Jeremiah 32:1-15

Jeremiah buys a field (32:1-15)

At the time of Babylon’s final siege of Jerusalem, just before the city fell, Jeremiah was imprisoned (32:1-2). The king, Zedekiah, considered Jeremiah a traitor because he forecast the defeat of the city and the captivity of the king (3-5).However, Jeremiah also forecast that the land of Judah would not be lost for ever, and that one day the people would repossess it. An opportunity now arose for Jeremiah to give practical demonstration of his faith in this future restoration. A relative of Jeremiah owned a piece of land that was occupied by the enemy armies. In these circumstances he saw no benefit in retaining ownership of the land, so gave Jeremiah the offer to buy it from him (6-8; cf. v. 24-25).Jeremiah, having confidence in God’s promises concerning Judah’s future, bought the land (9). In carrying out the transaction he made sure that everything was done according to the legal requirements and that there were public witnesses (10-12). He then put the title deeds in an earthenware pot for safe-keeping. He had faith to believe that some relative of a later generation would receive the right to inherit the land when the people returned from captivity (13-15).