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Testimonies for the Church Volume 4
appeal for them to renounce their sins. After it was written, Jeremiah,
who was a prisoner, sent his scribe to read the roll to all the people
who had assembled “in the Lord’s house upon the fasting day.” Said
the prophet: “It may be they will present their supplication before the
Lord, and will return everyone from his evil way; for great is the anger
and the fury that the Lord hath pronounced against this people.”
The scribe obeyed the prophet, and the roll was read before all
the people of Judah. But this was not all; he was summoned to read
it before the princes. They listened with great interest, and fear was
stamped upon their faces as they questioned Baruch concerning the
mysterious writing. They promised to tell the king all they had heard in
regard to him and his people, but counseled the scribe to hide himself,
as they feared that the king would reject the testimony God had given
through Jeremiah, and seek to slay not only the prophet, but his scribe.
When the king was told by the princes of what Baruch had read,
he immediately ordered the roll brought and read to him. But instead
of heeding its warnings and trembling at the danger that hung over
himself and his people, in a frenzy of rage he flung it into the fire,
notwithstanding certain ones who were high in his confidence had
begged him not to burn it. When the wrath of this wicked monarch
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rose against Jeremiah and his scribe, and he forthwith sent for them
to be taken; but the Lord hid them.” After the king had burned the
sacred roll, the word of God came to Jeremiah, saying: “Take thee
again another roll, and write in it all the former words that were in the
first roll, which Jehoiakim the king of Judah hath burned. And thou
shalt say to Jehoiakim king of Judah, Thus saith the Lord; Thou hast
burned this roll, saying, Why hast thou written therein, saying, The
king of Babylon shall certainly come and destroy this land, and shall
cause to cease from thence man and beast?”
A merciful God had graciously warned the people for their good.
“It may be,” said the compassionate Creator, “that the house of Judah
will hear all the evil which I purpose to do unto them, that they may
return every man from his evil way; that I may forgive their iniquity and
their sin.” God pities the blindness and perversity of man; He sends
light to their darkened understanding in reproofs and threatenings
which are designed to make the most exalted feel their ignorance
and deplore their errors. He would cause the self-complacent to feel