The Prophet's City Falls (Jeremiah 39:1-18)

I hope everyone had a great Father's Day and that all of your vacations are lined up and ready to go (if you're not already out of town).  Parts of my family have already travelled to Pennsylvania and Maine, so we're definitely making the most of summer break.  For those of us in town this Sunday, our sermon text will be Jeremiah 39, the account of the fall of the city of Jerusalem to the Babylonians at the end of an 18 month siege.  You might think that story would fit better at the end of the book, and you would be right, since it's repeated in chapter 52!  But it's here as well, and we're going to see Zedekiah, the king at the time, have a very dark ending to his kingship.

Judging by movies, TV, and books, our culture believes that the world will experience a huge upheaval that will send us into a post-apocalyptic world where every person will have to fend for themselves in a pre-modern world.  Whether it’s the Hunger Games, Bird Box, The Walking Dead, Mad Max, or any number of scenarios, the end of our current way of life must be in the "not-too-distant future" because of problems with technology, medicine, or our abuse of the environment.  But when a street preacher calls out, “Repent, the end is near!” we’re all more likely to respond with laughter and disbelief.  We don’t really believe that the end of the world could happen.  Just like the people of Judah and Jerusalem didn’t really believe that Jeremiah's prophecies of the end of the nation would come true.  But someday the end will come, and the biggest question facing us will be, "Were we ready?"  Let's study this key chapter together and ask some big questions Sunday.  See you then, -Dave