The Bill for Senseless Shepherds Text: Jeremiah 10:19-22
Introduction: The Inescapable Invoice
We live in an age that believes it can order whatever it wants from the cosmic menu and then simply dine and dash. Our culture is drunk on the wine of autonomy. We want the stability of a Christian social order without the Christ who ordered it. We want the personal security of a family, but we want to tear down the creational norms that make a family a family. We want prosperity, but we despise the God who gives the power to get wealth. And then, when the bill comes due, when the whole structure begins to groan and shudder, we look around with feigned innocence, wondering who could possibly be responsible for the mess.
The prophet Jeremiah is a man sent by God to a people who had been running up a covenantal tab for centuries. They had engaged in every form of idolatry, spiritual adultery, and social injustice, all while maintaining the outward forms of Temple worship. They thought the ritual was a talisman that would ward off the consequences. They thought they could have God's protection without God's governance. But God does not do business that way. Judgment was not a possibility; it was an invoice, already in the mail, and Babylon was the postal service God was using to deliver it.
In our text today, Jeremiah speaks with a voice that is both personal and corporate. He embodies the anguish of the nation. He feels the coming desolation in his own bones. This is not the detached analysis of a political commentator. This is the heartbroken cry of a patriot who loved his people but loved God more, and was therefore required to tell them the truth. He shows us that when a nation comes apart at the seams, the first thing we must do is accept the reality of the wound. The second is to diagnose its cause, which is invariably found in the leadership. And the third is to brace for the impact of the consequences.
This passage is a biopsy of a dying culture. It reveals a people wounded, a family scattered, leadership that is brain-dead, and an enemy on the horizon. And we would be fools not to see our own reflection in this ancient mirror. The bill for our own rebellion is coming due, and we must learn to read the writing on the wall.
The Text
19 Woe is me, because of my injury! My wound is desperately sick. But I said, “Truly this is a sickness, And I must bear it.” 20 My tent is destroyed, And all my ropes are torn out; My sons have gone from me and are no more. There is no one to stretch out my tent again Or to set up my curtains. 21 For the shepherds have become senseless And have not sought Yahweh; Therefore they have not prospered, And all their flock is scattered. 22 The sound of a report! Behold, it comes, A great quaking out of the land of the north, To make the cities of Judah A desolation, a haunt of jackals.
(Jeremiah 10:19-22 LSB)
The Sickness Unto Death (v. 19)
Jeremiah begins with a personal lament that is also the nation's lament. He is the voice of Judah, feeling the pain of the coming judgment.
"Woe is me, because of my injury! My wound is desperately sick. But I said, 'Truly this is a sickness, And I must bear it.'" (Jeremiah 10:19)
The first step toward any kind of recovery is a true diagnosis. Jeremiah does not sugarcoat the situation. The injury is a "breach" or a "shattering." The wound is "desperately sick," which is the same Hebrew word used elsewhere to describe the human heart as "deceitful above all things, and desperately sick" (Jer. 17:9). The external crisis is a direct manifestation of the internal corruption. The sickness of the nation is a terminal cancer of the soul.
But notice the second half of the verse. "But I said, 'Truly this is a sickness, and I must bear it.'" This is not fatalism; it is realism. It is the acceptance of God's righteous judgment. This is the opposite of the false prophets who were running around Jerusalem peddling their snake-oil promises of "Peace, peace," when there was no peace. They were telling the people that everything was fine, that God would never let His Temple be destroyed. Jeremiah, on the other hand, says that we must look the disaster squarely in the face and own it. This is our sickness. This is the consequence of our sin. And we must bear it.
This is the beginning of true repentance. It is not blaming your circumstances, or your enemies, or your upbringing. It is the quiet, settled acknowledgment that God is just and we are not. It is what Daniel did in exile when he prayed, "O Lord, righteousness belongs to You, but to us shame of face" (Dan. 9:7). Until a people, or a person, is willing to say, "This is my sickness, and I must bear the consequences," there can be no healing. You cannot be healed of a disease you refuse to admit you have.
Covenantal Collapse (v. 20)
In verse 20, the prophet uses the metaphor of a nomadic tent to describe the utter collapse of the nation's social and domestic fabric.
"My tent is destroyed, And all my ropes are torn out; My sons have gone from me and are no more. There is no one to stretch out my tent again Or to set up my curtains." (Jeremiah 10:20)
A tent is a home. It is a place of shelter, family, and continuity. But this tent has not just been taken down; it has been violently destroyed. The ropes that held it taut against the wind have been torn out. This is a picture of a society coming completely unmoored. The structures that provided stability, the laws, the customs, the covenantal ties, have all been ripped apart.
And the result is the loss of the future. "My sons have gone from me and are no more." The children are either dead or dragged off into exile. The next generation has been forfeited. This is the ultimate curse for a covenant people whose entire hope was bound up in their posterity, in the promised seed. When the sons are gone, the future is gone.
The final line is haunting: "There is no one to stretch out my tent again Or to set up my curtains." The skills of building have been lost. The men who knew how to pitch the tent and secure the ropes are gone. This speaks of a complete societal breakdown. It is not just that the house has fallen down, but no one is left who even knows how to read the blueprints. This is what happens when a nation is given over to judgment. It is not a temporary setback; it is a generational desolation. The corporate memory, the cultural capital, the ability to rebuild, is wiped out.
The Root of the Rot (v. 21)
Verse 21 is the diagnostic center of the passage. It tells us precisely why the tent has been destroyed and why the sons are gone. The problem is not ultimately with the Babylonians. The problem is with the shepherds.
"For the shepherds have become senseless And have not sought Yahweh; Therefore they have not prospered, And all their flock is scattered." (Jeremiah 10:21)
The "shepherds" are the leaders of the people, the kings, the priests, and the prophets. And God's charge against them is twofold. First, they have become "senseless." The Hebrew word means brutish, stupid, like an animal acting on instinct alone. It does not mean they lacked intelligence or education. It means they lacked the fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of all wisdom. They were practical atheists. Their policies and pronouncements were unmoored from the transcendent law of God. They were clever, perhaps, but not wise. They were strategic, but not righteous. They were, in a word, senseless.
And why were they senseless? The second charge tells us: they "have not sought Yahweh." They did not inquire of the Lord. They did not consult His Word. They did not pray for wisdom. They leaned on their own understanding, on political alliances with Egypt, on the strength of their walls, on the rituals of the Temple. They sought everything and everyone except the one true God. And when the leadership of a nation stops seeking the Lord, it is only a matter of time before the entire nation becomes senseless.
The result is stated with cold, covenantal logic: "Therefore they have not prospered, and all their flock is scattered." The "therefore" is crucial. This is cause and effect. The scattering of the people is the direct, predictable, and promised consequence of the leaders' apostasy. Prosperity is not finally about economics; it is about covenantal faithfulness. When the shepherds are fools, the sheep are scattered. When the pulpits and the parliaments are filled with men who do not seek the Lord, the families and businesses and communities will inevitably be torn apart. The fish rots from the head down.
The Roar from the North (v. 22)
The consequence, which has been looming, now becomes an audible reality. The invoice is arriving.
"The sound of a report! Behold, it comes, A great quaking out of the land of the north, To make the cities of Judah A desolation, a haunt of jackals." (Jeremiah 10:22)
The judgment is no longer a distant prophecy. It is a news report. A sound, a rumor, is on the wind. An army is on the march. The "great quaking" describes the rumble of an approaching military force, the tramp of boots and the clatter of chariots. The "land of the north" was the typical invasion route for armies like Assyria and Babylon.
And their purpose is not to negotiate a treaty. Their purpose is total destruction. God is sending them "to make the cities of Judah a desolation, a haunt of jackals." A haunt of jackals is what is left when a city is completely depopulated and left to ruin. It is a place for wild, unclean animals. This is a picture of de-creation. God had brought order, beauty, and fruitfulness to His land. Now, because of their sin, He is handing it back over to the tohu wa-bohu, to a state of chaos and emptiness.
This is the necessary end of a society whose shepherds have become senseless. When men refuse to be governed by God, they will eventually be ruled by tyrants. And when God's own people make themselves a haunt of spiritual jackals through their idolatry, God will make their cities a haunt of literal jackals through His judgment.
The Only Sensible Shepherd
This is a grim picture, and it was the reality for Judah. It is, in many ways, becoming the reality for us. We see our own tent being destroyed, our ropes torn out. We see a generation of sons being lost to folly. And we need not look far to find senseless shepherds who do not seek the Lord. So what is our hope?
Our hope is that God, in His mercy, promised to deal with this problem of senseless shepherds once and for all. Through another prophet, He said, "I will give you shepherds according to My heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding" (Jer. 3:15). And ultimately, God sent His own Son, who declared, "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep" (John 10:11).
Jesus Christ is the only truly sensible shepherd because He alone perfectly sought the will of His Father. He is the ultimate anti-type to the brutish leaders of Judah. And because He sought the Lord, He prospered, even through the cross. He prospered by being raised from the dead, and He is now gathering His flock not scattering it from every tribe, tongue, and nation.
On the cross, Jesus became the ultimate desolation. He bore the curse. He was cast out of the city, into the darkness, so that we, the scattered flock, could be gathered in. He took our desperate sickness upon Himself so that we could be healed. He allowed His own body, the true temple, to be destroyed, so that our ruined tents could be pitched again, eternally, in the household of God.
The call to us, then, is to renounce our senseless shepherds, the talking heads and godless politicians who do not seek the Lord. We are to turn from our own brutish folly and turn to the Good Shepherd. We must hear His voice and follow Him. For though our nation may well become a haunt of jackals for a time, His kingdom is a city that cannot be shaken, and His flock will never be scattered again.