God’s Test of a True Prophet

KEY VERSE: “Thus saith the LORD of hosts, Hearken not unto the words of the prophets that prophesy unto you: they make you vain: they speak a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of the LORD.” —Jeremiah 23:16

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: Jeremiah 28:5-9, 15, 16

JEREMIAH confronted Hananiah, who claimed to be a prophet, but was an evil influence upon the king and princes of Judah because he said the things they wanted to hear, and not the word that God spoke. Jeremiah said, “Hear now, Hananiah: The Lord hath not sent thee; but thou makest this people to trust in a lie.” (Jer. 28:15) “When the word of the prophet shall come to pass, then shall the prophet be known, that the Lord hath truly sent him.”—vs. 9

The dark prophecies which the Lord sent through Jeremiah, the true prophet, finally reached fulfillment. The besieging army of the Chaldeans, after a year and a half of siege, finally succeeded in making a breach in the wall with battering rams, through which an entrance was made and the city forced to surrender. King Zedekiah and his small army escaped to the south, going in the direction of the Jordan, but they were soon overtaken by the Chaldeans. Nebuchadnezzar, in person, was some miles distant from Jerusalem, at Riblah, and there the royal prisoner, Zedekiah, was taken to be punished for having violated the contract with Nebuchadnezzar who had placed him upon the throne.

The punishment was after the manner of the time. The king’s eyes were put out and he was led a prisoner to Babylon. Thus were fulfilled two very striking prophesies, which until fulfilled, seemed quite contradictory.

One of these prophecies respecting Zedekiah is found in Ezekiel 12:10-13. The other is found in Jeremiah 32:3-5. Ezekiel declared that King Zedekiah would be taken to Babylon a captive, and that there he would live and die, and yet it still declared that he would never see the city. This is a seeming contradiction. Jeremiah, on the other hand, in predicting the downfall of Jerusalem, declared that Zedekiah would speak with Nebuchadnezzar mouth to mouth and see his eyes. This seems to contradict Ezekiel’s statement, for if he would speak with the king, seeing him eye to eye, how could it be possible that he would not see the city of Babylon?

The fulfillment faithfully met all the requirements of the two prophecies. King Zedekiah saw Nebuchadnezzar, and spoke to him at Riblah in Judah. His sight was there taken from him and then he was taken a prisoner to Babylon. He lived and died in Babylon, but saw it not.

It has been written that in the bas-reliefs representing the capture of Lachish by Sennacherib, the prisoners are pictured as being cruelly beaten by their captors, some having their eyes put out. The practice of blinding prisoners especially prevailed in Persia, and it is mentioned by most Greek historians. This custom, no doubt, carried over from the Chaldean rule.

The seventy years which followed the overthrow here depicted, are frequently referred to as the seventy years’ captivity. But the Scriptures call them the seventy years’ desolation of the land—a desolation which had been predicted by the Prophet Jeremiah (25:11), saying, “This whole land shall be a desolation, and this nation shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” The completeness of the desolation is shown in II Chronicles 36:17-21; and although the king of Babylon allowed certain of the poor of the land to remain, and gave them vineyards and fields, yet it was the Lord’s purpose that the land of Israel should be desolate seventy years, and so it was. In the same year, Gedaliah, whom the king of Babylon had made governor, and under whom many of the Jewish fugitives returned from neighboring countries, was assassinated, and the entire population speedily removed into Egypt for fear of the wrath of the king of Babylon.—II Kings 25:21-26; Jer. 41:1-3; 43:5,6

Thus all that Jeremiah had prophesied concerning the kingdom of Israel came to pass in its every detail. The knowledge of this should give us great assurance that other wonderful prophecies concerning the coming kingdom of Christ, of which the prophet also was commissioned to write, will indeed have their fulfillment. One of these speaks of Israel’s and the world’s restoration to favor, and reads: “Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion and shall flow together to the goodness of the Lord … and their soul shall be as a watered garden, and they shall not sorrow any more at all!”—Jeremiah 31:12

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