12:6
Just to give a concrete illustration of how difficult things will get, God tells Jeremiah that even his own relatives have betrayed him. So Jeremiah is not even to trust his own family. Being a Christian is not a promise of a comfortable life. In the West we have had a comfortable life for many years. I do not mean that we have not encountered serious difficulties, sickness, financial or whatever, but society has not been overtly against us. In many countries this is not the case, and Christians face daily difficulties. Things are heading in the same direction in the West and we need to be prepared.
12:7
God then reiterates the message. He will forsake His house, and give the one He loves into the hands of her enemies. There are two things to notice here. One is that there is no pulling back from what God has said, His word needs to be taken seriously. The second is that He still speaks about “my house” and “the one I love”. There is still an emotional connection to Israel. We find it difficult to comprehend how the two things can go together, but they do and we must not seek to separate them.
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