12:21-25
The final part of this chapter deals with God debunking a couple of popular sayings. The first is “the days go by and every vision comes to nothing”. Jeremiah spent many years warning the people of the coming judgement, and that Babylon would overthrow Jerusalem. His preaching was dismissed, Peter encountered a similar situation in his day, described in 2 Peter 3:3-9. He reminds his readers that God is being patient, giving the people a chance to repent. In Jeremiah’s day if the people had repented then things would have been so different. Instead they persisted in their stubborn disobedience. For Jerusalem the day was nearing when the destruction would come. One day Jesus will return and the world will be judged. And for all of us a day of death comes and we will be called to give an account. In the meantime Jerusalem had its share of false prophets, but their day would come to an end, and they would be shown up for the hot-air merchants that they were. The words of the Lord would be fulfilled, and very soon.
12:26-28
The second saying probably applied to the preaching of Ezekiel. People were not overtly dismissing his words, but saying they were for the future. So they were kind of damning them with faint praise. But they were wrong, his words would come to pass very soon. Most prophecy in the Bible had both an immediate fulfillment and looked to the distant future.
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