Failure to do Righteously

Jeremiah 22:11-23

11 For thus says the LORD concerning Shallum the son of Josiah, king of Judah, who reigned instead of Josiah his father, who went from this place: "He shall not return here anymore, 12 but he shall die in the place where they have led him captive, and shall see this land no more.

13 "Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness
And his chambers by injustice,
Who uses his neighbor's service without wages
And gives him nothing for his work,
14 Who says, 'I will build myself a wide house with spacious chambers,
And cut out windows for it,
Paneling it with cedar
And painting it with vermilion.'

15 "Shall you reign because you enclose yourself in cedar?
Did not your father eat and drink,
And do justice and righteousness?
Then it was well with him.

16 He judged the cause of the poor and needy;
Then it was well.
Was not this knowing Me?" says the LORD.

17 "Yet your eyes and your heart are for nothing but your covetousness,
For shedding innocent blood,
And practicing oppression and violence."

18 Therefore thus says the LORD concerning Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah:
"They shall not lament for him,
Saying, 'Alas, my brother!' or 'Alas, my sister!'
They shall not lament for him,
Saying, 'Alas, master!' or 'Alas, his glory!'
19 He shall be buried with the burial of a donkey,
Dragged and cast out beyond the gates of Jerusalem.

20 "Go up to Lebanon, and cry out,
And lift up your voice in Bashan;
Cry from Abarim,
For all your lovers are destroyed.

21 I spoke to you in your prosperity,
But you said, 'I will not hear.'
This has been your manner from your youth,
That you did not obey My voice.

22 The wind shall eat up all your rulers,
And your lovers shall go into captivity;
Surely then you will be ashamed and humiliated
For all your wickedness.

23 O inhabitant of Lebanon,
Making your nest in the cedars,
How gracious will you be when pangs come upon you,
Like the pain of a woman in labor?

Jeremiah’s message to the sons of Josiah the king was accountability for their failure to do righteously according to God’s word.  Shallum the son of Josiah would die in captivity, never to see Jerusalem again for this continuous sin of rejecting God’s word and refusing to do His will toward Himself and others.  He had built his house on unrighteousness and injustice contrary to God’s commandments to deal fairly and morally with God and man.  He built bigger barns (Luke 12:18, 20-21) for himself instead of living righteously.  Knowing God meant that he should have judged the causes of the poor and needy, not misuse them for his own gain or act capriciously in ignoring their state of needs.  Instead, Shallum had loved  covetousness and violently oppressed others, even killing the innocent like Jezebel to gain more for himself (1 Kings 21:7, 13).  God’s judgment on him was that he would have nobody to mourn him and receive a less than common burial, a far cry from the notoriety he wanted for himself as a legacy.  The message then was aimed at the people of Israel (Lebanon, Bashan and Abarim were mountainous regions from which the whole land of Israel could be rhetorically addressed) who would lose their idolatrous lovers banded together in an unholy alliance and have no answers for their prayers to God because they refused to obey God’s voice from the prophets in His word.  They would be taken captive to Babylon and suffer greatly because they rejected the word of the LORD.  Their manner was to disobey God’s word all their lives and would therefore only reap the whirlwind of bondage, shame, and humility for their evil.  They would suffer as the pain of a woman in childbirth, arguably the most a person could endure and still live.  This warning is an example for all who read it to not reject or ignore God’s word or suffer the wages of that sin against Him in their failure to do righteously in humility and love for God and their neighbors.