The Rot at the Top
Introduction: When the Watchmen are Wolves
We live in an age of celebrity pastors, of religious influencers, of men who have mastered the art of the algorithm but have forgotten the fear of the Lord. They offer a therapeutic deism, a customized spirituality that promises a crown without a cross and a resurrection without a death. They are smooth, they are polished, they are popular, and they are poisonous. They are the direct spiritual descendants of the men Jeremiah confronts in our text today.
The prophet Jeremiah is not dealing with a problem of lay apostasy that has crept into the pews. He is dealing with a far more virulent disease, a rot that has begun at the very head. The spiritual leadership of Judah, the prophets and the priests, have become the primary source of the nation's corruption. When the watchmen on the wall are not just sleeping at their post but are actively opening the gates to the enemy, the city is doomed. When the shepherds are in league with the wolves, the sheep will be devoured.
This is not, therefore, some dusty historical account of a spat between ancient religious functionaries. This is a perennial warning from the living God. God holds His ordained spokesmen to a terrifyingly high standard, and when they betray that trust, His judgment is severe and specific. What God says here about the prophets of Jerusalem is what He says about every preacher who loves the praise of men more than the truth of God, who would rather soothe a sinner's conscience than save his soul.
Jeremiah’s words are a divine diagnosis. The nation is sick unto death, and the sickness is flowing downstream directly from the pulpit and the altar. The land is polluted because the prophets are polluted. We must attend to this with gravity, because the same principle holds today. A nation's spiritual health can be measured by the faithfulness of its pulpits. When the pulpits are strong, the people are strong. When the pulpits are compromised, the people are compromised. And when the pulpits are actively evil, the nation becomes Sodom.
The Text
As for the prophets: My heart is broken within me; All my bones tremble; I have become like a drunken man, Even like a man overcome with wine, Because of Yahweh And because of His holy words. For the land is full of adulterers; For the land mourns because of the curse. The pastures of the wilderness have dried up. Their course also is evil, And their might is not right. “For both prophet and priest are polluted; Even in My house I have found their evil,” declares Yahweh. “Therefore their way will be like slippery paths to them; They will be driven away into the thick darkness and fall down in it; For I will bring their evil upon them, The year of their punishment,” declares Yahweh. “Moreover, among the prophets of Samaria I saw an offensive thing: They prophesied by Baal and led My people Israel astray. Also among the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen an appalling thing: The committing of adultery and walking in lying; And they strengthen the hands of evildoers, So that no one has turned back from his evil. All of them have become to Me like Sodom, And her inhabitants like Gomorrah. Therefore thus says Yahweh of hosts concerning the prophets, ‘Behold, I am going to feed them wormwood And make them drink poisoned water, For from the prophets of Jerusalem Pollution has gone forth into all the land.’ ”
(Jeremiah 23:9-15 LSB)
A True Prophet’s Trembling (v. 9)
We begin with Jeremiah's personal, visceral reaction to the message he has to deliver.
"As for the prophets: My heart is broken within me; All my bones tremble; I have become like a drunken man, Even like a man overcome with wine, Because of Yahweh And because of His holy words." (Jeremiah 23:9)
This is the mark of a true prophet. He does not handle the Word of God as a mere professional. He is not a detached orator. The words of God get inside him and wreck him. His heart is not just saddened; it is broken. His bones, his very frame, tremble. He is like a man intoxicated, staggered and overwhelmed, not by fermented drink, but by the sheer holiness and power of Yahweh and His words. To truly see God is to be undone. To truly carry His message of judgment is to be crushed by its weight.
Contrast this with the false prophets. They are cool, collected, and confident. They are at ease in Zion. Why? Because they are not speaking God's words; they are speaking their own. They are trafficking in lies they've manufactured in the boardrooms of their own deceitful hearts. Their words are light because they have no substance. Jeremiah is shattered because he is handling holy dynamite. The false prophets are playing with plastic grenades. A man who can preach on the holiness of God and the reality of hell without a tremor in his soul is a man who has never truly met the God he claims to represent.
The Fruit of Prophetic Malpractice (v. 10)
Jeremiah now connects the state of the leadership to the state of the land. The relationship is causal.
"For the land is full of adulterers; For the land mourns because of the curse. The pastures of the wilderness have dried up. Their course also is evil, And their might is not right." (Jeremiah 23:10)
Theology is never abstract. Bad theology always produces bad morals. Because the prophets are spiritual adulterers, the land is filled with literal adulterers. The people are simply living out the implications of what they are being taught. The prophets have told them that God is a tame God, a manageable God, a God who winks at sin. And so the people sin with abandon. This adultery is twofold: it is breaking the seventh commandment, but it is also breaking the first. It is unfaithfulness to spouse and unfaithfulness to God.
And notice the consequence: "the land mourns because of the curse." Creation itself groans under the weight of our sin (Romans 8:22). The drought is not a random meteorological event; it is a covenantal lawsuit. The sky becomes brass and the earth iron because the hearts of the people have become stone. Their "course," their way of life, is evil, and their "might," their power and influence, is "not right." They are strong, but for all the wrong things. They are energetic in their pursuit of wickedness.
Pollution in the Sanctuary (v. 11-12)
God now speaks directly, identifying the source of the infection and promising a specific judgment.
"For both prophet and priest are polluted; Even in My house I have found their evil,” declares Yahweh. “Therefore their way will be like slippery paths to them; They will be driven away into the thick darkness and fall down in it; For I will bring their evil upon them, The year of their punishment,” declares Yahweh." (Jeremiah 23:11-12)
The corruption is systemic. It has captured both the prophetic office (the charismatic leaders) and the priestly office (the institutional leaders). They are "polluted," profane, godless. And the location of their wickedness is the ultimate affront: "Even in My house." They are not just sinning out in the streets; they are dragging their filth into the temple. This is the equivalent of pastors using the sanctuary to conduct their illicit affairs or using the church's finances to fund their greed. It is wickedness performed under the banner of worship, which is an abomination to God.
Therefore, the judgment fits the crime. They have chosen a dark path, so God will make it a dark and slippery path. They will not just wander off; they will be "driven away" into it. Their fall will not be an unfortunate accident; it will be a divine appointment. The "year of their punishment" is on God's calendar. There is a deadline for repentance, and Judah's is about to expire. God's patience, though vast, is not infinite.
From Bad to Appalling (v. 13-15)
God now draws a comparison between the apostasy of the northern kingdom and the even greater apostasy of Jerusalem.
"Moreover, among the prophets of Samaria I saw an offensive thing: They prophesied by Baal and led My people Israel astray. Also among the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen an appalling thing: The committing of adultery and walking in lying; And they strengthen the hands of evildoers, So that no one has turned back from his evil. All of them have become to Me like Sodom, And her inhabitants like Gomorrah." (Jeremiah 23:13-14)
The prophets of Samaria were bad enough. Their sin was "an offensive thing." They were open pagans, prophesying in the name of Baal. It was a straightforward, honest apostasy. But what God sees in Jerusalem is worse. It is an "appalling thing," a true horror. Why? Because it is a more insidious, hypocritical evil. These prophets still use the name of Yahweh. They maintain the outward forms of the true religion, but their lives are filled with "adultery and walking in lying."
Notice the pairing. Sexual sin and theological deception are twin brothers. A man who will lie about the nature of God will have no problem lying to his wife. And here is the damning charge, the very heart of their crime: "they strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one has turned back from his evil." Their preaching has the net effect of preventing repentance. They are spiritual anesthesiologists, numbing the consciences of sinners. They preach a gospel of "peace, peace" when there is no peace. They make sinners comfortable on their way to hell. And in doing so, God says the covenant city has become Sodom, and its people like Gomorrah, ripe for fiery judgment.
Because of this, the sentence is pronounced:
"Therefore thus says Yahweh of hosts concerning the prophets, ‘Behold, I am going to feed them wormwood And make them drink poisoned water, For from the prophets of Jerusalem Pollution has gone forth into all the land.’" (Jeremiah 23:15)
The punishment is a bitter cup. Wormwood is extreme bitterness, and poisoned water brings death. They served the people a sweet-tasting poison of lies, and now God will make them drink the bitter poison of His wrath. The principle is clear: the pollution flows from the top down. The spiritual state of a nation is a direct reflection of the spiritual state of its pulpits. The land is polluted because the prophets of Jerusalem have become a fountain of pollution.
The True Prophet and the Bitter Cup
This passage is a terrifying indictment, and it should make every man who stands behind a pulpit tremble. But it is not a word without hope. Jeremiah, with his broken heart and trembling bones, is a faint shadow of a greater Prophet to come.
Jesus Christ is the True Prophet, the very Word of God made flesh. He looked upon Jerusalem and He wept. His heart was broken not only for the sins of the people but for the sins of their corrupt shepherds, the Pharisees and scribes who laid heavy burdens on men but would not lift a finger to help them. They were the blind guides, the whitewashed tombs, the direct heirs of Jeremiah's false prophets.
And what did Jesus do? He did what no other prophet could. He took the cup of wormwood and poisoned water, the very cup of God's wrath that these false prophets deserved, and on the cross, He drank it down to the dregs. He absorbed the full measure of the curse that was due to us for our adultery, our lies, and our rebellion.
The solution to false prophecy is not to despise all prophecy. The solution is to cling to the True Prophet and His infallible Word. We must test everything we hear from any pulpit against the holy words of Scripture. We must demand that our shepherds be men who, like Jeremiah, tremble before this Word. And we must flee from any teacher who strengthens our hands in our sin, who tells us we can be at peace with God while remaining at war with His commands.
The call of this text is a call to repent, starting in the house of God. It is a call for pastors to repent of their fear of man and their love of worldly approval. And it is a call for the people to repent of their itching ears, their desire for teachers who will scratch them. Let us pray that God would purify His church, and let us run to the only Prophet who can lead us out of Sodom and into the heavenly city, not by soothing us in our sin, but by saving us from it.