Jeremiah 33:14-16, “A righteous branch will spring up for David!”
Today is the first Sunday of Advent, and the Scripture lesson comes from Jeremiah 33:14-16, a ‘prophecy of hope’ spoken to address a dire situation Israel as a nation faced. We know that Israel as a kingdom ended in BC 587 in the hands of Babylonians. The prophecy of hope was spoken in our text while the armies of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, were advancing on Jerusalem. The streets of Jerusalem will soon be filled with the corpses of her people (Jer. 33:4-5). The worst had not yet happened, but it was inevitable. Any reasonable person could see that the city was doomed.
Jeremiah, the prophet himself, was in jail when he prophesied this message of hope. He was imprisoned because he spoke many prophecies of judgment, which landed him in prison, and those prophecies of judgment were being actualized in the land. Yet now, amid the catastrophe, the prophet finally spoke words of promise! In the previous chapter, he had purchased a piece of land, a foolish thing to do in a land soon to be conquered by invading armies. Nevertheless, he had purchased the land as a pledge, as earnest of God’s redemption: “For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Houses and fields and vineyards shall again be bought in this land” (32:15). Amid impending doom, a sign of hope was acted out.
Before we move on, let us think about the role of Jeremiah as a God-sent prophet. He spoke day and night of the impending doom against his people and nation, warning people to return to God. Israelites drifted away from worshipping and serving God, manifesting in loving and caring for their neighbors. Instead of returning to God, they kept sinning, doing their own thing, and seeking what their sinful hearts desired. Jeremiah proclaimed God’s message of doom against their rebellion and their refusal to return to God.
No one wanted to hear God’s message, the truth; he was hated, bitten, and imprisoned in a dried yet muddied well. He had to speak the doomsday against his people because that was the message of God. He was regarded as a traitor, deserving the death penalty; that was why he was thrown into a muddied well without water and bread. Yet he didn’t stop prophesying with the hope that his people might return to God. Whenever I read Jeremiah, I can feel his pain and tears speaking against his people. He didn’t want to speak the doomsday message, biting his tongue, but then the message became a burning fire in his heart; he had to spit it out. Jeremiah 20:9, “Then I said, “I will not make mention of Him, nor speak any more in His name.” But His word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones…” Jeremiah had to proclaim God’s words no matter how much he was hated for what he was doing; he was true to his calling, constantly speaking God’s messages to people whether they wanted to hear them or not. Yet, no king or ruling people listened. As a result of their sins, Israelites experienced the fall of their nation, being taken as captives and dispersed from their native land. No hope was in sight, only despair and doom.
However, for God’s people, Israel, the doomsday cannot be the end. God’s story cannot be finished with the ending of despair and doom. God spoke through the prophet Jeremiah amid the doomsday of the coming restoration of normal life. He proclaimed that there would come a time in the land of Judah when “there shall once more be heard the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the bride” (Jer. 33:10-11).
Moreover, in our text, Jeremiah specifically speaks of the restoration not simply of daily life but also the major sign of God’s favor, the restoration of the Davidic line.
One of the major tragedies of the Babylonian Exile was the end of the Davidic dynasty. For nearly four hundred years, descendants of David had occupied the throne of Judah, and God had promised that it would always be so (2 Samuel 7; Psalm 89). But the Babylonians destroyed David’s city, burned Solomon’s temple, and took David’s heirs into exile. The promises of God seemed to have come to an end. Those Israelite exiles might have questioned, ‘What has happened to the promise of God about having descendants of David ruling Israel forever?’ ‘Does God truly exist?’
Jeremiah’s prophecy offered hope to a people devastated by the loss: “The days are surely coming, says the LORD when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah” in verse 14. All might seem lost, but God is still faithful. The house of David might be cut down, but God can bring life out of death. A righteous Branch will sprout from the line of David. A similar passage is found in Isaiah 11:1, “A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots.” It is a message of hope and unexpected joy: a new life springs from what looks like a dead stump.
Can we imagine these people who had heard the message of hope when they were experiencing the fall of their nation, and the doom and despair were all they could experience and feel in their reality? I am sure there were people who held on to the promise of God, the message of hope spoken through the prophet Jeremiah. Depending on their faith in the message of hope, their exilic life might have differed, either pessimistic or hopeful. Did you know that the partial promise of this message was fulfilled seventy years later? After seventy years of Babylonian captivity, they returned and lived a normal life in their land, and about 500 years later, from the return of the Babylonian captives, Christ was born as the “righteous branch” sprouted from the stump of Jesse as the hope of the world that is facing death and doom.
What does this text tell us, the believers of Christ? 1) Christ’s birth has been prophesied everywhere in the Old Testament: Jeremiah, Isaiah, Micah, and other places. 2) Jesus Christ is the only hope for us who experience disappointment and loss of hope. 3) we must hold on to the promise of God, the message of hope.
There are many people who go through difficulties and hardships in life to the point of being hopeless. I met a woman recently who had been looking for a steady job for a year; she applied everywhere: Walmart, restaurants, Caseys, and all those places she could think of, but she hasn’t heard from anywhere. She was hopeless. Many of us feel hopeless having dysfunctional family members struggling with addictions of all kinds. Many people go through marital problems, landing them in despair. Some of us battle with our health conditions; some despair about losing their physical independence, being wheelchair-bound or homebound, and some face the impending loss of their loved ones. No one is immune to perils in life. I was so shocked to find out that one of my family members (in-laws) was thinking about euthanasia, killing himself legally; he had no purpose in living.
Many of us feel hopeless all the more because the gap between our reality and the message of hope we read in the Bible and hear from the pulpit is so huge, like those Israelites who heard messages of hope amid their doom and impending captivity. Isn’t that why some of us suffer from seasonal depression? What we experience in life is terrible, yet the Christmas lights and decorations are so festive and bright, forcing us to face the Gulf of Chasm between our hopeless reality and the message of hope.
Our text tells us that our God is faithful, keeping his promises. As he promised, our Messiah, our Redeemer, was born and will be born in our hearts of desolation if we have faith in God. Out of the seemingly dead stump, the righteous branch sprouted. If God speaks to you about healing, you will be healed. It will be restored if God speaks to you about restoring your family. Do you believe that God is living and faithful, keeping His promises to us? What God has promised has been fulfilled throughout history and in our lives.
We must do one thing amid our suffering and pain: to see God beyond our life’s problems, who is much bigger, broader, deeper, and higher than our own problems. Christ, our hope, is born in our midst. Amen!
