CHAPTER 45 Aug. 24 
God Will Spare Baruch's Life
The message that Jeremiah the prophet spoke to Baruch the son of Neriah, when he wrote these words in a book at the mouth of Jeremiah, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, saying, 2Thus says Yahweh the God of Israel, to you, Baruch: 3You said, Woe is me now! For Yahweh has added sorrow to my pain; I am weary with my groaning and I find no rest. 4You shall tell him, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, that which I have built will I break down, and that which I have planted I will pluck up; and this will be so in the whole land. 5Do you seek great things for yourself? Don’t seek them; for, behold, I will bring evil on all flesh, says Yahweh; but your life will I give to you for a prey in all places where you go.

Commentary

45:5 The command not to see great material things for himself was given to Baruch in the context of the fact that the entire nation of Judah was about to be taken over and destroyed by Babylon. Likewise James 5:3 comments upon the absurdity of heaping up treasures in the last days. If Jesus is about to return and establish His Kingdom here, then amassing wealth in this present order of things which is so soon to be destroyed is bizarre. To live as if the day of Christ’s return is upon us appears to have been an expectation of the early Christians. It is not to say that we actually know that day shall be hear imminently; rather are we to live as if it will be.