Today's Daily Lesson comes from Jeremiah chapter 37 verses 11 throught 16:
11 Now when the Chaldean army had withdrawn from Jerusalem at the approach of Pharaoh’s army, 12 Jeremiah set out from Jerusalem to go to the land of Benjamin to receive his share of property among the people there. 13 When he reached the Benjamin Gate, a sentinel there named Irijah son of Shelemiah son of Hananiah arrested the prophet Jeremiah saying, “You are deserting to the Chaldeans.” 14 And Jeremiah said, “That is a lie; I am not deserting to the Chaldeans.” But Irijah would not listen to him, and arrested Jeremiah and brought him to the officials. 15 The officials were enraged at Jeremiah, and they beat him and imprisoned him in the house of the secretary Jonathan, for it had been made a prison. 16 Thus Jeremiah was put in the cistern house, in the cells, and remained there many days.
Jeremiah had become a marked man. And anything he said or did would be used against him. His simple travel was now outlawed; and in his attempt to leave Jerusalem and go and tend to some property in the country, he was arrested and imprisoned -- for treason.
These are signs of a failed and now fascist state. The leaders govern through fear and with suspicion. Anyone who opposes them is seen as an enemy of the state. They are the state. And surveillance and arrest are the tactics which keep them in power. That -- and lies.
The leaders are desperate -- desperate enough to arrest and imprison one of Jerusalem's most well-known prophets. But even in prison Jeremiah remains defiant. If he is wrong, he says, then why does everything he says is soon to befall the country keep happening?
NOTE: We are reading the whole Bible through this year. We will find out what happens to Jeremiah and Jerusalem over the weekend as we read Jeremiah chapters 38-40; Psalms 74 and 79; 2 Kings 24-25; 2 Chronicles 36 and Habakkuk for Monday morning.
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