Why will he make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth and utterly destroy them from the land?

The Lord describes how he is going to deal with those who remained in Judah. He will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a reproach, a byword, a taunt, and a curse in all the places where I will drive them. This draws on the covenant language of curse, especially Deuteronomy 28:15ff.

The word horror comes from the Hebrew word raah, which means evil. This is probably meant to pick up on the way the bad figs are described earlier in the passage.¹ The fact that Judah will become a horror, a reproach, a byword, a taunt, speaks of Judah becoming an example and tale of how a people should not behave.² This is the complete opposite of what they should have been. When the Lord made his covenant with them at Mount Sinai, he said that they were to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (Exodus 19:6). By living in obedience to the covenant, Israel was supposed to draw the nations to the Lord by showing what it means to experience his blessing by living in covenant faithfulness. Through stubborn disobedience the nation has failed to be what the Lord saved them to be. Instead, they have become an example of what it means to be cursed by the Lord.

Those who remained in the land under the rule of Zedekiah believed that they had escaped judgment and were favoured by the Lord. The Lord makes it clear however that judgment is still coming to them. Using the three words that have been used before in Jeremiah, sword, famine, and pestilence, the Lord says that war is still coming to Judah and this time they shall be utterly destroyed from the land that I gave to them and their fathers. Nebuchadnezzar would come in 587 BC to complete what he had started in 597 BC.

 Despite experiencing the Lord’s judgment, the good figs are offered the hope of restoration in Jeremiah 24:4–7. There is no such hope offered to the bad figs in Jeremiah 24:8–10. However, the Lord had spoken of unrelenting judgment against Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 22:18–23; Jeremiah 25:1–14), which came with the invasion in 597 BC. Unrelenting judgement would come also to Zedekiah and those who remained in the land in 587 BC. All would be driven from the land, but some would also end up in Babylon and even they would experience the promise of restoration spoken of in Jeremiah 24:4–7. Despite judgment being inevitable, it is not sin and judgment that would have the final say in the fate of the Lord’s covenant people, but his word of mercy.³. This is only possible because of the Lord’s sovereign grace that will give a sinful and rebellious people a new heart that will turn to him in wholehearted repentance. The paradox is that the Lord carries out his purposes for his people and the world, not through those who remain in the land, but through those who appear to be rejected and lost in Babylon.⁴