Jeremiah 37:16
“So Jeremiah entered an underground cell in a cistern turned into a dungeon. He stayed there a long time.”
“Jeremiah was put into a prison cell, where he remained for many days.”
Jeremiah told King Zedekiah the Egyptians would not help Israel defeat the Babylonians. The city would still fall. The Babylonian’s pulled back when the Egyptians arrived allowing Jeremiah to attend personal business at his home in Benjamin. On his way out of the city he was seized, falsely accused and thrown into prison. We don’t know how long nor why God allowed it.
This was a wilderness experience for Jeremiah, persecuted for doing God’s will and then seemingly forgotten. Sometimes God leads us smack into painful circumstances where we feel utterly abandoned. We may also, like Jeremiah, never know why. Our feelings mustn’t draw us into paranoia and self-pity. Instead, like Job, we learn God is beholden to no one and works in ways beyond our understanding. He owes us no explanation.
Lord, thank you for these kinds of experiences in my life. Hindsight shows you were there though I thought you absent. I treasure the lessons you taught me. That you, mighty God, should care to teach me lessons in life, fills me with awe. I deserve it not and rejoice in your my great, merciful, and loving Lord.