need to be humbled.

Then in v.15-17, Jeremiah burdened by how proud God’s people really were began to plead with them to lay down their pride and give glory to the Lord before the dark day of judgment comes upon them, saying to them that if they don’t repent that he will weep in secret over their arrogance; he will weep bitterly because the Lord’s flocks have been taken captive.  So he rebukes them again urging them to repent or else the Lord himself would lift up their skirts over the faces in order that their shame might be seen by all for all their idoltatry and sexual immorality.

It is a very dangerous thing in a culture when people no longer feel a sense of shame over their sins.  When pride runs rampant in a nation and people do what is right in their own eyes, not only disregarding the law of God but ridiculing it and mocking anyone who proclaims it, a dark day of judgment can’t be too far away, unless the people repent.  Even the wicked Ninevites repented when Jonah preached to them half-heartedly.  May we have at least half the heart of the Ninevites and get ready our sackcloth and ashes even now.