As Jeremiah recounted to the
Lord in prayer the conditions for the people of Jerusalem since they
were overtaken by the Babylonian armies, he wrote of the loss of
their inheritances and houses, widows and orphans in the streets,
having to purchase their own water and wood, and being under the
persecution of the Egyptians and Assyrians while laboring just to
have bread. In chapter five and verse seven of Lamentations Jeremiah
adds one of the reasons why they suffered where we read:
Our fathers have
sinned, and are not; and we have borne their iniquities.
The
verse begins, “Our fathers have sinned, and are
not;” As though he was
attempting to make sense of the conditions of the people of
Jerusalem, Jeremiah reasons that “Our fathers have
sinned” which means “those
who went before them” “missed, missed the way, went wrong,
incurred guilt, or forfeited” the ways of God. In other words their
ancestors walked away from their “right path and duty”, and they
“are not” which means they were “passed away” or
brought to “nothing”.
The
verse goes on to say, “and we have borne their
iniquities.” The result of the
ancestors of Jerusalem's people missing the mark and dying was that
those left behind “have borne their iniquities”
which means “to bear, bear a load, drag oneself along, be laden
with, or make oneself a burden” with the “perversity, depravity,
guilt or punishment of iniquity” of their ancestors. In other
words, the punishment for the sins of the fathers are being paid for
by their children.
As
we ponder these words of Jeremiah, we might imagine what it is like
to bear the punishment for the sins of others. Perhaps we have been
punished for someone else's sins, and we know the weight of that
bearing. Those within Jerusalem were the descendants of men who were
sinners, and although Jeremiah and other prophets attempted to turn
them from their sinful ways over and over again, they refused and
their children were paying the price. Peter the apostle wrote
concerning Jesus in the first epistle after his name in chapter two
and verse twenty-four:
Who his own self bare
our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins,
should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.
Jesus
knows what it is like to bear the punishment for the sins of others,
and when we identify with those within Jerusalem who were bearing the
sins of their fathers, we should keep in mind that we have one who
never sinned Himself but bore punishment for the sins of the whole
world. May the Lord Jesus keep us ever mindful of what He did for us.
Next
time we see how the people are as servants with no one to deliver
them, so read ahead, and we shall join together then.
Until
tomorrow...there is more...
Look
for the daily devotional book “Equipped for Battle – From
Generation to Generation”, the marriage book “So, You Want to Be
Married”, and the new devotional “One Year in the Sermon on the
Mount” in all major bookstore sites, www.amazon.com ;
www.barnesandnobles.com ; download to e-books, and find it locally at
www.mrzlc.com/bookstore
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