When the Word Becomes a Reproach Text: Jeremiah 6:9-15
Introduction: The Deafness of a Doomed People
We live in an age that prides itself on its openness, its tolerance, and its commitment to hearing all voices. But this is a carefully cultivated lie. Our generation has more ways to communicate than any in history, and yet it is perhaps the most deaf. It is deaf to reason, deaf to history, and most importantly, deaf to God. And when a people become deaf to God, it is not that they hear nothing; it is that they will hear anything. They will listen to any soothing lie, any flattering falsehood, any damnable heresy that allows them to continue in their sin without the inconvenience of a guilty conscience.
This is the situation Jeremiah confronts in our text. He is a prophet sent to a people who have systematically stopped their ears. They are covenant people, God's people, and yet they have reached a point of terminal spiritual sclerosis. The Word of the Lord, which should have been their delight and their life, has become an offense to them, a reproach. And when God's Word becomes a burden, God's wrath is not far behind.
The message of Jeremiah is a hard one, but it is a necessary one. It is a message for his time, and because the hearts of men do not change, it is a message for ours. We are looking at a society that is rotten from top to bottom, from the least to the greatest. It is a society where the spiritual leaders, the prophets and priests, have become purveyors of cheap grace and false peace. They are spiritual quacks, applying cosmetic bandages to a cancer of the soul. God's diagnosis is terminal, and their prescription is a lollipop.
What happens when a nation's ears are uncircumcised? What happens when they can no longer blush? What happens when the very Word of God is treated as an insult? Jeremiah tells us plainly. The cup of God's wrath fills up, and a time comes when He will no longer hold it in. He will pour it out. This passage is a sobering anatomy of a culture on the brink of collapse, a people ripe for judgment. We would do well to listen, lest we find ourselves in the same condition.
The Text
Thus says Yahweh of hosts, “They will thoroughly glean as the vine the remnant of Israel; Pass your hand again like a grape gatherer Over the branches.” To whom shall I speak and give warning That they may hear? Behold, their ears are uncircumcised, And they cannot give heed. Behold, the word of Yahweh has become a reproach to them; They have no delight in it. But I am full of the wrath of Yahweh; I am weary of holding it in. “Pour it out on the infants in the street And on the gathering of choice men together; For both husband and wife shall be captured, The aged with the one full of days. Their houses shall be turned over to others, Their fields and their wives together, For I will stretch out My hand Against the inhabitants of the land,” declares Yahweh. “For from the least of them even to the greatest of them, Everyone is greedy for gain, And from the prophet even to the priest Everyone practices lying. They have healed the brokenness of My people superficially, Saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ But there is no peace. Were they ashamed because of the abomination they have done? They were not even ashamed at all; They did not even know how to feel dishonor. Therefore they shall fall among those who fall; At the time that I punish them, They shall be cast down,” says Yahweh.
(Jeremiah 6:9-15 LSB)
The Thorough Gleaning and the Prophet's Frustration (vv. 9-10)
We begin with the Lord's instruction and Jeremiah's lament.
"Thus says Yahweh of hosts, 'They will thoroughly glean as the vine the remnant of Israel; Pass your hand again like a grape gatherer Over the branches.' To whom shall I speak and give warning That they may hear? Behold, their ears are uncircumcised, And they cannot give heed. Behold, the word of Yahweh has become a reproach to them; They have no delight in it." (Jeremiah 6:9-10)
The first image is agricultural and ominous. God is speaking of a gleaning. Normally, the law required that the corners of the field and the leftover grapes be left for the poor (Lev. 19:9-10). But this is not a normal harvest; this is a harvest of judgment. The command is to "thoroughly glean," to go back over the branches a second time. Nothing is to be left. This is a picture of a total and devastating judgment. The Babylonians are God's grape-gatherers, and they will be ruthlessly efficient. There will be no remnant left in the land.
In the face of this coming devastation, Jeremiah is filled with a holy desperation. "To whom shall I speak and give warning?" It is the cry of every faithful preacher who has ever stood before a stubborn congregation. The prophet's task is to speak, but the people's ears are the problem. He diagnoses their condition with surgical precision: "Behold, their ears are uncircumcised."
Circumcision was the sign of the covenant, a cutting away of the flesh that signified a separation unto God. It was an external sign that was meant to point to an internal reality: a circumcised heart (Deut. 30:6), a heart tender and responsive to God. But here, Jeremiah says their very ears are uncircumcised. They are covered with a spiritual foreskin, a thick layer of fleshly pride and rebellion that prevents the Word of God from entering. They literally "cannot give heed." It is not a matter of intellectual capacity, but of moral and spiritual inability. They have so hardened themselves against God that they are now sealed off from His truth.
The result is predictable. "The word of Yahweh has become a reproach to them." The very thing that was their glory, the living oracles of God, is now an insult. When Jeremiah preaches repentance, they hear it as a personal attack. When he warns of judgment, they hear it as treason. When he speaks of holiness, they hear it as judgmentalism. They have no delight in it. God's Word is not sweet like honey to them; it is bitter like medicine they refuse to take. This is a fatal condition. When a man's body starts rejecting the very food that would nourish it, you know the end is near. When a culture treats God's Word as an enemy, its destruction is not a matter of if, but when.
The Full Cup and the Poured-Out Wrath (vv. 11-12)
The prophet's frustration gives way to a reflection of the divine frustration. Jeremiah becomes a vessel filled with the very wrath he is proclaiming.
"But I am full of the wrath of Yahweh; I am weary of holding it in. 'Pour it out on the infants in the street And on the gathering of choice men together; For both husband and wife shall be captured, The aged with the one full of days. Their houses shall be turned over to others, Their fields and their wives together, For I will stretch out My hand Against the inhabitants of the land,' declares Yahweh." (Jeremiah 6:11-12 LSB)
Jeremiah is not some detached, stoic messenger. He feels the weight of the message. He is "full of the wrath of Yahweh." It is a terrible burden. He is weary of containing it. This is not personal vindictiveness; it is a holy alignment with God's own righteous indignation. God's patience has a limit, and Jeremiah feels that limit being reached. The command comes: "Pour it out."
And the judgment is to be utterly indiscriminate, just like the sin was. It will fall "on the infants in the street." This is shocking to our modern, sentimental sensibilities. But we must understand that covenantal judgment is corporate. The sin of the fathers has consequences for the children. When a nation as a whole turns its back on God, the judgment falls on the nation as a whole. It touches everyone: the young men, husband and wife, the old and the very old. No one is exempt.
The judgment is also a direct, ironic reversal of the covenant blessings. God had promised them houses, fields, and fruitful families in the land (Deut. 28). Now, as a direct consequence of their covenant-breaking, those very things are forfeit. "Their houses shall be turned over to others, Their fields and their wives together." This is the curse of the covenant in action. God is stretching out His hand, not to save, but to strike. The hand that once delivered them from Egypt is now raised against them. This is what happens when a people presumes upon God's grace while despising His law.
The Rot from Top to Bottom (v. 13)
Why is this judgment so total? Because the corruption is so total. Verse 13 gives us the diagnosis of a society saturated with sin.
"'For from the least of them even to the greatest of them, Everyone is greedy for gain, And from the prophet even to the priest Everyone practices lying.'" (Jeremiah 6:13 LSB)
The cancer of sin has metastasized throughout the entire body politic. It is not just a few bad apples. It is "from the least of them even to the greatest of them." The common man and the nobleman are united in their sin. And what is the root sin? "Everyone is greedy for gain." The Hebrew is stark; they are all "cutting a cut" for themselves. It is the sin of covetousness, the idolatry of self-interest that dissolves all social bonds and duties to God and neighbor.
But the most damning indictment is reserved for the spiritual leadership. "From the prophet even to the priest Everyone practices lying." When the watchmen on the wall are blind and the physicians are charlatans, the city is doomed. The prophets, who were supposed to speak God's truth, speak flattering lies. The priests, who were supposed to administer God's law and sacrifices, are engaged in falsehood. They have turned the house of God into a marketplace of lies, selling spiritual snake oil to a dying people. When the pulpit becomes a place for affirming people in their sins instead of calling them out of them, the last line of defense has fallen.
The Quack Doctors of the Soul (vv. 14-15)
Jeremiah now describes the specific nature of their lies and the hardness of their hearts.
"They have healed the brokenness of My people superficially, Saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ But there is no peace. Were they ashamed because of the abomination they have done? They were not even ashamed at all; They did not even know how to feel dishonor. Therefore they shall fall among those who fall; At the time that I punish them, They shall be cast down,” says Yahweh." (Jeremiah 6:14-15 LSB)
This is one of the most searing condemnations of false ministry in all of Scripture. They have treated a mortal wound as though it were a paper cut. They have "healed the brokenness of My people superficially." The word is literally "lightly" or "cheaply." They offer a gospel of cheap grace. They see the people shattered by sin, on the verge of covenantal collapse, and their solution is to whisper soothing platitudes. "Peace, peace." Everything is fine. God is love. Don't be so negative. You're okay, I'm okay. But God thunders back, "there is no peace." There can be no peace with God while you are at war with His law. There can be no true peace that is not grounded in repentance and righteousness. Their message is a spiritual anesthetic that allows the patient to die comfortably.
And why do they do this? Because they, like the people, have lost the capacity for shame. "Were they ashamed because of the abomination they have done?" The question is rhetorical and the answer is devastating. "They were not even ashamed at all; They did not even know how to feel dishonor." They have sinned so long and so brazenly that their consciences are seared. They can no longer blush. The ability to feel shame is a grace from God; it is the moral nerve ending that tells you something is wrong. When that is gone, a man or a nation is spiritually dead. They are past feeling.
Therefore, the conclusion is inescapable. "Therefore they shall fall among those who fall." The false prophets and priests who promised peace and safety will be swept away in the very judgment they denied was coming. When God brings His punishment, they will be cast down with everyone else. There is no special exemption for corrupt clergy. In fact, their judgment will be all the more severe.
Conclusion: Circumcise Your Ears
The message of Jeremiah is not a comfortable one. It is not designed to be. It is a divine alarm bell, intended to wake a sleeping, dying people. The trajectory described here is a terrifying one: it begins with ears that will not hear, progresses to a Word that becomes an offense, leads to a society saturated in greed and lies, is enabled by a corrupt pulpit offering cheap peace, and ends with a people who have forgotten how to blush. The final stop on that line is judgment, thorough and devastating.
We must ask ourselves, where is our culture on that trajectory? Where is the church? Do we delight in the Word of God, or do we find its hard edges offensive? Do our preachers heal the wounds of sin lightly, crying "peace, peace" over sins that God has said lead to death? Have we, as a people, lost our capacity for shame?
The only hope is to reverse the first step. The only hope is to cry out to God for circumcised ears and circumcised hearts. We must pray that God would cut away the fleshly calluses of our pride and our rebellion, and make us tender to His Word once more. We must ask Him to make His Word a delight to us, even when it corrects, even when it rebukes, even when it warns.
For the good news is that the God who pours out wrath is also the God who pours out mercy. The God who judges is the God who saves. The judgment Jeremiah prophesied came, but it was not the final word. A remnant returned. And ultimately, the Word that Judah found so offensive became flesh and dwelt among us. Jesus Christ came, and He spoke the hardest words of all, words about taking up crosses and losing your life. And the establishment of His day, the priests and scribes, found His words to be a reproach, and they killed Him for it.
But on that cross, He absorbed the full cup of God's wrath that we deserved. He took the gleaning of judgment upon Himself, so that we who believe might be grafted into the true vine. He provides the only true peace, a peace bought with blood. Therefore, let us not be a people with uncircumcised ears. Let us hear Him, believe Him, and delight in Him. For His Word is not a reproach to us, but our very life.