Jeremiah 13:15-17 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Hear ye, &c. The prophet proceeds to give them good counsel, which, if it had been taken, the desolation and destruction threatened would have been prevented. Be not proud Pride was one of the sins for which God had a controversy with them, Jeremiah 13:9. Let them mortify and forsake this and their other sins, and God will let fall his controversy with them. Give glory to the Lord your God Glorify God by an humble confession of your sins, by submitting yourselves to him, humbling yourselves under his word, and under his mighty hand; before he cause darkness Before he bring upon you the night of affliction, even his great and heavy judgments. Light is the emblem of joy, and happy times are expressed by bright and pleasant days. On the contrary, calamities and troubles are represented by night and darkness, when every thing looks melancholy and dismal. And before your feet stumble, &c. Before the time come when ye shall be forced to flee by night unto the mountains for fear of your enemies. Or, more generally, before you find yourselves overtaken by the pursuing judgments of God, notwithstanding all your endeavours to outrun and escape from them. And while ye look for light That is, for relief and comfort; he turn it into the shadow of death Involve you in most dismal and terrible calamities, out of which you shall be utterly unable to extricate yourselves. But if ye will not hear Will not submit to and obey the word, but continue to be refractory; my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride Your haughtiness, stubbornness, and vain confidence; and mine eye shall weep sore, &c. Not chiefly, nor so much, because my relations, friends, and neighbours are involved in trouble and distress, but because the Lord's flock His people, and the sheep of his pasture; are carried away captive Observe, reader, that should always grieve us most by which God's honour suffers, and the interest of his kingdom is weakened.