Jeremiah 23

Today’s Passage: Jeremiah 23

Here the LORD turns His face toward the men who were supposed to care for His people, the shepherds and the prophets, and He does not spare them. First come the failed shepherds, the kings and leaders of Judah who scattered the flock they were meant to tend, and against their ruin God sets one of the most radiant promises in all the prophets: He will gather His scattered sheep, raise up faithful shepherds, and above all raise up for David a righteous Branch, a King who reigns wisely and bears a name almost too great to speak, The LORD Our Righteousness. Then the passage turns, in a long and searing word, to the false prophets who filled the people with sweet, empty hopes, preaching visions dreamed up in their own minds while claiming to speak for God. Against their soft lies the LORD lifts up the true word and asks whether it is not like fire, and like a hammer that shatters rock. This chapter sits near the heart of the book, gathering into two hands the whole story of Jeremiah’s ministry: the tragedy of leaders who betrayed their trust, and the coming of the one true King who never will.

As you read, hold this: God Himself raises up the true King and Shepherd who is our righteousness, and His true word is fire and hammer, not the flattering dreams of liars.

Jeremiah 23:1–4 (BSB)

¹ “Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of My pasture!” declares the LORD. ² Therefore this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says about the shepherds who tend My people: “You have scattered My flock and driven them away, and have not attended to them. Behold, I will attend to you for the evil of your deeds, declares the LORD. ³ Then I Myself will gather the remnant of My flock from all the lands to which I have banished them, and I will return them to their pasture, where they will be fruitful and multiply. ⁴ I will raise up shepherds over them who will tend them, and they will no longer be afraid or dismayed, nor will any go missing, declares the LORD.

The chapter opens with a woe, and that little word carries a world of grief and warning in it. Notice how tenderly God speaks of His people even here: they are the sheep of My pasture, My flock, and it grieves Him that the very men appointed to care for them have scattered and destroyed them instead. There is a solemn justice in verse two that we should not rush past. You have not attended to them, He says to the shepherds, and so I will attend to you, and the same word is used for both, as if the neglect of the flock will now be repaid measure for measure upon the ones who neglected it. But watch what God does next, for it is the pattern of the whole Bible. Where the human shepherds failed, He does not merely punish and walk away; He steps in Himself. I Myself will gather them, He says, I will bring them home, I will raise up shepherds who actually tend them, and the frightened, scattered sheep will at last be unafraid. When those we trust to lead us fail us, the LORD is not finished. He is only beginning to show what a true Shepherd does.

Jeremiah 23:5–6 (BSB)

⁵ Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and He will reign wisely as King and will administer justice and righteousness in the land. ⁶ In His days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is His name by which He will be called: The LORD Our Righteousness.

Here we come to the mountain-top of the chapter, and I would ask you to slow down and read these two verses more than once, for there are few brighter promises in all the Old Testament. Against the whole sorry line of failed kings, God promises to raise up for David a righteous Branch (צֶמַח) tsemach, pronounced TSEH-makh. Strong's H6780, sprout, shoot, branch. It is a gentle and hopeful word, this tsemach, and God chose it with care. It is the picture of a fresh green shoot pushing up from an old stump, of life stubbornly rising where everything looked finished. The royal house of David, in Jeremiah’s day, was very nearly a dead stump: the last kings were weak or wicked, the throne was about to be swept away, the nation carried off into exile. And into that hopelessness God speaks of a tsemach, a righteous Branch, springing up from the very roots that seemed cut down. The later prophets take up this same word as a title, until it becomes almost a name for the promised Messiah. When we read in the Gospels that a child of David’s line is born in Bethlehem, we are watching this quiet Hebrew word come true, the green shoot rising at last from the old and weary tree, and His name is The LORD Our Righteousness. , a green and living shoot springing up from a family tree that looked all but dead. This is the King the prophets kept pointing toward, and the New Testament tells us plainly who He is: Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of David, born of that very line. See how different He is from the shepherds who scattered the flock. He reigns wisely; He administers justice and righteousness; in His days the people are saved and dwell securely at last. And then comes the name, and it takes our breath away: The LORD Our Righteousness. Think of what is folded into those four words. This King does not merely rule righteously over us; He becomes our righteousness, the very standing we could never earn for ourselves. The name places the covenant name of God, the LORD, upon this coming King, and joins to it the one thing every sinner most desperately needs, a righteousness that is not our own. Long before the manger, before the cross, before the empty tomb, God set this name shining over the ruin of Judah like a star: The LORD Our Righteousness.

Jeremiah 23:7–8 (BSB)

⁷ So behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when they will no longer say, ‘As surely as the LORD lives, who brought the Israelites up out of the land of Egypt.’ ⁸ Instead they will say, ‘As surely as the LORD lives, who brought and led the descendants of the house of Israel up out of the land of the north and all the other lands to which He had banished them.’ Then they will dwell once more in their own land.”

For centuries the great story every Israelite told, the deed by which they swore and remembered who their God was, had been the exodus out of Egypt: as surely as the LORD lives who brought us up out of Egypt. It was the founding rescue, the memory that made them a people. Now God says a day is coming when an even greater rescue will fill their mouths, a homecoming out of exile in the land of the north so wonderful that the old story of Egypt will seem almost small beside it. There is a beautiful principle tucked into these two verses. God’s mercies are not only remembered; they grow. Every fresh deliverance He works becomes a new song, and the God who brought them out of Egypt and would bring them back from Babylon is the same God who, in Christ, brings sinners out of a far deeper bondage still. His rescues build one upon another, each one giving His people a larger reason to say, as surely as the LORD lives.

Jeremiah 23:9–12 (BSB)

⁹ As for the prophets: My heart is broken within me, and all my bones tremble. I have become like a drunkard, like a man overcome by wine, because of the LORD, because of His holy words. ¹⁰ For the land is full of adulterers—because of the curse, the land mourns and the pastures of the wilderness have dried up—their course is evil and their power is misused. ¹¹ “For both prophet and priest are ungodly; even in My house I have found their wickedness,” declares the LORD. ¹² “Therefore their path will become slick; they will be driven away into the darkness and fall into it. For I will bring disaster upon them in the year of their punishment,” declares the LORD.

Now the chapter turns from the failed kings to the false prophets, and the tone changes from radiant promise to trembling grief. Hear the anguish in verse nine, where Jeremiah’s own heart is breaking within him and his bones shake, until he feels like a man staggering under too much wine. And what has undone him so? Not his own troubles, but the holiness of God’s words set against the rottenness of the men who claimed to speak them. The land itself is described as mourning, dried up under a curse, because prophet and priest alike, the very men meant to be holy, have grown ungodly, and their wickedness has even crept into the LORD’s own house. God’s word about them is stern: their path will turn slick underfoot, and they will be driven off into the darkness they loved. There is a sober lesson here that we must not soften. When those who handle holy things do so carelessly or falsely, it is no small matter to God. He takes the misuse of His name with deadly seriousness, precisely because His name is holy.

Jeremiah 23:13–15 (BSB)

¹³ “Among the prophets of Samaria I saw an offensive thing: They prophesied by Baal and led My people Israel astray. ¹⁴ And among the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen a horrible thing: They commit adultery and walk in lies. They strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one turns his back on wickedness. They are all like Sodom to Me; the people of Jerusalem are like Gomorrah.” ¹⁵ Therefore this is what the LORD of Hosts says concerning the prophets: “I will feed them wormwood and give them poisoned water to drink, for from the prophets of Jerusalem ungodliness has spread throughout the land.”

God draws a painful comparison here, and it is meant to shame. The prophets of the northern kingdom, Samaria, had prophesied by Baal, and everyone knew how that story ended, for the north had already fallen. But the prophets of Jerusalem, God says, are worse, and He calls their conduct not merely offensive but horrible. See the dreadful power of the false teacher laid bare in verse fourteen: they strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one turns from his wickedness. That is the true damage of the comforting lie. By telling sinners that all is well, these prophets propped up the very evil that was destroying the people, and made repentance seem unnecessary. To compare Jerusalem, the city of the temple, to Sodom and Gomorrah is to say something almost unthinkable, and God says it plainly. The bitter wormwood and the poisoned water He promises them are the fruit of their own poison spreading through the land. A lie that lets people feel safe in their sin is not a kindness. It is a slow poison, and God will not treat it as anything less.

Jeremiah 23:16–20 (BSB)

¹⁶ This is what the LORD of Hosts says: “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you. They are filling you with false hopes. They speak visions from their own minds, not from the mouth of the LORD. ¹⁷ They keep saying to those who despise Me, ‘The LORD says that you will have peace,’ and to everyone who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart, ‘No harm will come to you.’ ¹⁸ But which of them has stood in the council of the LORD to see and hear His word? Who has given heed to His word and obeyed it? ¹⁹ Behold, the storm of the LORD has gone out with fury, a whirlwind swirling down upon the heads of the wicked. ²⁰ The anger of the LORD will not turn back until He has fully accomplished the purposes of His heart. In the days to come you will understand this clearly.

Now God tells the people plainly what to do with these voices: do not listen to them. And He puts His finger on exactly what is wrong. These prophets speak visions from their own minds, not from the mouth of the LORD, and the result is that they fill people with false hopes. Look closely at verse seventeen, for it names the very audience the flattering lie always finds. They say peace to those who despise God, and no harm will come to you to those who walk in the stubbornness of their own hearts. The comfortable lie is precisely a comfort to the unrepentant; it lets a man keep his sin and his peace of mind both at once. Then God asks the question that exposes them all: which of these prophets has actually stood in My council to hear My word? A true messenger has been in the presence of the One he speaks for; the false one has only been in his own imagination. And the real word of the LORD, God warns, is no gentle breeze but a gathering storm that will not turn back until His holy purpose is accomplished. In the days to come, He says, you will understand this clearly, and so they did, when Babylon came.

Jeremiah 23:21–24 (BSB)

²¹ I did not send these prophets, yet they have run with their message; I did not speak to them, yet they have prophesied. ²² But if they had stood in My council, they would have proclaimed My words to My people and turned them back from their evil ways and deeds.” ²³ “Am I only a God nearby,” declares the LORD, “and not a God far away?” ²⁴ “Can a man hide in secret places where I cannot see him?” declares the LORD. “Do I not fill the heavens and the earth?” declares the LORD.

God lays the charge down without hedging: I did not send them, yet they ran; I did not speak, yet they prophesied. And He gives us a simple, searching test for a true word in verse twenty-two. Had these men truly stood in His council, His word would have turned the people back from their sin. That is the mark of the genuine message: it does not leave people comfortable in their evil, but calls them home to God. Then the LORD asks a question meant to strip away every hiding place. Do these men imagine He is only a small local god, near enough to be fooled but too far off to see what they are really doing? Do I not fill the heavens and the earth, He asks. The false prophet lives as though God were not truly watching, as though a lie told in His name could be tucked away in some corner He cannot reach. But there is no such corner. The God who fills all things hears every word spoken in His name, and He is not deceived by the ones who wag their tongues and call it revelation.

Jeremiah 23:25–29 (BSB)

²⁵ “I have heard the sayings of the prophets who prophesy lies in My name: ‘I had a dream! I had a dream!’ ²⁶ How long will this continue in the hearts of these prophets who prophesy falsehood, these prophets of the delusion of their own minds? ²⁷ They suppose the dreams that they tell one another will make My people forget My name, just as their fathers forgot My name through the worship of Baal. ²⁸ Let the prophet who has a dream retell it, but let him who has My word speak it truthfully. For what is straw compared to grain?” declares the LORD. ²⁹ “Is not My word like fire,” declares the LORD, “and like a hammer that smashes a rock?”

Hear the mockery God puts in the mouths of the false prophets: I had a dream, I had a dream, as though their own night visions were the voice of the Almighty. And He exposes the real aim of it all, that these dreams told back and forth would make His people forget His name, dragging them into forgetfulness as surely as Baal worship had done to their fathers. Then comes one of the great sayings of the whole book, and it draws the line as clean as a blade. Let the man who has only a dream go ahead and tell his dream, God says, but let the man who actually has My word speak it truthfully, and then He asks: what is straw compared to grain? Straw is light and dry and empty; it fills the eye but never the stomach. Grain is heavy with life, and it feeds. So it is with the flattering dream set beside the true word of God. And then the LORD reaches for two more pictures for His own word, and they are unforgettable. Is not My word like fire, He asks, and like a hammer that smashes a rock? A comforting lie can do neither. It cannot burn away what is false in us, and it cannot break a hard heart. Only the true word of God, heavy as grain, hot as fire, mighty as the hammer, can do the real work in a soul. When you long to be changed, do not go to the soft dreams of men. Go to the word that burns and breaks and feeds.

Jeremiah 23:30–32 (BSB)

³⁰ “Therefore behold,” declares the LORD, “I am against the prophets who steal from one another words they attribute to Me.” ³¹ “Yes,” declares the LORD, “I am against the prophets who wag their own tongues and proclaim, ‘The LORD declares it.’” ³² “Indeed,” declares the LORD, “I am against those who prophesy false dreams and retell them to lead My people astray with their reckless lies. It was not I who sent them or commanded them, and they are of no benefit at all to these people,” declares the LORD.

Three times God says the same terrible words: I am against them. There is nothing more fearful in all the Scriptures than to have the LORD of Hosts set Himself against you, and He says it here of the men who traded in false revelation. Notice the three ways they sinned. Some stole words from one another, passing around borrowed phrases as if they were fresh from God. Some simply wagged their own tongues and stamped the LORD declares it upon their private opinions. And some told false dreams that led the people astray with reckless lies. In every case the verdict is the same, that God never sent them and they do His people no good at all. It is a sobering thing to see how seriously the LORD guards the honesty of His own word. To put His name on something He never said is not a small carelessness; it is to make the God of truth the author of a lie, and against that He sets His face.

Jeremiah 23:33–40 (BSB)

³³ “Now when this people or a prophet or priest asks you, ‘What is the burden of the LORD?’ you are to say to them, ‘What burden? I will forsake you, declares the LORD.’ ³⁴ As for the prophet or priest or anyone who claims, ‘This is the burden of the LORD,’ I will punish that man and his household. ³⁵ This is what each man is to say to his friend and to his brother: ‘What has the LORD answered?’ or ‘What has the LORD spoken?’ ³⁶ But refer no more to the burden of the LORD, for each man’s word becomes the burden, so that you pervert the words of the living God, the LORD of Hosts, our God. ³⁷ Thus you are to say to the prophet: ‘What has the LORD answered you?’ and ‘What has the LORD spoken?’ ³⁸ But if you claim, ‘This is the burden of the LORD,’ then this is what the LORD says: Because you have said, ‘This is the burden of the LORD,’ and I specifically told you not to make this claim, ³⁹ therefore I will surely forget you and will cast you out of My presence, both you and the city that I gave to you and your fathers. ⁴⁰ And I will bring upon you everlasting shame and perpetual humiliation that will never be forgotten.”

The chapter closes with a play on a single word. The Hebrew for burden could mean both a heavy load and a solemn oracle, a weighty message from God, and the people had turned it into a mocking little catchphrase. So they would sneer, what is the burden of the LORD today, as if His word were a tiresome weight to be joked about. God will not have His revelation treated as a punchline. He tells them to stop using the word altogether and simply to ask, honestly, what has the LORD spoken, for the moment a man drapes the phrase the burden of the LORD over his own invention, he perverts the words of the living God. And there, quietly, in verse thirty-six, stands the phrase that judges every false prophet in the chapter: the words of the living God. That is what they had been playing with. The warning grows heavy at the end, promising that those who keep abusing His name will be forgotten and cast out, carrying an everlasting shame. It is a solemn note to end on, and it is meant to be. To trifle with the word of the living God is the most dangerous game a person can play, for His word is not straw to be tossed about. It is fire, and it is a hammer, and it is the truth by which we will one day be measured.