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So Jeremiah chapter 24 is quite a short chapter if you compare it to the other chapters that are in the book of Jeremiah. Nonetheless it's one of the more challenging ones if you've been paying attention. God gives Jeremiah a vision there but look at verse number three Jeremiah chapter 24 verse number three it reads then said the Lord unto me what sayest thou Jeremiah and I said figs the good figs very good and the evil very evil. The title for the sermon this morning is good figs or evil figs good figs or evil figs. Now these figs basically represent the people of God and as we're going through this I want you to decide which one you want to be. Are you going to be the good fig or you're going to be the evil fig? Now you might say well you know I'm going to church I'm going soul winning I read my bible surely I'm a good fig. You know I try to live a righteous life and a holy life surely I'm one of these good figs but as we're going through them and I'm glad if that's you if that's what you think I'm glad for that you know but when we look at this chapter the good figs actually represents or basically the differentiation between the good figs and the evil figs basically have to do with how the people responded with the Babylonian takeover with the Babylonian captivity. Okay so you know I'm glad you know if you're a soul winner in church or in your bible serving the Lord I'm glad for that brethren you are very fruitful then for the Lord if you're doing such things but the context of the figs here is a slightly different take it's how you respond to external forces that are causing you or removing your rights removing your privilege privileges all right in the land and I think again this is very relevant to the time we're in okay as we've been going through Jeremiah I think we've seen a lot of parallels with Australia I think we've seen a lot of parallels with God's judgment we've seen a lot of parallels with your rights and your freedoms being removed during this time and I expect as time goes on further removal of our rights and privileges will be taken away you know and so we pay attention to this and I want you to conclude to say hey I want to be one of these good figs and as I said it is one of the it's a very challenging chapter okay because your natural response my natural response in the time of Jeremiah would be to be an evil fig okay let's look at verse number one Jeremiah chapter 24 verse number one the Lord showed me and behold two baskets of figs were set before the temple of the Lord so I want you to notice this I don't know if this is a vision okay that God has given him a supernatural vision or Jeremiah is passing by the temple of the Lord and he sees these baskets of figs being put there you know and the Lord's you know pointing him to this all right but I want you to notice where these figs where these baskets of figs are located where are they located they're set before the temple of the Lord this is important okay to understand what has been referenced here so the temple of the Lord is the house of the Lord okay so if we want to take this for us in 2021 then we ought to be thinking about Blessed Hope Baptist Church because our church is the house of the Lord you know your local church is the house of the Lord and so these two baskets of figs represents God's people the good figs the evil figs they represent those that are set in the house of the Lord now notice this it says after that Nebuchadreza now remember Nebuchadreza is the same that is the same person as Nebuchadnezzar all right Nebuchadreza king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim son of Judah and the princes of Judah with the carpenters and smiths from Jerusalem and had brought them to Babylon so this chapter begins by giving us the the time frame of this judgment this captivity that's come now a new name that's been introduced to us here is Jeconiah Jeconiah but this is not the first time we hear of king Jeconiah in in in uh in Jeremiah in Jeremiah chapter two you you may remember that we came across the name Konyah remember king Konyah well well Jeconiah Jec we just has je in front of it Jeconiah is Konyah okay but another name that we're you know as we're going through Jeremiah chapter 22 i was explaining to you how these kings had multiple names okay and the name that we're most common uh or most associated with this king is that is the name Jehoiakim okay remember you might recall Jehoiakim who was the father and Jehoiakim is the son well Jehoiakim also has two other names in Jeremiah Konyah and Jeconiah it's the same guy okay just so you understand that the time frame of this and so what we're looking at here is is Jeconiah okay or Jehoiakim already been taken into captivity and not just him it says the princes of Judah carpenters smiths so people that have you know have skills okay so Babylon hey we need carpenters we need smiths get those kinds of people to come into our land from Jerusalem right and brought them to Babylon so when we look at the captivity of of Judah in the days of Babylon there were two two main exiles that took place okay the first main exile took place here with Jeconiah or Jehoiakim all right and that's the first one that came into you know people were being taken into the the lands and the countries of Babylon and then we have a second one which is in the time of Jeconiah sorry Zedekiah so Zedekiah was the last king of Judah and Zedekiah he rebels against king Nebuchadnezzar never the king Nebuchadnezzar comes in they take basically all the people into captivity or or they're killed in the battle and that's basically the end of Judah okay so there are the kind of two major exiles that took place so the time frame of this chapter is when the first exile took place okay so certain people are already being taken into Babylon now I want you to remember this because we as these people we are losing our freedoms you know we are losing our rights you know especially in this covered world now I don't know whether we're going to retain some of the things that you know our nation the people of this world have given up you know I don't know whether they'll ever come back you know but one thing I want you to just understand you know first of all I'm not saying that things are as bad as the time of Babylon I mean if you're losing your house if you're losing your family if people you know around you are dying okay at the hands of the government or external powers that may be then yeah maybe we can draw a closer parallel to the time of Jeremiah but what I want us to do is take the principles take the lessons that we see here and apply in our situation because for a lot of us you know the covered world for a lot of us anyway is is probably the one of the biggest events that we're going to have in our life you know there are other generations that have gone through world wars right world war ii world war one those are major times and you know there was obviously much greater deaths during that time much greater changes to the world during those events we've not gone through anything like this basically for my generation this would be one of the biggest things that we've seen in our lifetime and so I don't want to leave you without direction you know I don't want to leave you with with being unstable or not showing not sure how we respond or react as Christians because again there's nothing new under the sun okay whatever situation we're in you're going to find a story in the bible and God will teach us how we ought to respond to that situation we see here people are being taken into captivity now they're losing their rights they're losing their freedoms well we've seen that and what we also see here because there were two major exiles you know we may see you know uh things develop over the years where we lose more and more of what we've become used to you know we lose more and more of the normality that we're used to I'm not saying it's definitely going to happen but I'm just saying if it does happen I want you as a Christian to come back to the book of Jeremiah and remind yourself of the things that you've learned okay now why is this important you might say well pastor Kevin come on this is the time of Judah this was thousands of years ago right how can we apply that to Australia today don't forget in Jeremiah chapter one verse five I'll just read it to you uh Jeremiah says before I for sorry God says before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee and before thou came us forth out of the womb I sanctified thee and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations remember that that's in chapter one so as soon as we start the book of Jeremiah we read you okay this is about Judah this is about Babylon you understand but don't forget Jeremiah is a been ordained by God to be a prophet unto the nations plural that means the gentile nations that means Australia all right so we read this don't don't just think oh this is history okay no these are real life events these are real people this is real history this stuff really happened and God has recorded it for us in the bible so we can learn thereby okay so let's never have that idea well this is just about the past no you need to apply this to the now just a reminder there in verse number one two baskets of figs all right before the temple of the Lord the house of the Lord this represents God's people okay we both both baskets represents God's people verse number two verse number two it says one basket had very good figs even like the figs that are first ripe and the other basket had very naughty figs which could not be eaten they were so bad actually there was one more thing that I wanted to mention in verse number one before we look at verse number two don't forget these people that have been exiled okay they're losing their access to the temple of God they're losing their access to the house of God okay and again think about what happened in 2020 you know for was it was six weeks we lost access roughly or six six to eight weeks can't remember right now we lost access to the house of the Lord okay we lost that privilege for a period of time I want you to just be you know thinking about these things in terms of what we're seeing here there's a reason why these figs are before the temple of the Lord okay now in one basket there are very good figs ripe figs okay it's my mom's favorite fruit okay I think fig is actually classified as a flower okay but it's one of her favorites and you can see when they're ripe they're sweet they're juicy they're delicious and not only are they very sweet but they're light on the stomach if you if you've eaten figs you could eat several figs in one hit okay and so there's one basket that represents those delicious figs they can be eaten they're sweet okay it represents the fruitfulness of the fig but then there's another basket of figs which has very naughty figs now you when you think of naughty figs you might think of you know ill-disciplined but naughty if you just consider the word remove the y for a moment what do you get if you remove the y from naughty naught zero okay that's what it means here naughty means zero zero value zero nutrition they cannot be eaten it's a waste okay there's no value in these figs which cannot be eaten because they're so bad all right let's keep going verse number three as I said these figs don't represent your Christian life right now it represents your response to the Babylonian captivity all right now obviously if these figs have become so bad they've become what's the word sorry they've gone they've gone bad so that they used to be ripe they used to be figs that could be eaten they used to be figs that had value but they've been over ripened they've gone bad they've gone off okay and they cannot be eaten all right remember that verse number three then said the lord unto me what seest thou jeremiah and i said figs the good figs very good and the evil very evil that cannot be eaten they are so evil so we learn another thing about these naughty or bad figs jeremiah says that these figs are evil figs now again evil doesn't necessarily mean wicked all right i mean figs in of themselves are not wicked even if they've gone bad okay evil in the bible often has to do the word being harm harmful okay so jeremiah says look these figs are harmful they're evil if you eat of them it's going to make you sick it's going to harm your body okay so that's what jeremiah sees verse number four again the word of the lord came unto me saying thus saith the lord the god of israel like these good figs so will i acknowledge them look at this that are carried away captive of judah so what do the good figs represent the people that are being carried away into captivity you know we want to be the good figs god may allow you to be taken away into captivity god may allow you to lose your liberties your freedoms that you so desire god says well those people are the good figs okay now like i said i said i told you this chapter is challenging do you want to lose your liberties do you want to lose your freedoms do you want to be taken into captivity in some foreign nation where you don't know the language you know and basically you're just used you're just to be used for the purpose of other people no one wants that like no one wants to lose your freedoms and no one wants that right and this is why it's challenging because god says those people represent the good figs those people represent the sweet figs those people represent a fig that can be eaten that can be used that is useful to work for god okay so this is what i want you to be challenged with we live in an environment where you can actually apply this okay today before you get too nervous about what i'm going to preach you know we will stick to the biblical passages here we'll definitely take the context directly from the story at hand okay let's keep going uh it says there so we'll acknowledge them that are carried away captive of judah whom i have sent out of this place into the land of the caldeons look at this for their good for their good god says those people that have been taken away into captivity into a foreign land to the land of the caldeons i'm doing it for their good brethren when you're going through this time this covered land this covered world okay you're losing your liberties and you see your liberties being lost you see your access to church being uh restricted you know what i want you to stop and say you know what i want to be one of these good figs god how are you going to use this for my good that's what you should be asking yourself okay how are you going to be using this lord i've seen jeremiah you use this for good i want it to be for my good keep your finger there and please turn to ezekiel ezekiel chapter one ezekiel chapter one nobody wants to be taken into captivity nobody wants to lose their freedoms but it can be for our good brethren it could be okay ezekiel chapter one for me please in verse number one because maybe in your minds you think well surely the people that were extremely wicked they were taken into captivity surely people that hated god and yet you know what israel the ojuda here was made up of saved and unsaved people we've seen this already as we go through jeremiah but you know even safe people are being taken into captivity you know even great men of god great people of god are being taken into captivity they're losing all their freedoms okay ezekiel chapter one verse number one and it came to pass in the 30th year in the fourth month in the fifth day of the month as i this is ezekiel was among the captives by the river of kebar that the heavens were open and i saw visions of god in the fifth day of the month which was the fifth year of king captivity so it's that first exile that's taking place here the word of the lord came expressly unto ezekiel the priest the son of buzai in the land of the kaldians by the river kebar in the hand of the lord was there sorry and the hand of the lord was there upon him so who got taken into captivity as jeremiah is putting these things the priest ezekiel now you may have thought the house of god was full of evil wicked people no there were still godly people there ezekiel was a priest that's trying to serve the lord even amongst the corruption that's taking place in the temple of the lord and the lord allows him to be taken into captivity okay but what we saw it was for his it was for his good hey he receives visions of god about to the hand of the lord is upon ezekiel and ezekiel writes a great portion of the bible god used him in a great way can you please turn to esther chapter two turn to esther chapter two esther give you a moment to turn there i think these are important to look at if you can turn there to esther chapter two esther chapter two and verse number five you guys are probably familiar with the story of esther esther chapter two and verse number five now in shushan the palace there was a certain jew whose name was mordecai and basically if you know the book of esther mordecai is the hero or esther as well okay but mordecai plays a great role in delivering the jews from certain death okay so there's this jew named mordecai the son of jaya the son of shimaya the son of kish are benjaminites look at this first number six who had been carried away from jerusalem with the captivity which had been carried away with jeconiah so you can see jeconiah is mentioned there jehoi kin was mentioned in ezekiel same king but jeconiah king of judah whom nebbknezzar the king of babylon had carried away so another great man of god was taken into captivity this guy is not you know a priest he's a benjaminite he's just a good believer he's just a good man of faith he's just a a good person all right that god would use in a powerful way and guess what else what his fate was to be carried away into captivity as well say oh god how could you allow these people to be taken it was for their good god had a purpose for these people you know having all their rights and the freedom stripped away god still had a purpose god's hand was still on these people can you please turn to daniel chapter 1 daniel chapter 1 these people are of course more common to us more familiar to us daniel chapter 1 please daniel chapter 1 and verse number 1 daniel chapter 1 verse number 1 we know that daniel is one of the main of course it's his book one of the main characters and boy it's hard to find a more faithful person than daniel in the bible you know but daniel chapter 1 verse number 1 reads in the third third year of the reign of jehoiakim king of juda came Nebuchadnezzar king of babylon unto jerusalem and besieged it and the lord gave jehoiakim king of juda into his hand with part of the vessels of the house of god so not only was this captivity being taken place but the things that make up the house of god are being taken away as well which he carried into the land of shina to the house of his god and he brought the vessels into the treasure house of his god and the king spake unto ashpenaz the master of his eunuchs that he should bring certain of the children of israel and of the king's seed and of the princes children in whom was no blemish but well favored and skillful in all wisdom and cunning in knowledge and understanding science and such as had ability in them to stand in the king's palace and whom they might teach the learning and the tongue of the caldians and the king appointed them a daily provision of the king's meat and of the wine which he drank so nourishing them three years and at the end thereof they might stand before the king now look at verse number six now among these were the children of juda daniel we know daniel hadoniah michel and azariah so you got three other names there hadoniah michel and azariah if you don't know who they are verse number seven says unto whom the prince of the eunuchs gave names for he gave unto daniel the name of belchezah and to hadoniah of shadrach and of michel of mishak and of azariah of abed-nigo so you might be familiar more of those names those are the three that were cast into the furnace of fire for not bowing down and worshiping the idol that Nebuchadnezzar had set up so we have four great men daniel and his three friends guess what they were also taken into captivity okay during this time so so far we've seen daniel his three friends ezekiel mordecai what are we seeing we're seeing great people of god that god has allowed to be taken into captivity to lose their freedoms to lose their rights to lose their access to the house of god and god says it was for their good i'm doing it for their good how do we apply that today we are losing our freedoms brethren okay we are losing our rights we have lost our access to the house of god but i want to pause and say you know what god this was for our good this is for our good i want you to take the lessons of jeremiah and say lord the way i'm going to respond in this crazy world that we live in is to respond the same way great people of god respond in the days of jeremiah in the days of the babylonian captivity in the days of the babylonian takeover i'm going to respond in the same way god because i want to be one of these good figs i want to be nutritious in value i want to be able to be used of you god and i want to do something good in me i don't know what may happen i don't know what the future may hold and again i don't say this to to cause fear or alarm what i want from this brethren is to just prepare yourself we may see a secondary loss of rights of privileges we may see a complete takeover of everything we know that we used to the normality that we're used to how are you going to respond are you going to be one of the good figs are you going to be one of the evil figs you know think about this apply this to your situation you know god's word is timeless god's word is a spiritual book it's applicable today just as much it is applicable in the days of jeremiah back to jeremiah please back to jeremiah chapter 24 and verse number six jeremiah chapter 24 and verse number six god says for i will set mine eyes upon them for good but notice the next words and i will bring them again to this land and i will build them and not pull them down and i will plant them and not pluck them up again what is the purpose of them being taken into captivity that god will do good upon them his eyes are upon them for good brethren you're losing if we lose more and more of our rights our privileges if we lose our access to church i'm not talking about this building you know i'm trying to fix up this building as best as we can because i want to be a comfortable place when we come and worship the lord i'm not talking about this building i'm talking about church the people of god being gathered together we may lose our privileges our rights to to meet the way we want to meet brethren it may happen but i want to remind yourself what does god say here in verse number six for i will set mine eyes upon them god's eyes are going to be upon us for good god can take a situation even like that and make it for good okay for good purposes the bible tells us very familiar passage to all of you romans 828 and we know that all things all things work together for good to them that love god to them who are called according to his purpose please keep your finger there in jeremiah and turn to first peter chapter five first peter chapter five first peter chapter five and then when you when you've turned to first peter chapter five come back to jeremiah 24 go to first peter chapter five and then go back to jeremiah 24 and verse number six let's read it again for i will set mine eyes upon them for good and i will bring them again to this land so god does promise that those are the good figs that he's going to bring them back into the land okay we know that there was a 70 year captivity that took place in babylon before they started to come back and started to rebuild the city rebuild the temple all these kinds of things but god continues saying i will build them you say pastor kevin are you upset that in 2020 we had to shut down our church for six weeks or whatever it was i'm not i don't have a heavy conscience i have a perfectly clear conscience for doing that you know pastor kevin are you concerned that you know you've asked us to wear the mask when it was being mandated across all of sydney i have a clear conscience completely clear conscience you know why because god says that his eyes are upon us and it's going to be for our good there are lessons to be learned during these days during these times okay if that means we have to give up some of our liberties we give them up i want to be a good fig i want you to be a good fig but it's your choice it's your call okay god says i will build them and not pull them down and i will plant them and not pluck them up what is god saying you're going to be stronger you're going to be planted you're going to be further rooted in god's word in your christian faith if you put up with these challenges if you put up with these difficulties if you put up with captivity god's going to make you a stronger person a good fig a fig that can be eaten that can be useful for god that is sweet to the taste of god okay look at uh go back there to first peter chapter five and verse number 10 first peter chapter five and verse number 10 it says but the god of all grace who have called us unto his eternal glory by christ jesus look at this after that you have suffered a while make you perfect establish strengthen settle you you want to be perfect complete you want to be established you want to be strengthened you want to be settled you know what you're going to have to go through a bit of suffering a bit of hardships okay maybe captivity maybe the loss of everything you have the loss of everything you own that could happen okay but i want you to respond not woe is me i want you to respond god your eyes are upon me and you're going to use this for my good you're going to strengthen me you're going to establish me and lord i'm unsettled right now you're going to settle me is what we saw in first peter chapter five back to jeremiah 24 please verse number seven jeremiah 24 and verse number seven that's not the only thing god's going to do if you want to be one of these good figs verse number seven and i will give them and heart to know me that i am the lord and they shall be my people and i will be their god for they shall return unto me with their whole hearts what a great promise you know what i don't know what powers are right now what the weaker powers that are in this world removing our rights removing our privileges taking advantage of this covered situation to further their agendas we know that ultimately it's going to lead to the antichrist and his kingdom okay things that come again put yourself in this position all right you know what i'm going to go through some hardships and some challenges lose some privileges but you know what god's going to give me a heart to know him how much how well do you know god how well do you know god well god's saying i'm going to give you a heart to know me further you know one of my great desires in my life is just to know god and the more i know god the happy i am you know the more pleased i am the more i know god you know and they shall be my people and i will be their god for they shall return unto me look at this with their whole hearts you know what this tells me as we're losing our rights now the things that the normalities that we're used to you know it may very well be that we're not seeking god with our whole hearts maybe you have a great heart for the lord but maybe it's it's 80 on the lord and 20 on this world maybe it's 90 on the lord but 10 on this world maybe your heart is still in this this world you know i've preached previously that just just seeing the corruption of this world is causing me to just loosen any kind of attachments that i have to this world okay and then i look at this and i go well god you've got your purpose behind that because you want us to be people that return unto you with our whole hearts that we love you 100 with our hearts that we don't love a portion of this world and and uh you know that we give up on this world and say lord you can have it all it's my money my possessions my homes the everything that i have is what it's useless when it comes to you and your kingdom and your heaven your home your mansion the streets of god salvation knowing that i can be with you for all eternity whatever i have in this world lord is worthless compared to the great promises that you've given me and lord you know it may very well be that god allows us to go for these difficulties that we can just come to god with a whole heart that we can serve him and know him better than we've ever known him before can you please turn to psalm 119 keep your finger there in jeremiah 24 please go to psalm 119 you guys probably know psalm 119 as the longest psalm there is and while you're turning i'm going to read to you from second corinthian 6 16 second corinthian 6 16 which says in what agreement have the temple of god with vitals then it says these words pay attention for ye are the temple of the living god as god have said i will dwell in them and walk in them and i will be their god and they shall be my people brethren if you're saved today god says about you that he will dwell in you and that he will be your god and you will be his people that's exactly what god said about those that have been taken into captivity in jeremiah 24 verse 7 it said and they shall be my people and i will be their god so when we see these parallels they're speaking about us who does god want us to be he wants us to be the people that have been taken into captivity okay he wants us to be those good figs he wants us to be the people that say well lord i'm losing everything i'm not really liking this but i know your eyes are upon me and i know you're going to do good unto me i know you mean well for me lord i know you're going to strengthen me but we saw that god is calling us to be people that return unto him with a whole heart and when i think about this term the whole heart psalm 119 talks about this topic the most so let's look at verse number two psalm 119 and verse number two it reads blessed are they that keep his testimonies and that seek him with the whole heart so brethren when we seek the lord god says do it with your whole heart look at verse number 10 with my whole heart have i sought thee oh let me not wander from thy commandments what else do we notice when we come to the lord with a whole heart we're going to have a desire to not wander from his commandments a desire to live a more holy blameless life look at verse number 58 drop down to verse number 58 same psalm verse number 58 it says i entreated thy favor with my whole heart be merciful unto me according to thy word so when we come to the lord and entreat of him ask of him we ought to be doing it with our whole heart drop them to verse number 69 it says the proud have forged a lie against me but i will keep thy precepts with my whole heart so a desire to keep the the laws of god the priests of god ought to be coming from a place of a whole heart sometimes we can do what god wants us to do it but we don't do it with our whole heart we do it because we know we need to do it we just do it but our hearts not in it you know god wants our whole heart to be in service for him drop down to verse number 145 verse number 145 same psalm 145 the bible reads i cried with my whole heart hear me oh lord i will keep thy statutes so when we cry before the lord when we go to him for help we ought to cry with our whole heart you know this just gives us an idea this psalm gives an idea how the lord wants us to respond with a whole heart to follow his ways to keep his commandments to love doing it to come before me in prayer with our whole heart you know what when we go through a time of difficulties and loss of freedoms and whatever maybe loss of our access to church god's going to build this in us he's going to cause us to to come before him with a whole heart maybe sometimes we take church for granted maybe we took our liberties our blessings for granted and when we lose them it brings us back to the knowledge of god and say god we need this back and when they get returned back unto us we come back with that whole heart you know appreciating what god has given us back to jeremiah 24 now we saw that in jeremiah's time that were to be brought back they'll return with a whole heart but i wanted to keep something in mind as well it was 70 years all right many of the people especially the adults okay that went into captivity would not come back they would not return to the land all right so is god saying these things in vain not because we know the children and the grandchildren we know the next generations came back and returned unto the lord with a whole heart okay now that's an important point to make because your decision of right of choosing to be a good fig or an evil fig has lasting consequences to your descendants to your children to your grandchildren all right your decisions are going to have an effect you know i want my kids you know if we lose our rights and our access whatever you know and and i suffer for that and i suffer with that for the rest of my life well i know that if i desire to be this good fig that my children are going to benefit from it that my grandchildren going to benefit from it that we're going to be able to continue this lineage of a people that love the lord and one day they're going to be able to come and be able to return them to the lord with a whole heart they're going to be strengthened by the lord they're going to be used by god they're going to be sweet to the taste of god but what we'll soon see that if you choose to be one of these evil figs all right one of these figs that are bad one of these figs that are not naughty that you may lose your descendants you may lose your children your children will not want to be in the house of the lord your children will not want to continue this lineage you know that god would would have us to have and so really the choice is yours you know your response has lasting effects or consequences on your descendants look at verse number eight and as the evil figs which cannot be eaten they are so evil remember think of the word harmful okay surely thus saith the lord so will i give zedekiah the king of judah and his princes and the residue of jerusalem that remain in this land and them that dwell in the land of egypt i might read verse number nine and i will deliver them to be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth for their hurt these are the evil figs for the good figures for their good for the evil figs is gonna hurt them to be a reproach and a proverb a taunt and a curse in all places whither i shall drive them verse number 10 and i will send the sword and famine and the pestilence among them till they be consumed from off the land that i give unto them and to their fathers these are the evil figs now let's look at verse number eight again okay so when we see so i will give king zedekiah we're talking about the second the second major exile that took place okay after king jehoiachin but notice who are these people who are these evil figs who are these figs that are going to lose their lives okay it says at the end of verse number eight that uh and the residue of jerusalem that remain in this land now if you know the history of the story here okay those that said no you know what i'm gonna i'm gonna fight the king of babylon i'm gonna fight this judgment to come we're gonna stay in jerusalem we're gonna go to war all right those that's they're the people that stay in the land that said no we're not going to take this we're not going to lose our rights we're not going to lose our freedom we're not going to be taken into captivity that's not going to be for us and you can see where they're coming from they mean well they know this is their land they know this is supposed to be an inheritance from god they know that they receive this land because of god's blessings when god led you know the israelites out of egypt right but it's these people that god is calling for evil figs the figs of no value the figs that become harmful to those around them not only them it says here at the end that remain in the land look at this and then that dwell in the land of egypt so then there was another group of people that said you know what things are getting bad here all right things are getting horrible here we need to flee and they flee to egypt right they don't stay in the land to fight they know there's a problem they don't decide well you know jeremy's been saying you know hand yourself to the captors i'm not going to do that either i don't want that rather let's flee to egypt we'll be safe in egypt god says no even them that dwell in the land of egypt there's come in this judgment you're not going to flee you're not going to you know escape this okay these are the people that are the evil figs the bad figs the naughty figs okay you know this reminds me of a story when i was in primary school i don't know how old i was maybe 10 and uh there was a there was a kid in my school uh who had six fingers six fingers in one hand okay so obviously a genetic defect and if i recall correctly it was his little finger and there was like another little finger coming out of the little finger okay and uh you know some of my friends or i don't care if they were really my friends or just people in you know my year basically said oh you know there's this kid with six fingers do you want to go and have a look i was like yeah i mean a child's curiosity yeah yeah yeah i'd like to see that that's unusual that's different right and so we went to the to the kid with their six fingers and and uh you know i i i wasn't trying to tease him or be rude i was just curious you know i think of a child's curiosity that's the response that i had you know i wasn't i wasn't trying to be mean to him i wasn't there to make fun you know in fact i felt sorry for him that he had this sort of unusual defect but anyway so a few of the kids i don't know how many there were maybe seven or eight of us we got together we just you know ask him can you show us your finger whatever they come to the teacher all right guys all of you you know you got detention this was during lunchtime or recess you're in detention it's like what sir like what you know and basically you know he's thinking that we're mocking him and teasing him maybe now as an adult i look back and i think yeah obviously we shouldn't have done that okay you know trying you know but our child doesn't think that way right and so you know we're taking into captivity as it were right a whole bunch of us and he's leading us to some classroom and and you know i'm just on the way to as we're walking amongst this group i'm thinking all right there's a whole bunch of us he probably doesn't even know who i am he's never been my teacher uh and you know and i you know i don't believe in this justice i i don't deserve to be in detention during lunch and uh this isn't right you know i wasn't there to cause any problems it wasn't even my idea to go and see this guy's finger so it's you know so what am i going to do i'm going to escape all right so i'll never forget we ran around the corner of a building teachers walking a whole bunch of kids and i just stay back i'm like yes and i see them keep walking they don't notice that i stayed back it's like yes i got away from the judgment you know i escaped to egypt i'm going to be safe here well never you know later on after lunch when i was in class that same teacher comes into my classroom you know pulls me aside and i can't remember how what i'm going to but basically i got in more trouble than the kids that actually went into you know and just copped it you know i got a bigger uh you know correction i can't remember what he was right now but i learnt a lesson there sometimes it's better even if it's not your fault even if you think it's not justified so just take the punishment that comes you know we've just been there you know just being caught up you know in in the mess if you try to run away there can come a greater judgment we've seen the same thing happen here in jeremiah those that decided let's just get out of here let's just run to egypt that's a good place to be god says no your judgment you know wait i'm going to send the sword the famine the pestilence you're going to be consumed you're going to be destroyed you're not going to have descendants you're not going to have children that are going to be able to return and come back to the lord with a with a whole heart so this is what we learn in this story brethren i want you to be one of the good figs not an evil fig you know as we lose these these freedoms and access to church and you know your heart and you know my heart initially is to fight these things to go you know what this is not fair this is not right let's run and hide or let's just stand up and fight no matter what those thoughts have crossed my mind and i'm sure it's crossed your mind but as i look at the story of jeremiah you know because i kept thinking as a pastor of two churches you know i don't want to make decisions on my emotions or decisions in what i think best okay but i need a story in the bible i need a situation in the bible that i can see parallels with with my current situation and make my decisions from a biblical standpoint whether i like it or not whether it's not about me liking something it's about lord what can you teach us from your word and let me walk in accordance to your word i want things to go well with me lord i want things to be good i want your eyes upon me lord even if i lose my privileges and my rights and my freedoms i still want you to work in me and i want you to do something great in me i want you to settle me i want you to strengthen me i want you to build me and lord i want my descendants i want my children to love you with all their hearts i want my grandchildren to continue loving you with all my heart with all their heart sorry and i look at the story well the people that are in that category are the good things the people in this category the people of god are the ones that said you know what i don't like it i don't like being taken to captivity but it's god's will i'm just going to surrender to the situation i'm going to give in to the capitals as long as god's eyes upon me i'm happy to do this and brethren we are in a situation in 2020 2021 where we can actually apply this okay if you feel unsettled i've got a way to settle you it's to be one of the good figs all right and you may lose a lot we may lose a lot i don't know i'm hoping things return to normal okay i don't know okay but think about this story when you're unsettled when you decide you know what i'm gonna stay here i'm gonna fight no matter what you know this is not fair i'm gonna escape and run away it's not going to end well for you especially it's not going to end well for your children and your children's children all right we see this here in the bible and it's my job to just be a jeremiah it's my job just to preach god's word it's your decision as to which basket of figs you want to be part of the good figs where god can use it where god can strengthen you where god will use your descendants to return and with a whole heart and serve god in a mighty powerful way or you decide to be someone that is a fighter someone that says no i'm not this is not fair you run away or whatever situation may be you know you end up as one of these evil figs and you're going to lose your descendants your descendants are not going to be the people that return back to the lord with a whole heart okay let's pray