Jeremiah 28:10: “Then Hananiah the prophet took the yoke off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck and broke it.”

October 27th, 2024 by Pastor Ed in devotional

God told Jeremiah to wear a wooden yoke on his shoulders to symbolize that Judah would be servants to Babylon. After about a year of wearing it, Hananiah, the son of a prophet from the priestly city of Gibeon, came with a very different message from the one God had given Jeremiah. He said, “God’s going to rescue us and all is well, and the breaking of this yoke symbolizes what’s going to happen to Nebuchadnezzar’s kingdom.” He then physically broke the wooden yoke off Jeremiah. That was exactly what the people wanted to hear, so they accepted the “positive message.” Jeremiah then came back with a new message. Since they were ignoring God, it was going to be even worse than they had first heard; the wooden yoke was going to be replaced with an iron one.

As Jonah learned in the belly of the great fish, we can’t ignore God for long because He keeps chasing us down. In His love for us, Jesus acts like a hound dog, intense and focused as He pursues the hunt. We also find this image of pursuit in “The Hound of Heaven,” a 182-line poem written by English poet Francis Thompson. Although Thompson was a follower of Christ, he struggled with poverty, poor health, and an addiction to opium (an “over-the-counter” medication in 1893). In the depths of his despair, Thompson described his flight from God. He knew the unrelenting love of Jesus, the hound of heaven, so he describes how Jesus pursues him, and how he hears, as he runs from Him, the feet of Jesus beating after him.

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the midst of tears
I hid from Him, and under running laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped; . . .
From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.
But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbed pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy [urgency],
They beat—and a Voice beat
More instant than the Feet—
“All things betray [those] who [betray] Me.”

“LORD, we thank You for pursuing us into Your arms of love.”