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Tuesday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time
Jeremiah 14:17–22
Jeremiah lived in a time when people heard two opposite messages.
Jeremiah warned them:
the sword is coming,
famine is coming,
Jerusalem is in danger.
But other prophets said:
There will be no sword.
There will be no famine.
God will give lasting peace in this place.
So the question was serious.
How could ordinary people know which voice came from God?
The Bible itself does not hide this problem.
Already in the Book of Deuteronomy, the people ask:
“How shall we know the word that the Lord has not spoken?”
One answer was simple:
wait and see.
If the word comes true, it was from God.
If it fails, it was false.
But that answer helps only afterwards.
It does not help much when a decision must be made now.
Jeremiah gives us another criterion.
False prophets usually say what people want to hear.
They give comfort without conversion.
Peace without repentance.
Security without truth.
They heal the wound of God’s people lightly, saying:
“Peace, peace,”
when there is no peace.
True prophets do something harder.
They call people back to the Lord.
They call them back to justice.
They call them back to fidelity.
They do not flatter the powerful.
They do not bless illusions.
They do not say that everything is well when a nation is walking toward disaster.
This was Jeremiah’s burden.
His message sounded unbearable.
He said that Jerusalem would fall.
He said that the temple would not save them.
He said that Babylon would conquer the city.
To many people, this sounded unpatriotic.
It sounded negative.
It sounded almost blasphemous.
But Jeremiah was not against his people.
He was the one who truly loved them.
Because real love does not hide danger.
Real love does not give false peace.
Real love does not whisper comfort while the house is burning.
History eventually proved Jeremiah right.
Jerusalem fell in the year 586 BC.
The prophets who promised peace were exposed as false.
But by then, it was too late.
This is the tragedy.
The problem is not only that false prophets speak.
The problem is also that people often prefer reassuring lies.
We prefer the voice that says:
nothing serious will happen,
God is on our side,
no change is needed.
But the true prophetic voice is rarely the most comfortable one.
It asks:
Where is justice?
Where is repentance?
Where is fidelity to the covenant?
Where is the Lord?
Today, Jeremiah still teaches us how to listen.
Do not trust every voice that speaks of peace.
Do not trust every message that makes conversion unnecessary.
Do not trust every comfort that leaves the wound untouched.
The word of God may wound us first.
But only because it wants to heal us truly.
Biblical Reflections on the Gospel of Matthew
Scripture Attribution
New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition,
copyright © 1989, 1993
the Division of Christian Education of the National Council
of the Churches of
Christ in the United States of America.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Content License
© 2025 Krakus.
Licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0
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