Jeremiah 50-52

What’s Happening?

For 40 years, Jeremiah has prophesied that God would one day send Babylon to invade Judah and exile its citizens for their failure to listen and obey God. But Jeremiah’s last prophecy is delivered to the king of Babylon just before Babylon besieges Judah. In it, Jeremiah announces Babylon’s destruction for abusing its role in Judah’s exile (Jeremiah 51:59-64). Jeremiah’s last prophecy isn’t of Judah’s deserved punishment but the defeat of Judah’s enemy and Judah’s ultimate restoration.

Jeremiah predicts Babylon’s ruin and how God will avenge the violence Babylon gleefully inflicted against Judah (Jeremiah 50:1-13). And for their arrogance, their whole civilization will lay ruined and humiliated (Jeremiah 50:31-32). Even though they have been a predator for decades, hunting and conquering the weak, God will raise an even greater nation to turn Babylon into prey (Jeremiah 51:34-35). And every idol Babylon has prayed to and trusted will be exposed as the dead lumps of metal they are (Jeremiah 51:17-19). For all the wrongs Babylon has and will inflict upon God’s people, Jeremiah promises that God will hold them accountable, destroy the guilty, and free his people (Jeremiah 51:24). Babylon will soon be judged for their great evil. Soon, the people of God will return to their homeland.

The final chapter of Jeremiah is not a prophecy at all. Instead, it describes in gruesome detail the fall of Judah at Babylon’s hands and how all the warnings Jeremiah spent 40 years delivering came true. Judah’s king is captured, and his sons are murdered. Judah’s citizens are first starved and then exiled. Both Judah’s capital and God’s temple are burned to the ground (Jeremiah 52:1-17). Every precious metal and sacred object is weighed, recorded, and added to Babylon’s treasury (Jeremiah 52:18-23). Finally, those not exiled are either left as beggars or executed (Jeremiah 52:24-30).

The last chapter of Jeremiah recounts Judah’s fall in extreme detail because it means there is hope. If Jeremiah was right about Judah’s fall, then he must be right about Babylon's too. If Judah has been judged, Babylon will fall just as God said. As a sign that God will do this, Jeremiah tells us that a prince from Judah’s exiled royal family now sits at the Babylonian king's dinner table (Jeremiah 52:31-34). God’s royal family is still alive, Judah is not dead, and a new king has risen in exile. Jeremiah ends with the hope that if God’s prophecies of doom have all come true, his promises of Judah’s restoration and the defeat of her enemies will also come true.

Where is the Gospel?

Jeremiah’s prophecies didn’t simply come true in his time; they also set the pattern for how God deals with evil and pride in every age. The future hope that Babylon would fall was grounded in the fact that Judah’s prophesied destruction and exile came true. Once judgment had done its work, restoration followed. In the same way, our hope that evil, violence, and oppression will not have the final word is grounded in what God has already done through Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Jesus did not overcome the powers of this world by escaping death, but by entering fully into it (Philippians 2:6-8). He was handed over to the violent authority of the world, suffered at the hands of empire, and was exiled to the grave. Yet death did not hold him (Acts 2:24). God raised Jesus from the dead, publicly vindicating him and revealing that the powers which crucified him had been exposed and defeated (Colossians 2:15). The resurrection declares that exile is not the end, and death is not the final ruler (1 Corinthians 15:54-57).

The book of Revelation tells this same story using Jeremiah’s pattern. One of its first images is a slain Lamb standing alive on a throne (Revelation 5:6). Like Judah’s king raised in exile to sit at Babylon’s table, Jesus is raised from death and enthroned in heaven. His wounds are not signs of punishment but testimony that the worst the world could do has already been overcome (Revelation 5:9). And just as Babylon fell after Judah’s exile, Revelation portrays the violent world system as “Babylon,” destined to collapse under its own pride and injustice (Revelation 18:1-8).

The story does not end with destruction. God returns to dwell with his people, establishes an eternal Kingdom, and renews the whole earth (Revelation 21:1-5). The hope Jeremiah held out—that judgment would give way to restoration—finds its fullest expression in Jesus. His resurrection is both proof and promise that God will finish what he has begun: evil will be dealt with, pride will fall, and life will be restored.

So, like Jeremiah’s original readers, we wait. We wait for the day when all violence and injustice are finally undone. And as we wait, we lift our eyes to Jesus—raised from the dead, seated on God’s throne—as a living sign that exile does not win, death does not rule, and resurrection life is coming for the whole world.

See for Yourself

I pray that the Holy Spirit will open your eyes to see the God who brings lie out of exile. And may you see Jesus as the risen King whose resurrection promises that death, injustice, and loss will not have the final word.