Personal Study And Teaching In Jeremiah – Part 16 – Deepest Anguish Parallels The Lord. Looking At Creationism - Young Earth/Old Earth? Destruction Series

PERSONAL STUDY AND TEACHING IN JEREMIAH – PART 16 – DEEPEST ANGUISH PARALLELS THE LORD. LOOKING AT CREATIONISM - YOUNG EARTH/OLD EARTH? DESTRUCTION

PART 16 - Jeremiah 4:19-26

CHAPTER 4

[A]. DEEPEST ANGUISH MATCHING DISASTER AND DEVASTATION

{{Jeremiah 4:19-20 “MY SOUL, MY SOUL, I AM IN ANGUISH! Oh, my heart! My heart is pounding in me. I cannot be silent because you have heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Disaster on disaster is proclaimed, for the whole land is devastated. Suddenly my tents are devastated, my curtains in an instant.”}}

This passage carries some doubt as to whom the speaker is. I normally write what the Lord is giving me but sometimes I check out other writers on a difficult passage. In this case I looked at the Commentaries to see where they fell in this matter, and they are on one side or the other, or say it could be two speakers. The two choices are either the prophet, or the people of the nation. A few suggest it may be a bit of both.

Verse 19 opens with “My soul, my soul” in the NASB, and with “My bowels, my bowels” in the KJV and “My anguish, my anguish” in the NIV and ESV. The word tries to reach the centre of one’s being and is said to fathom the depths and seat of human emotions, sometimes likened to labour pains. This word “anguish” is plummeting to the depths of sorrow and deepest distress. Then it is followed by “Oh, my heart. My heart is pounding in me.” This is a key expression. It literally means “the walls of my heart”, or in the ancient thinking, “the heartstrings that surrounded the heart and which were ready to break.” Modern expression is “My heart is breaking” and means it is being torn apart. Such was the extreme anguish. It also means great shakings of the heart, what we would call great palpitations. That whole experience is grave and full of distress, or as one has said, “my heart makes a noise in me; palpitates, beats and throbs, being filled with fears and dread, with sorrow and concern, at what was coming on; it represents an aching heart, all in disorder and confusion”.

This experience of the prophet or the nation, or both, is not unlike that inner tearing apart the Lord experienced on the cross. He too was facing the ruthless enemy and was abandoned, with none to help. {{Psalm 22:11 “Be not far from me, for trouble is near, for there is none to help.”]]

He faced the onslaught of the foes of hell just as Judah faced the northern foes. The Messianic Psalm 22 contains this verse – {{Psalm 22:14-15 “I AM POURED OUT LIKE WATER, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax. It is melted within me.” My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaves to my jaws, and You lay me in the dust of death.”}}. In that other Messianic Psalm, 69, we read this – {{Psalm 69:17 “Do not hide Your face from Your servant, for I am in distress. Answer me quickly.”}} And {{Psalm 69:20 “REPROACH HAS BROKEN MY HEART, and I am so sick, and I looked for sympathy, but there was none, and for comforters, but I found none.”}}

In Jeremiah 4 verse 19, we learn that the speaker can not keep silent and it was because of the grief and coming fear. Did something similar apply to the Lord? Yes, it did – {{Psalm 69:3 “I am WEARY WITH MY CRYING. My throat is parched. My eyes fail while I wait for my God.”}} And {{Psalm 22:1-2 “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Far from my deliverance are the words of my groaning.” O my God, I cry by day but You do not answer, and by night, but I have no rest.”}}. Another interesting comparison presents itself here as both the Lord and the nation faced the roaring lion – {{Psalm 22:13 “They open wide their mouth at me, as a ravening and a roaring lion.”}} Of course the whole Gethsemane experience would fit in here as well.

Going back to verse 19, the reason for not being silent is that the soul has heard trumpet and alarms associated with the battle noise and shouts. In reality that had not yet happened but the vision of it, or the realisation of its coming, provoked a verbal response of determination. Verse 20 is the continuation of the fear or vision in verse 19, and looks at total disaster through the whole land. The Targum of Jeremiah believes these exclamations of verse 19 are those of the prophet. If that is the case, then Jeremiah is overcome by the devastation that is coming to his people. His soul sees it all, like a vision from God, and his whole being is deeply affected. I consider it is the correct interpretation of that verse. Compare Jeremiah’s inner soul in Lamentations.