Dear Suzanne, Rebecca, Anna and Mikayla,
God asks Jeremiah in Chapter 19 to get a potter's earthen flask and take some of the elders of the people and the elders of the priests and go to the Valley of Hinnom by the Potsherd Gate. This is where the potters did their work. Here Jeremiah proclaims to the King of Judah and the people of Jerusalem that the Lord is about to smash them like a potter's vessel that cannot be made whole again, because they had made the land an alien place, burned incense to other gods and shed the blood of innocents. (baby sacrifice) The Valley of Hinnom would be renamed the Valley of Slaughter and the famine would be so great during the siege that cannibalism would be the result. Then he goes to the temple court and and preaches the same message message of doom and destruction if they do not repent. Needless to say, they did not repent. The last words of Chapter 19 are "Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: 'Behold, I will bring on this city and on all her towns all the doom that I have pronounced against it, because they have stiffened their necks that they might not hear My words.' "
The application that comes to mind here is hardened clay cannot be reworked. The Valley of Hinnom is where the field purchased with the 30 pieces of silver that Judas threw on the ground in the temple is located. It became known as Aceldama or literally field of blood. This is where Judas fell when he hung himself. It was where the bodies were disposed during the destruction of Jerusalem. It was the garbage dump.
God's people were willful in their unbelief. They rejected the word of the Lord as did Judas...I think it is significant that Jeremiah smashed an earthen vessel...we are described as earthen vessels...when our clay is soft we can be molded and shaped...if the soft clay becomes marred it can be remade into another vessel. However, if the clay becomes hard or set and is marred there is nothing that can be done with it. The field is where the potter threw his useless, hardened pieces of clay. It reminds me of James 1:21 which says "Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls."
Sin hardens us. The people did what had not even come into the mind of the Lord and yet they considered what they were doing was "religious". They were walking in overwhelming wickedness, believing the false prophets and thinking they were okay. Continued sin with no turning cements our destiny. The Bible says that today is the day of salvation. Read the book of Exodus where it says over and over that Pharaoh hardened his heart...then in Exodus 10:20 it says this: "But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not let the children of Israel go" This is a warning to all of us. If our hearts do not receive the word of God they cannot be transformed by His grace. (Ezekiel 36:26-27 and Hebrews 8: 7-13) The same is true for those of us who know the Lord...we can become hearers and not doers...we can allow His word to bounce off our hearts as they harden. The longer you resist God's truth the harder and harder your heart becomes. Look to Him now...open your heart now...the Bible says "today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts." Pharaoh did not repent and relent despite all the affliction that God laid on his kingdom. Judas despite all the opportunity he had, did not believe. There is a sin leading to death...unbelief. Hebrews 10:31 says "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."
Love
Mom
"I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them"--Ezekiel 36:26-27
For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second. 8 Because finding fault with them, He says: “Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 9 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they did not continue in My covenant, and I disregarded them, says the LORD. 10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 11 None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. 12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds[b] I will remember no more.”[c]
13 In that He says, “A new covenant, ” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.--Hebrews 8:7-13
