In this message we will begin to consider Jehovah's further commission to Jeremiah and His further statement of Judah's sins.
Jehovah's further commission to Jeremiah is covered in 15:10 through 16:9.
In 15:10-14 we see Jeremiah's remorse and Jehovah's encouragement and strengthening. In these verses there are three parties: Jeremiah, his mother, and God. Jeremiah was disappointed and said to his mother, "Woe is me, my mother, because you bore me, / A man of strife and a man of contention to the whole land. / I have not lent with interest, / Nor have they lent to me; / Yet everyone curses me" (v. 10). Surely, no mother would be happy to hear such a word from her son. Whereas Jeremiah's mother was silent, God came in to say something to him.
I feel that it is very significant that as Jeremiah was speaking to his mother, God came in to speak to him. This indicates that God was always with Jeremiah. Wherever Jeremiah went, God was there with him. Whenever Jeremiah spoke, God was present to participate in the conversation. God was with Jeremiah even when he, in his disappointment, was talking to his mother. She might have been very happy about how God spoke to her son to encourage and strengthen him.
In His speaking to Jeremiah, God spoke not as the Divine Being, as the mighty One, but almost as if He were a man, talking in a very human and personal way. According to the record of this book, as God dealt with His people, He often spoke to them in such a way. For instance, when He addressed Israel as His apostate wife and lovingly pleaded for her to return, He spoke in a human way.
After Jeremiah told his mother that everyone was cursing him, Jehovah intervened and said to him, "Surely I will set you free for your good; / Indeed I will cause the enemy to make supplication to you / In a time of trouble and in a time of distress. / Can one break iron, / Iron from the north, or bronze?/Your wealth and your treasures/I will give as plunder without price,/And that for all your sins,/And within all your borders. / I will cause your enemies to bring it / Into a land which you do not know; / For a fire is kindled in My anger, / Which will burn against you" (vv. 11-14). We need to pay attention to the pronouns your and you in verses 13 and 14. In verse 13 God refers to "your wealth" and "your treasures." Whose wealth and treasures are these? They must be the wealth and treasures of Israel. However, God spoke this word not directly to Israel but to Jeremiah. Surely, the word your here includes the addressee. This means that God regarded Jeremiah the prophet as being one with Israel. Israel's wealth and treasures were also Jeremiah's wealth and treasures. This indicates that God considered the entire nation of Israel as one entity. Because Jeremiah was a part of this entity, when the wealth and treasures of Israel were given to their enemies, Jeremiah also became poor. The wealth and treasures of Israel, and also of Jeremiah, would be brought to a land which they did not know. God had kindled a fire in His anger, which would burn against them. In this matter also, Jeremiah was included.
Here we have not only three parties—Jeremiah, his mother, and Jehovah—but also a fourth party—Israel. God's word was addressed to Jeremiah, but in speaking to Jeremiah He included the children of Israel together with Jeremiah. In speaking to Jeremiah and to Israel, God spoke as if He were a human being talking to other human beings. He spoke as one of the four parties participating in this conversation.