When you read the story closely, what is immediately disturbing about this moment in the life of the prophet Jeremiah is how much good sense it made to throw him into the pit, into that empty muddy cistern to be left to die.

Really, when you get the facts, you sympathize with the princes in this story. At least for me, I admit that I would likely have been on their side, asking the king’s permission to put him to death. King Zedekiah in this story, like most kings in the Bible, is a weak, vain, and vacillating leader, which is why the violent gather around him, to use him; that, of course, is a consistent theme of human political history. But nonetheless, I’ll be honest, I would have been on the side of the princes here and not the side of the prophet, and my guess is that so would most of you.

You see, here is what was going on. The Kingdom of Judah was a weak subject of the Kingdom of Babylon, the Chaldeans. Nebuchadnezzer, king of the Babylonians, would have just as well left Judah alone, an unbothered little client; but Zedekiah was not content with that and so sent ambassadors to Egypt to beg their military protection. But that was foolish, for that poked the Babylonian bear, and whatever little defense force Egypt would send Judah’s way would never have been enough to repel a Babylonian siege. Zedekiah thought he could play one powerful force against another, but it exploded in his face; remember, their king was vain, vacillating, and weak. And the Babylonians were at the gates; it was the beginning of the end for the Kingdom of Judah.

Soldiers were already deserting. The writing was on the wall; morale was already almost completely dead. But then enter Jeremiah the prophet. And what did he say? Well, when King Zedekiah asked him, “Is there any word from the Lord?” Jeremiah said, “There is…You shall be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon.”[1] What those princes accused Jeremiah of saying, accusing him of “demoralizing the soldiers,” he probably did indeed say: those who stay in the city will die by famine or the sword, Jeremiah declared; but, those who surrender to the Babylonians will live.[2] In a few verses, he’ll tell King Zedekiah the same: if you surrender, you’ll live; if you don’t, then this city will be burned to the ground.[3]

That was Jeremiah’s message, what the princes called “demoralizing.” That’s why they wanted to throw him into a pit and leave him to starve. Jeremiah, the prophet of God, was preaching sedition, surrender. The prophet’s words, you see, were unbearable. You see why I said if I were there, I too would have likely wanted him to be removed from the scene.

The only person who stood up for the prophet was a foreigner, a Cushite, an Ethiopian; only the outsider did anything at all to protect the prophet. Less privileged, less a beneficiary of society, maybe he was less invested in the world he lived in, and therefore, maybe he could more readily accept the prophet’s words of destruction, but who knows? Anyway, that foreigner seemed to be the only one with any sense. Indeed, in the next chapter, as Jerusalem was falling, God himself would say to that Ethiopian, “I will fulfill my words against this city for evil and not for good…But I will deliver you.”[4] It’s strange, you know, how he was saved all because he accepted the unbearable words of the prophet, words I would not have accepted myself if I were there, words I understand why they were so hated.

They were indeed demoralizing words to hear while facing such an existential threat; they were indeed seditious words. Which as I said at the beginning is what’s so disturbing about this story, that the word of God could ever be unbearable like that. But that indeed is what the Book of Jeremiah repeatedly suggests.

Which makes me remember some of the things that happened to Jesus, some of the things he said. Like when Jesus first preached at Nazareth, it was a great homily; however, by the end of it Luke says, “they rose up and put him out of the city, and led him to the brow of a hill…that they might throw him down headlong.”[5] I think also of the whole of John 5; you should read it and ask yourself, if you were a first century Jew, how hard it would have been to hear what Jesus was saying. “And the Father who sent me…His voice you have never heard, his form you have never seen; and you do not have his word abiding in you…it is Moses who accuses you.”[6] Those would have been unbearable words for most people to hear; Jesus’s preaching would have seemed intolerable to almost everyone. You see what I’m saying? “I have come to set the earth on fire…Do you think I have come to establish peace on the earth? No…but rather division.”[7] That’s today’s gospel. What are we to make of that? What are we to make of the evidence that suggests that even Christ’s words are at times unbearable?

Or is it the case that we don’t pay attention well enough to realize just how unbearable the words of God are. Maybe if we really heard the pure and unfiltered words of Jesus, we’d move past politely ignoring them to genuinely hating them. “[I]f anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”[8] Or what about, “Sell your possessions, and give alms”?[9] Remember that from last week? Or what about, “If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross…whoever loses his life for my sake will save it”?[10] Or what about all that talk in the Old Testament about widows and orphans and strangers: “You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him…You shall not afflict any widow or orphan. If you do…and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry; and my wrath will burn.”[11] Or what about the least of Jesus’s brethren, the sheep and the goats?[12] Do we hear those words? Ignore them? Hate them? You see what I’m getting at? Are any of these words unbearable for you?

Of course, we don’t really know what to do with prophets anymore. YouTube has too many of them. The allegedly sophisticated, the educated, can’t help but laugh at all of it. We can barely suffer criticism or counterarguments these days or admit that any wisdom at all exists outside our own tribe or political sect much less suffer the hard truths a true prophet. I don’t know, maybe it explains that sense of cultural demise many folks have today, our sense of collective spiral. But that itself may be an unbearable thought, so I won’t proceed.

Rather, I will conclude simply by suggesting two things. One is that you are in a good place here by the altar of God. “[I]f the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?”[13] The ground unstable everywhere, wherever a soul stands on faith, that is a firm foundation. Here you can hear the unbearable words of God, bear the burning penitential brunt of them, and hear the words of forgiveness that always follow. Here you can begin to “be transformed by the renewal of your mind.”[14]

But then, we should strive to imitate that foreigner, the Ethiopian—Ebed-melech was his name. To admit to you that I would have hated the prophet right along with everyone else may be honest of me, but it remains shameful. It’s evidence that I still am capable of cowardice. But we Christians, if we are what we say we are, should not be cowards. Instead, we should have it in us to stand up against any crowd or any king, strengthened in holiness by the unbearable words or God, unbearable no more. Amen.

[1] Jeremiah 37:17

[2] Jeremiah 38:1-4

[3] Jeremiah 38:17-18

[4] Jeremiah 39:16-17

[5] Luke 4:29

[6] John 5:37-45

[7] Luke 12:49-51

[8] Matthew 5:39, 44

[9] Luke 12:33

[10] Luke 9:23-24

[11] Exodus 22:21-24

[12] Matthew 25:31-46

[13] Psalm 11:3

[14] Romans 12:2

© 2025 Rev. Joshua J. Whitfield