And I will deliver them to be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth for their hurt, to be a reproach and a proverb, a taunt and a curse, in all places whither I shall drive them.
I will deliver them to be removed ... - (Jeremiah 15:4). Calvin translates, 'I will give them up to agitation, in all,' etc. This verse quotes the curse, Deuteronomy 28:25; Deuteronomy 28:37. (Compare Jeremiah 29:18; Jeremiah 29:22; Psalms 44:13-14).
Remarks:
(1) The captives already in Babylon are compared to good fruit, such as is fit for use and sweet to the taste. The party in Jerusalem, as yet free, is compared to bad fruit, unfit for use and nauseous to the palate. And yet, if one judged by the mere outward aspect of things, the state of the captives in the enemies' city seemed a much more undesirable one than that of their brethren in the metropolis of their own land. Hence, we see that the good or evil of one's circumstances is not to be judged by outward appearances. Often what seems a peculiarly hard and distressing position proves to have been the very best for us. God humbles and tries us sorely at first, in order to do us good in our latter end. By afflictions the first captives in Babylon were convinced of sin, weaned from idols, and taught to turn to God with their whole heart (Jeremiah 24:7). Thus in the end they learned to look back on their trials as mercies in disguise, and to feel that God had indeed "sent them out of their native land into the land of the Chaldeans for their good" (Jeremiah 24:5). So may many a believer testify, "Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now have I kept thy word" (Psalms 119:67). When sorrow is sanctified to us, we may be sure it will end well.
(2) True repentance and conversion are not man's work, but the gift of God's grace preventing us; that is, going before us in the first instance, and "giving us an heart to know the Lord" (Jeremiah 24:7), and to become His people, anterior to any good-will or effort on our part. When God thus works with prevenient grace, the sinner returns to the Lord, not partially and outwardly, but "with the whole heart." Pardon is an act of grace, not the reward of our good-will or good works; yet it is invariably accompanied by repentance, and produces the fruits of love.
(3) Zedekiah, and the Jews still free in their own city and land, seemed to their brethren in exile an object of envy, and to themselves the special objects of God's favour, as contrasted with the exiles, whom they looked down upon as castaways from God; but really the case was very different from what it seemed. The relative state of the exiles and of those still in Jerusalem would ere long be reversed: the latter were to be "removed into all the kingdoms of the earth for their hurt (Jeremiah 24:9), to be a reproach, a proverb, a taunt, and a curse in all places." Let us hence learn, there is no stability or reality in that prosperity which is unaccompanied with the true fear of God, and which only puffs us up with a self-sufficient and haughty spirit toward our brethren who seem less outwardly favoured than ourselves. Let us ask God to give us such things only as are truly expedient for us.