It’s a shocking scene: the king of Judah listening to Jehudi reading the Book of Jeremiah, then pausing after every few columns to slice off portions of the text and toss them into the fire. It’s hard to imagine a clearer rejection of the Word of God, or a more obvious desire to keep anyone else from hearing it.

But the king’s behavior turned out to be futile. For verse 28 makes plain that after the first scroll was destroyed, a second one quickly replaced it: in fact, it was even more complete than the one the king had burned up (36:32). Yes, we can still read the words of Jeremiah today, words which the Lord spoke to him. There is simply no way for any human ruler or government, no matter how powerful, to stamp out the Word of God.

And what did that Word say about the king who wanted so badly to destroy it? That Jehoiakim would die, and that none of his descendants would sit on David’s throne in Jerusalem (36:30). And sure enough, his son Jehoiachin was carried off into exile in Babylon only three months after his father died, along with all the treasures of the Temple, as well as thousands of other captives (II Kings 24:12-16). It didn’t matter how firmly Jehoiakim rejected God’s Word: everything still happened just as Jeremiah said it would.

And the same truth continues to apply to us today. Oh, we can reject all or part of God’s Word. We can choose to believe that this world is all that matters. We can deny what the Bible teaches about our responsibility to love our enemies and to give our hearts completely to Jesus. We can believe that Christ isn’t coming again to judge the living and the dead, to set all things right and make all things new. But rejecting the truth doesn’t make it any less real.

So, will we pay attention to the Word of God that prophets like Jeremiah have written down for us? Will we turn from our sin and turn to Christ as our Savior and Lord (36:7)? Or will we go on denying the truth until it’s too late?

Jeremiah 36:20-32 (NASB)

20 So they went to the king in the court, but they had deposited the scroll in the chamber of Elishama the scribe, and they reported all the words to the king.
21 Then the king sent Jehudi to get the scroll, and he took it out of the chamber of Elishama the scribe. And Jehudi read it to the king as well as to all the officials who stood beside the king.
22 Now the king was sitting in the winter house in the ninth month, with a fire burning in the brazier before him.
23 And it came about, when Jehudi had read three or four columns, the king cut it with a scribe’s knife and threw it into the fire that was in the brazier, until all the scroll was consumed in the fire that was in the brazier.
24 Yet the king and all his servants who heard all these words were not afraid, nor did they rend their garments.
25 Even though Elnathan and Delaiah and Gemariah entreated the king not to burn the scroll, he would not listen to them.
26 And the king commanded Jerahmeel the king’s son, Seraiah the son of Azriel, and Shelemiah the son of Abdeel to seize Baruch the scribe and Jeremiah the prophet, but the LORD hid them.
27 Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah after the king had burned the scroll and the words which Baruch had written at the dictation of Jeremiah, saying,
28 “Take again another scroll and write on it all the former words that were on the first scroll which Jehoiakim the king of Judah burned.
29 “And concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah you shall say, ‘Thus says the LORD, “You have burned this scroll, saying, ‘Why have you written on it that the king of Babylon shall certainly come and destroy this land, and shall make man and beast to cease from it?'”
30 ‘Therefore thus says the LORD concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah, “He shall have no one to sit on the throne of David, and his dead body shall be cast out to the heat of the day and the frost of the night.
31 “I shall also punish him and his descendants and his servants for their iniquity, and I shall bring on them and the inhabitants of Jerusalem and the men of Judah all the calamity that I have declared to them– but they did not listen.”‘”
32 Then Jeremiah took another scroll and gave it to Baruch the son of Neraiah, the scribe, and he wrote on it at the dictation of Jeremiah all the words of the book which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire; and many similar words were added to them.