John Calvin Commentary Jeremiah 5:14

"Wherefore thus saith Jehovah, the God of hosts, Because ye speak this word, behold, I will make my words in thy mouth fire, and this people wood, and it shall devour them." — Jeremiah 5:14 (ASV)

God shows here how intolerable to Him was their wantonness in despising the prophets, through whom He wished to be heeded. Though Christ did not refer to this passage when He said,

“He who hears you hears me,
and he who despises you despises me,” (Luke 10:16).

Yet it contains an eternal law, for God’s will from the beginning has been that His servants should be obeyed, as though He Himself had come down from heaven. Hence the Jews dealt no less contemptuously with God in despising His prophets than if they had dared to treat God Himself with contempt. God therefore now shows how much He abhorred that madness through which they nullified all the labors of His servants.

Therefore thus says Jehovah, the God of hosts. Jeremiah made this preface that he might more effectually rouse the Jews; for if he had omitted Thus says Jehovah, and had begun thus, “Because you have announced this word, behold, as fire shall be the word of God,” his doctrine would have been objected to and treated with contempt.

But now, by invoking the name of God, and that not simply, but by adorning it with a lofty attribute and calling Him “the God of hosts,” he makes known His power in order to strike them with fear. He then says, “Thus says Jehovah, the God of hosts, Because you have spoken this word,” etc.

Here he often changes the persons, and it was necessary for him to do so, that there might be more force and point in what he said. He ought to have said in the third person, “Because they have spoken thus, Behold, I will make my words in your mouth,” etc.; but he now addresses the people, and then he turns to his servant Jeremiah.

He therefore says, “You have indeed spoken thus;” that is, “You have scoffingly spoken, as though my prophets had nothing but the empty sound of words;” Behold, he says, I will make my words in your mouth like fire, (he thus addresses the Prophet) and this people shall be wood, and the fire shall devour them.

God compares His own word to fire, not as in other places, nor for the same reason. This comparison has a particular meaning: that the prophetic word would consume the people as fire consumes dry wood or straw.

In other places, the word of God is called fire because it kindles the hearts of men, because it cleanses or burns the impurity within.

But he does not here discuss the benefit or the fruit which the faithful derive from God’s word. Instead, God declares only that the Prophet's doctrine would prove fatal to the people, and for this reason he expressly says, “I make my words in your mouth like fire.”

Had he said, “Behold, my words shall be like fire, and this people shall be stubble,” it would not have been sufficiently expressive.

But as the people had been accustomed to scoff and say, “Ah! What are these prophets, and what are their words? They beat the air only;” since the Jews had been accustomed to speak in this manner, he now replies to them, saying, “I will make my words in your mouth like fire.” This means your tongue alone shall be more than sufficient to destroy the whole people.

Jeremiah teaches here the same thing as Paul, when he said,

“We have vengeance in readiness against all altitude
which rises against the gospel.” (2 Corinthians 10:4–5).

For it has always been an evil, common to all ages, either to neglect or wholly to despise the servants of God.

When Paul saw that the gospel was despised by many, he said that he and other ministers had vengeance in readiness. It was as though he had said, “As many words as we speak shall be so many swords to slay all the ungodly. And though their hardness now makes them reject the judgment of God, their perverseness will not help them at all. Let them then know that there is as much power in my word as if God were openly to put forth his hand from heaven, as if he were to hurl his lightnings.”

This is the same thing Jeremiah means here: Behold, he says, I will make my words in your mouth fire; that is, there will be so much power in your words that the ungodly shall know to their own loss that you are the executioner of my vengeance.

This passage should be carefully observed by us, lest by our ingratitude we provoke God’s wrath against us, so that His word, which is intended as our food, will be turned into a fire for us. For why has God appointed the ministers of His gospel, except to invite us to become partakers of His salvation, and thus gently to restore and refresh our souls? And thus the word of God is to us like water to revive our hearts: it is also a fire, but for our good, a cleansing, and not a consuming fire. But if we obstinately reject this fire, it will surely serve another purpose: to devour us and wholly to consume us.

But he says that this people would be wood: as the ungodly present an iron front to God, they think they can thus keep His vengeance at a distance. The Prophet now scoffs at this madness and says that they would be like wood or straw.