The Israelites put great store on where bones were buried. During the onslaught from Babylon there would not even be any dignity in death. The bones of the dead would be exposed to the moon and the stars which they had worshipped. The exiles would suffer greatly.
Jerusalem was utterly stubborn in her ways. She turned away from God never to return. They would do anything except repent of their sin. Again, Israel is a model of the whole human race. We are utterly stubborn in our persistence in sin. Nature follows its course, it does what it is supposed to do, but we human do not do what we are supposed to do. The reason for this is a combination of two things. One, we are made in the image of God, we have a degree of autonomy that other creatures do not have. Secondly, we have rebelled against God so our nature is corrupt. Therefore we persist in doing the wrong thing, in taking the wrong course. We need to be submitted to God to be what we are meant to be.
Yet we claim to be wise. Listen to the world today, it claims to be wiser than God, to know what it is doing. In reality it lives a lie and bases its wisdom on a lie. Sin has taken such deep root.
Jerusalem would suffer the consequences of her sin. She would be faced with the reality that it is God who supplies the harvest, so since they showed no interest in God He would withhold the harvest. If you want a life without God you can have a life without God, and all that that entails. This is the judgement on man.
Jeremiah is in agony at the crushing judgement. People object to the idea of hell, but the reality of hell is that it is the natural consequence of man's choice to have life without God.
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