Rock Bottom, and how God helped: Jeremiah #13
Reasoning with God from the pit of depression
Hi guys, this story is inspired by Jeremiah chapter 19-21. As always I encourage you to pick up your bibles in the hope that this brings context and depth to your reading. Here we go:
Jeremiah’s lowest moment
There can be moments in life when even the bottom gives way, when what you valued most feels like a burden too heavy to bear, and all you find when you reach out is loneliness.
For Jeremiah, the prophet of fire and tears, this was that moment.
There he way, curled on his bed like a child, his back scarred and his soul crushed. His whispered cry broke the midnight stillness:
“Cursed be the day I was born… Why did I ever come out of the womb? My life has been filled with trouble, sorrow, and shame.”
The same God who had lit a fire in his bones, a word he could not keep in, now said nothing. No answer. And Jeremiah sunk into the weight of dark silence.
The Valley of Topheth - a Few Days Earlier
The sun was just beginning to burn off the morning mist as Jeremiah walked down into the Valley of Ben Hinnom — Topheth. Behind him, a small group of elders followed: religious leaders, city officials. I imagine that some were curious, while others impatient.
In Jeremiah’s hands was a simple clay pot. It was crude — the kind a potter makes when the clay has resisted too many times, spoiling in his hands. Once, it might have been shaped into something beautiful. But now, it was fit for nothing more than latrine water. What was he up to now?
The elders wondered why they’d been brought here. Topheth was not a place for meetings — it was Jerusalem’s garbage dump, a place of smoke, filth, and buried bodies. It was also the site of Judah’s darkest sins: child sacrifices to Molech, an abomination to the Lord God.
Suddenly Jeremiah stopped, turned to face them, and raised the jar. His voice rang out against the valley walls:
“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says:
Just as this jar lies shattered, so I will shatter this nation and this city beyond repair. They will bury the dead here until there’s no room left.”
Then he hurled the pot to the ground.
It exploded on the hard earth, shards scattering like the coming judgment — sharp, irreversible, final.
A Clash at the Temple
While the fragments still lay in the dust, songs of praise rose from the temple mount. Worshippers sang psalms, oblivious to the judgment just pronounced a short walk away.
Jeremiah wasted no time. He strode back to the temple with dust kicking up from his determined steps, interrupting the service. The priest looked up mid-prayer as Jeremiah’s voice thundered through the courtyard:
“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, the God of Israel, says:
I will bring disaster upon this city and its surrounding towns, just as I promised, because you have stubbornly refused to listen to Me!”
The temple grew tense. The words hung in the air like a bad smell as the congregation shifted uncomfortably and murmurs rose, many eyes looked to the priest for reassurance.
A simple nod from the chied Rabbi and Pashhur, — the temple overseer, perhaps not unlike our modern day ‘bouncer’ — lunged forward.
Jeremiah was seized. No trial. No defense.
He was stripped and whipped — his back torn open by leather thongs. And before the blood dried, he was thrust into the stocks at the Benjamin Gate, his body twisted unnaturally, the scaffold designed to make the muscles and joints scream through the day and night.
Magor-Missabib
Most would have stayed silent after such humiliation. But Jeremiah remained true to the fire that welled inside him. It burned stronger than the screaming pain.
He was free from the stock, but more needed to be said. He looked Pashhur straight in the eye. The crowd fell silent.
“The LORD has renamed you,” Jeremiah declared.
“No longer Pashhur, but Magor-Missabib — Terror on Every Side.”
Pashhur, who had promised the people peace, would be remembered as the bringer of terror. Now for the first time, Jeremiah named the invader plainly: Babylon.
Babylon — the rising empire from the land where Abraham (then Abram) once stood before the covenant. How shocking it must have been that Judah, the covenant people, dragged back to a time where no hope was on the horizon, no promise, no homeland.. History was folding in on itself. Perhaps they scoffed, perhaps they laughed at this gloomy Jeremiah, but Gods words were true. I wonder if Magor-Missabib stood back to reflect at all that happened that day, little did he know his name would be recorded in History as a name of terror.
The Prophet’s Lowest Point
Bloody, limping, mocked by boys, who knew no better than to throw rotten fruit at a broken man. Jeremiah shuffled home. His door creaked as he entered, and sound felt like a knife twisting in his joints.
He collapsed onto his bed. No songs. No visions. Just pain.
For the first time, Jeremiah questioned everything. He argued with God. Accused Him of deception. Regretted his calling. He stared into darkness, and in that place:
He found no reply.
God was silent.
(What? No comforting words? No direction? Perhaps it is noteworthy that God chose not to reason with Jeremiah, perhaps the greatest reason cannot work against the gloom of depression. Jeremiah was at the pit of despair, and God; in His infinite wisdom, did not speak. He allowed silence, and I like to think that in the days and months and years that followed, deep cried unto deep, and Jeremiah found strength once more.
Summoned to the King
Time passes. Around 20 years. A new King is on the throne as the Kingdom of Babylon looms on the horizon.
King Zedekiah, in desperation, sends messengers (One whose name is Passhur, could it be the same Passhur from chapter 20?) to the prophet. Now, the same Jeremiah who once lay broken and questioning… is summoned to the palace.
“Inquire of the LORD for us,” the king says, “Perhaps He will perform wonders as in days past…”
Jeremiah rises. He has endured fire, mockery, loneliness, silence. But he is still here. The fire in his bones still burns.
And in Judah’s darkest hour, it is Jeremiah’s voice the nation seeks.
A Prophet to the Nations
Yet Jeremiah once more sees that Judah is too far gone. His advice is not popular, those who surrender will live and be exiled to Babylon.
Perhaps he remembered at that moment that God’s call was not for Judah alone, Jeremiah was called to be a prophet to the nations. (Jer 1:5) His words able to speak through tribes, tongues, cultures and ethnic groups and touch the heartbeat of society, in the hope that it would beat for the God who made them.
For ancient times yes, and I believe for today.
For America. For Russia. For China. For the nations of the middle-east, Africa and Europe. For every tongue and tribe across the globe.
Will we listen to God’s message through Jeremiah? Or will we be like the crude clay that could be fashioned only into a crude vessel, that would be shattered upon the Rock?
Thanks for being with me, See you next week for more on the prophet Jeremiah. If you enjoyed this, please subscribe and share for others to find the riches of God’s words, for us.
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Thank you. The image is from my music video, animated to the song inspired by the book of Jeremiah. Weeping for the nations.