Jeremiah 21-22

“Whoever stays in this city will die ... but whoever goes out and surrenders to the Babylonians ... will live” (21:9-10). God had turned His face away from Jerusalem because His people had rejected the covenant: “Do no wrong or violence to the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood” (22:3). Instead, they made the poor “work for nothing” (22:13) and obsessed about building bigger, better palaces (22:15-16).

“I am setting before you the way of life and the way of death” (21:8). The Israelites’ only hope was to surrender their land and trust the Lord. Jesus calls us to surrender our pursuit of the world’s best and instead find life in Him (Mark 8:35).