[3] For twenty-three years, since the thirteenth year of Yoshiyahu the son of Amon, king of Y’hudah, until today, the word of Adonai has come to me; and I have proclaimed it to you on numerous occasions; but you haven’t listened. [4] Moreover, Adonai sent you all his servants the prophets – again, on numerous occasions – but you didn’t listen or pay attention. [5] The message was always: ‘Everyone of you, turn back from his evil way, from the evil of your actions. Then you will live in the land Adonai gave you and your ancestors forever and ever.’ Jeremiah 25:3-5
As I sat and read the twenty-fifth chapter of Jeremiah, there were a few things that caught my attention about it. In the opening few verses, he mentions the specific timeframe that he had been proclaiming the Word to the people, twenty-three years. It made me pause to consider why he mentioned the exact number of years here. As Hebrew letters are also numbers, I decided to take a look at what words held the value of twenty-three. As I went down the list using the Gematria, only one of the thirteen words listed stood out, and it was the final entry. The word ka’ab (kaw-ab) means be in pain, sorrowful, sad, physical pain, mental pain, to grieve or lament. Jeremiah is widely known for being called the weeping prophet, and ka’ab shows this amazingly. Twenty-three years he stood and cried out to the people admonishing them to turn back to Adonai. Through his own words, we see his emotional and mental pain and anguish over seeing and knowing his city and people were headed for judgement and destruction. He endured physical pain at the hands of the false prophets and priests who were speaking words in opposition, words of peace and prosperity when war, famine, and plague were on the horizon. It is odd to say, but my heart breaks for a man that has been dead for hundreds of years. A man who did all he could to warn his nation and show them the path of righteousness. As I have read and really searched his words, seeing what he went through physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, I can not help but shed tears in the here and now, not just for him, but because we are watching a similar situation play out in our own time. Adonai is crying out for the people of not just Israel, but the world to turn their hearts back to Him. We see men and women of God crying out, sounding the warning, yet they seem to not be heard. May our hearts be as broken as Jeremiah’s crying out for the lost, sharing the Word, and showing the love of the One who gave His life so that they may not just live, but have life more abundantly.
[11] “‘This entire land will become a ruin, a waste; and these nations will serve the king of Bavel for seventy years. [12] But when the seventy years are over, I will punish the king of Bavel and that nation for their sin.’ Says Adonai, ‘and I will turn the land of the Kasdim into everlasting ruins.’” Jeremiah 25:11-12
Upon reading the above verses, unlike being curious about the number twenty-three, I knew instantly what the seventy years was in reference to as I have heard a lot of teaching and have read some great material on the subject. This is a number that wasn’t given by chance. In fact, it is a number that is very specific, but to see those specifications, one must go back to Moses and the Torah.
· For six years, you are to sow your land with seed and gather in its harvest. But the seventh year, you are to let it rest and lie fallow, so that the poor among your people can eat; and what they leave, the wild animals in the countryside can eat. Do the same with your vineyard and olive grove. Leviticus 23:10-11
· Adonai spoke to Moshe on Mount Sinai; he said, “Tell the people of Isra’el, when you enter the land I am giving you, the land itself is to observe a Shabbat rest for Adonai. Six years you will sow your field; six years you will prune your grapevines and gather their produce. But in the seventh year is to be a Shabbat of complete rest for the land, a Shabbat for Adonai; you will neither sow your field nor prune your grapevines. You are not to harvest what grows by itself from the seeds left by your previous harvest, and you are not to gather the grapes of your untended vine; it is to be a year of complete rest for the land. But what the land produces during the year of Shabbat will be food for all of you – you, your servant, your maid your employee, anyone living near you, your livestock and the wild animals on your land; everything the land produces may be used for food. Leviticus 25:1-7
· At the end of every seven years, you are to have a sh’mmittah (shemitah). Here is how the sh’mittah is to be done: every creditor is to give up what he has loaned to his fellow member of the community – he is not to force his neighbor or relative to repay it, because Adonai’s time of remission has been proclaimed. Deuteronomy 15:1-2
· Guard yourself against allowing your heart to entertain the mean-spirited thought that because the seventh year, the year of sh’mittah is at hand, you would be stingy toward your needy brother and not give him anything; for then he may cry out to Adonai against you, and it will be your sin. Deuteronomy 15:9
· I will lay waste to your cities and make your sanctuaries desolate, so as not to smell your fragrant aromas. I will desolate the land, so that your enemies living in it will be astounded by it. You I will disperse among the nations, and I will draw out the sword in pursuit after you; your land will be a desolation and your cities a wasteland. Then, at last, the land will be paid its Shabbats. As long as it lies desolate and you are in the lands of your enemies, the land will rest and be repaid its Shabbats, when you lived there. Leviticus 26:31-35
After Adonai finished His work of creation, He blessed the seventh day and separated it as holy. Shabbat means rest, and as every seventh day, man and livestock were to rest, every seven years, the land itself was to observe Shabbat and rest. Shabbat is to remember the Creator and set the day aside to rest in Him. The Sabbatical year begins on the first of the Hebrew month Tishri and ends the following year on the twenty-ninth of Elul, which is the Shemitah, the day of release or remission. However, the full Sabbatical year is simply called the Shemitah. On September 7th of this year, the Shemitah began and will end on September 25th of 2022. The fact that we are in a Shemitah year is part of what made the scriptures about the seventy years jump out at me so strongly. For more specific information about the Shemitah and how it affects us today, I highly encourage you to read The Mystery of the Shemitah by Johnathan Cahn as he lays out in detail about what the Sabbatical year means to us and will bring into focus the events we currently see daily.
Long before Babylon ever invaded Judah, Moses told the people what would happen if the land was not allowed its rest every seven years. He spelled it out plainly; they would be taken into the land of their enemies and the land would lay in waist so that the land could be REPAID its Shabbats. This was ignored for seventy Sabbatical years, and as the Shemitah is once every seven years, it shows that the people disregarded this command from the Lord for 490 years. It makes one wonder why Adonai let so much time pass before executing His judgement, and we find the answer in Numbers 14: 18, “Adonai is slow to anger, rich in grace, forgiving offenses and crimes; yet not exonerating the guilty, but causing the negative effects of the parents’ offenses to be experienced by their children and even by the third and fourth generations.” In 2 Peter 3:9 it reads, “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some people think of slowness; on the contrary, he is patient with you; for it is not his purpose that anyone should be destroyed, but that everyone should turn from his sins.” Even before the grace of Yeshua, Adonai was patient and wanting His children to turn from their sins, and that was the exact word that Jeremiah and the prophets proclaimed time and time again.
“Time after time, and frequently, Adonai, the God of their ancestors, sent word to them through his messengers; because he had compassion on his people and on the place where he lived. But they ridiculed God’s messengers, treating his words with contempt and scoffing at his prophets, until the anger of Adonai rose up against his people to the extent that there was no longer any remedy. Therefore, he brought the king of the Kasdim, who put their young men to the sword in the house of their sanctuary. They had no compassion on either young men or young women, old men or gray-haired; God handed all of them over to him. All the articles in the house of God, great and small; the supplies in the house of Adonai; and the supplies of the king and his leading men – all these he brought to Bavel. Then they burned down the house of God, broke down the wall of Yerushalayim, put to flames all its palaces and destroyed everything of worth. Those who had escaped the sword he carried off to Bavel, and they became slaves to him and his sons until the reign of the kingdom of Persia. Thus, was fulfilled the word of Adoani spoken by Yirmeyahu (Jeremiah), “until the land has been paid her Shabbats” – for as long as it lay desolate it kept Shabbat until seventy years had passed.” 2 Chronicles 36:15-21
As Jeremiah 25 continues, it is a proclamation of judgment against not only Judah and Babylon, but also all the surrounding nations. “For here is what Adonai the God of Isra’el says to me: ‘Take this cup of the wine of fury from my hand and make all the nations where I am sending you drink it. They will drink, stagger to and fro and behave like crazy people because of the sword that I will send among them.’” Jeremiah 25:15-16 “For, look!” – if I am bringing disaster on the city that bears my name, do you expect to go unpunished? Yes, I will summon a sword for all the inhabitants of the earth. Jeremiah 25:29 The imagery that is used in these verses is a powerful metaphor and is found many places in scripture. (Isaiah 51, Psalm 75:8, Revelation 14:10) According to Rashi, Rabbi Sholomo Yitzhaki, who is considered the “father” of all commentaries that followed on the Talmud, the cup of fury mentioned here is “displayed by Jeremiah’s prophecy of diving retribution, declaring that it will no longer be retracted for any repentance from the sinner”.
Cup of Judgement, Wine of Wrath, fierce anger; these are the phrases that my focus zeroed in on for a closer look.
· Cup of Judgement: In Adonai’s hand there is a cup of wine, foaming, richly spiced; when he pours it out, all the wicked of the earth will drain it, drinking it to the dregs. Psalm 75:9(8) Mishpat (mish-pawt) or judgement in Hebrew holds a multitude of meanings including the act of deciding a case, seat of judgement and the process or procedure of litigation. But as the definitions continue, they come to what happens at the end of a court proceeding. The sentence or decision of judgement and the execution of judgement. The cup Jeremiah was to give to the nations held the sentence and execution of judgment to be carried out.
· Wine of Wrath: Ebrah (eb-raw) or wrath is an outburst of passion that is translated as anger, rage, or wrath. It is an outpouring, overflow, and excess. It is overflowing rage or fury. “Awake! Awake! Stand up, Yerushalayim! At Adonai’s hand you drank the cup of his fury; you have drained to the dregs the goblet of drunkenness.” Isaiah 51:17 This wine would not run dry until the sentence of judgement was complete. It would flow until each nation Adonai decreed to drink had drunk its fill.
· Fierce Anger: Fierce, charown (kahw-rone) is symbolized by bursts of burning anger, heat, and according to the Brown Driver Briggs Lexicon, always used of God’s anger. It is sore displeasure, fury, and wrath. Anger, aph (af), is not described in the Hebrew as it is in English, it is described as nostril, nose, or face. It insinuates the flaring of the nostril, or one’s countenance, the forehead as when it is furrowed, or rapid breathing in passion, which are all attributes of anger. It is also descriptive of a camel flaring its nostrils when in distress or discomfort.
In reading this chapter, I could not help but feel the warning message that was not just for the time that it was written, but for us today. One only has to turn on the news, to see what is happening around us to see that the cup of judgement has been raised, and while the Word promises us in John 3:36, “Whoever trust in the Son has eternal life. But whoever disobeys the Son will not see that life but remains subject to God’s wrath.”, I do believe that we are seeing signs of His judgement and as the nation of Israel did in the time of Jeremiah, even those who were faithful to Adonai felt the ramifications of the judgement He poured out upon them. It is why it is important now more than ever that we share the Good News of salvation, that we draw ever closer to our Abba Father, that we truly live in this world and not of it. I believe that we are a breath away from Yeshua’s return. He said, “For the Son of Man’s coming will be just as it was in the days of Noach. Back then, before the flood, people went on eating and drinking, taking wives and becoming wives, right up till the day Noach entered the ark; and they didn’t know what was happening until the Flood came and swept them all away. It will be just like that when the Son of Man comes.” Matthew 24:37-39 Let us not be asleep on the wall but sounding the shofar to all we know. He is coming and I want everyone I know to be ready and not drink the wine of His wrath and fury that will inevitably be poured out. “For God has not intended that we should experience his fury, but that we should gain deliverance through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah, who died on our behalf so that whether we are alive or dead, we may live along with him.” 1 Thessalonians 5:9-10
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