The Logic of Desolation
Introduction: The Unasked Question
We live in an age that is drowning in information but starved of wisdom. When we see ruin, whether it is the ruin of a city, a culture, or a family, we are very quick to offer our diagnoses. We blame economics, or politics, or systemic injustices, or a lack of education. We have a thousand shallow answers, but we refuse to ask the one deep question that matters. We see the land perishing, but we will not ask the God of the land why.
Jeremiah is a prophet sent to a people who were experts at this kind of self-deception. They saw the Babylonian storm clouds gathering on the horizon, and they consulted their political strategists and their military alliances. They saw the moral rot in their own streets, and they doubled down on their religious ceremonies, thinking that ritual could cover the stench of rebellion. They saw the effects of their sin everywhere, but they refused to look at the cause.
This passage is a bucket of ice water to the face of a slumbering nation. It is God's own answer to the question that Judah refused to ask: "Why has the land perished?" The answer is not complicated, but it is profoundly offensive to the proud heart. It is offensive to the ancient Israelites, and it is offensive to us. The answer is that God is a covenant-keeping God, which means He keeps His promises of blessing for obedience and His promises of cursing for disobedience. When a people systematically abandons His law, follows the depraved GPS of their own hearts, and goes whoring after false gods, the result is not progress or enlightenment. The result is desolation. God un-creates their world. This is not divine petulance; it is divine justice. It is the logic of desolation.
The Text
"For the mountains I will take up a weeping and wailing, And for the pastures of the wilderness a funeral lamentation, Because they are turned into ruin so that no one passes through, And the lowing of the cattle is not heard; Both the birds of the sky and the beasts have fled; they are gone. I will make Jerusalem a heap of ruins, A haunt of jackals; And I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant."
Who is the wise man that may understand this? And who is he to whom the mouth of Yahweh has spoken, that he may declare it? Why has the land perished, turned into ruin like a desert, so that no one passes through? Yahweh said, "Because they have forsaken My law, which I set before them, and have not listened to My voice nor walked according to it, but have walked after the stubbornness of their heart and after the Baals, as their fathers taught them," therefore thus says Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel, "behold, I will feed them, this people, with wormwood and give them poisoned water to drink. I will scatter them among the nations, whom neither they nor their fathers have known; and I will send the sword after them until I have consumed them."
(Jeremiah 9:10-16 LSB)
Creation in Reverse (vv. 10-11)
The judgment begins with a lament over a de-created world.
"For the mountains I will take up a weeping and wailing, And for the pastures of the wilderness a funeral lamentation, Because they are turned into ruin so that no one passes through, And the lowing of the cattle is not heard; Both the birds of the sky and the beasts have fled; they are gone. I will make Jerusalem a heap of ruins, A haunt of jackals; And I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant." (Jeremiah 9:10-11 LSB)
This is Genesis 1 played backwards. In creation, God separated the land from the water, filled it with vegetation, and then populated it with birds, beasts, and cattle. Man was placed in this ordered world to exercise dominion. But here, because of man's rebellion, the world is being unmade. The land is "turned into ruin." The cattle are gone. The birds and beasts have fled. The created order, which groans under the weight of man's sin, is here being emptied out. Sin is not just a spiritual problem with personal consequences; it has cosmic, environmental, and agricultural consequences. When we rebel against the Creator, the creation itself recoils.
And the pinnacle of this desolation is Jerusalem. The city where God had placed His name, the center of worship and covenant life, is to become "a heap of ruins, a haunt of jackals." This is not just a military defeat; it is a theological statement. Jackals are creatures of the desolate wilderness. For them to inhabit the holy city means that God has removed His holy presence and protection. He has turned His own house over to the wild. When a people profanes the holy, God will remove the holy from them, and the profane will rush in to fill the vacuum. We see this today. When a nation kicks God out of its public square, it does not become a neutral space. It becomes a haunt for every unclean and screeching ideology.
The Question of True Wisdom (v. 12)
In the face of this totalizing ruin, Jeremiah asks the central question.
"Who is the wise man that may understand this? And who is he to whom the mouth of Yahweh has spoken, that he may declare it? Why has the land perished, turned into ruin like a desert, so that no one passes through?" (Jeremiah 9:12 LSB)
This is the question that separates the fools from the wise. The fools are the talking heads, the political analysts, the court prophets who offer geopolitical explanations for the crisis. They talk about Babylon's military might or Egypt's untrustworthy alliances. They are full of explanations that never touch the heart of the matter. They have data, but no wisdom.
True wisdom, the kind that can "understand this," does not come from human insight. It comes from one source only: the mouth of Yahweh. The wise man is the prophet. He is the one who has listened to God and is therefore equipped to "declare" the reason for the calamity. This is a profound statement about epistemology, about how we know things. You cannot understand history, you cannot understand your own culture, you cannot understand the evening news, unless you have first listened to what God has spoken. All other analysis is just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The wise man is the one who knows why the ship is sinking in the first place, because the Captain told him.
The Divine Answer: A Threefold Rebellion (vv. 13-14)
And God does not leave us in suspense. He answers the question directly.
"Yahweh said, 'Because they have forsaken My law, which I set before them, and have not listened to My voice nor walked according to it, but have walked after the stubbornness of their heart and after the Baals, as their fathers taught them.'" (Jeremiah 9:13-14 LSB)
Here is the divine diagnosis, and it is threefold. First, "they have forsaken My law." This is the foundation. God gave them His Torah, the instruction manual for human flourishing. It was not a burden; it was a gift. It was the blueprint for justice, peace, and prosperity. To forsake it is an act of cosmic stupidity. It is to throw away the map and then complain about being lost.
Second, having thrown away God's map, they followed a new one: "the stubbornness of their heart." This is the essence of the fall. It is the declaration of autonomy. It is man saying, "My will be done. My truth is what matters." The heart of man is not a reliable guide; it is a crooked compass that always points back to self. To follow it is to walk in circles of self-interest until you walk right off a cliff.
Third, this inward rebellion manifested in outward idolatry: "and after the Baals." You cannot forsake God's law and follow your own heart without setting up a new god to worship. Man is a worshiping creature. If he does not worship the true God, he will worship a false one. The Baal cults were centered on fertility, sex, and power. By worshiping them, Judah was simply baptizing their own lusts and ambitions. And notice the source: "as their fathers taught them." Rebellion becomes a tradition. Sin becomes a heritage. Each generation passes down the idolatry to the next, making it harder and harder to break free.
The Divine Sentence: A Bitter Harvest (vv. 15-16)
Because of this threefold rebellion, the "therefore" of God's judgment is pronounced.
"therefore thus says Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel, 'behold, I will feed them, this people, with wormwood and give them poisoned water to drink. I will scatter them among the nations, whom neither they nor their fathers have known; and I will send the sword after them until I have consumed them.'" (Jeremiah 9:15-16 LSB)
The punishment fits the crime with terrifying precision. They chose a path apart from God, which is the path of bitterness and death. So God says, "Fine. I will give you what you have chosen, in its purest form." He will feed them wormwood, a plant known for its extreme bitterness. He will give them poisoned water. The very things meant to sustain life will become instruments of judgment. When you turn from the fountain of living waters, all you are left with are broken cisterns that hold poisoned water.
The final sentence is exile and the sword. "I will scatter them among the nations." This is the great covenant curse of Deuteronomy 28. To be in the land was to be in the place of blessing and promise. To be cast out of the land was to be cut off, handed over to the chaos of the nations. And the sword will pursue them even there. The judgment will be total, "until I have consumed them." This is not the language of a therapeutic deity who just wants everyone to be happy. This is the language of a holy God whose covenant has been trampled and whose honor must be vindicated.
The Consumed One
This is a hard word. It is a terrifying word. If this were the end of the story, we would be left with nothing but despair. A holy God, a rebellious people, and an inescapable judgment. But this is not the end of the story. This utter desolation, this "consuming" of covenant-breaking Israel, was a foreshadowing of a greater judgment that would fall upon one man.
On a hill outside Jerusalem, the true Israel, Jesus Christ, was made a desolation. He was cast out of the city to a place of ruin, a skull-shaped hill. He was surrounded not by jackals, but by the jeering crowds and the demonic powers of darkness. He cried out in thirst, and in a profound fulfillment of this very imagery, He was given a bitter drink. He drank the cup of God's wrath. He drank the wormwood. He drank the poison of our sin down to the dregs.
The sword of God's justice, which pursued Israel, fell on Him. He was "consumed" by the wrath we deserved. Why? So that we, who have all forsaken God's law, who have all walked in the stubbornness of our hearts, who have all chased our own Baals, could be forgiven. Because He was scattered, we can be gathered. Because He was fed bitterness, we can be invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb. Because He was consumed, we can be saved.
The logic of desolation is real, and it leads straight to hell. But the logic of the gospel is that God in His mercy sent His own Son to enter that desolation for us, to drink that poison for us, and to exhaust that curse for us. The only wise response is to abandon our own stubborn hearts and to flee to Him for refuge.