If you have your Bibles and turn with me to Jeremiah chapter 49. Jeremiah is giving prophecies dealing with nations that have been enemies of Israel. And the amazing thing is you look at the map up here, this is a modern map of the Middle East.
The nations that we’re going to be looking at this evening, I don’t know if we’ll get through them all, but first we’re going to look at Damascus, which is Syria. Then we’ll be looking at Arabia, and then we’ll be looking at Elam. Now, as you look at this map, last week we looked at down here at Edom, which would be down in the southern portion of Jordan.
The prior two weeks we looked at Moab and Amman, which would be here in the center portion of what is today Jordan. Syria would be located here, and Damascus is located right about where that line starts pointing towards the El of Lebanon. And Damascus is 40 miles from the Golan Heights Israeli border with Syria.
So it’s not very far from Israel. And then we see also that it refers to Arabia, which is in the references given in the text this evening, are going to refer to some of the sons of Abraham through Keturah. His second wife after Sarah had died, he took Keturah and he had boys by her.
These sons, before Abraham died, he sent these sons to the east, which would be over here in the Arabian Peninsula. And that’s where their descendants live today. And many of the Arab tribes that come from Arabia are descendants of those boys that were by the sons of Abraham and Keturah. And also Ishmael went over in that same area. And so Abraham sent all his sons over there. And if you want to study a little bit about that, you can go to Genesis chapter 15.
Genesis chapter 15, it talks about the sons of Abraham by Keturah. And prior to that, before it talks about Isaac way back in Genesis chapter 12 or 13, it talks about Ishmael being born and Ishmael was by Hagar. And these boys, Abraham all gave them all an inheritance, but he sent them away because the son of promise was Isaac and Isaac was born of Sarah and Abraham.
Isaac became the father of, as we said last time, Esau and Jacob. And Esau was given the land, as we said, in the southern part of Jordan. Eventually they moved over when they were driven away by the Nabateans, which were also descendants of Abraham, some of his other sons.
The Nabateans defeated them in Petra and drove them and they settled over in southern Judah, which would be the Sinai or the Negev desert. The Negev desert would be right here in the southern part of Israel. And that’s where the descendants of Esau settled.
But we see that all of these around here and here were descendants of Abraham. The ones in Syria were not descendants of Abraham. And the Syrians were always a thorn in the side, especially the Syrians were a thorn in the side of the northern tribes of Israel.
Remember when we were studying the kings, especially the kings of the north, Benadad, the king of Syria, located in Damascus, was attacking Israel during the time of Elisha, the prophet. And then Hazor took over from Benadad. He assassinated him after Elisha said, well, you will be made king.
Well, he took it upon himself to assassinate Benadad and he became king then. And then tonight we’re going to see the people here in Iraq. They’re referred to as those of Elam.
And in the last portion of chapter 49. So all of these nations that are surrounding Israel have been the enemies of Israel forever. And today they’re still the enemies.
You have Egypt. You have the countries that would consist of Amman and Moab in Jordan. You have Syria.
You have Iraq. You have the other sons of Abraham that take care of the Saudi Arabian Peninsula. And then also the Iranians up here, which aren’t referred to in this particular passage.
Judgment
- Jeremiah as a prophet during Judah’s last days.
- Nations mentioned: Damascus, Kedar, Hazor, and Elam.
As you look at the events in the Middle East, when they say that things have always been the same, in many ways they are. The things that are happening today in the Middle East go back thousands of years. All the way back to the time of Abraham.
And that’s when many of these conflicts begin. But let’s take a look at what Jeremiah’s prophecies were concerning these people. So let’s begin at verse 23 this evening.
And it begins to talk about Damascus. It says, concerning Damascus.
Judgment on Damascus
-
Fear and turmoil in the cities of Syria.
-
The fall of a powerful stronghold.
-
Lesson: No nation is too strong for God’s hand.
23 Concerning Damascus.
Hamath is confounded, and Arpad:
for they have heard evil tidings:
they are fainthearted; there is sorrow on the sea;
it cannot be quiet.
Now these two cities, one of them, Damascus, as I said, was just north of the Syrian, rather northeast of the Syrian-Israeli border. And the first city, the city of Hamath, is about 111 miles north here. And it’s over towards the sea. And the other city isn’t quite as far away. But they’re both outside of Damascus a bit. But the tidings of what is happening in Damascus is reaching them.
24 Damascus is waxed feeble, and turneth herself to flee,
and fear hath seized on her:
anguish and sorrows have taken her, as a woman in travail.25 How is the city of praise not left, the city of my joy!
26 Therefore her young men shall fall in her streets, and all the men of war shall be cut off in that day, saith the Lord of hosts.
27 And I will kindle a fire in the wall of Damascus,
and it shall consume the palaces of Ben-hadad.
Now, what’s interesting is this is a judgment that Jeremiah gave. There’s also a judgment that deals with the fact that Damascus is going to be completely destroyed. And oftentimes, people wonder, how would that happen? Damascus is currently the oldest and longest running or continuous city in the world. There are cities that were older than Damascus, but those have been destroyed and never been rebuilt.
But Damascus, even though it’s been at war and has been partially destroyed, has always been rebuilt. And today, Damascus is there. It’s in the same place it’s always been.
The Druze are kind of people that have a religion where they’ve combined various things. They say that they’re Muslims, but they’re really not Muslims in the sense of the rest of the Muslims.
And they’re really descendants of, a lot of people feel their religion goes back to Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses in that period of time, and that they have combined the God of the Bible with Islam, and it’s kind of a convoluted religion, but a lot of people don’t know a lot about it because they do not proselytize, and they don’t tell anybody outside of their community what they really believe. But they are rejected by the current leader of Syria, and their villages, especially the ones that are close to Damascus, have been being attacked, and many of the people have been being destroyed or killed, and Israel has come to their defense. Now, there are Druze communities in Israel, and in Lebanon, and in Syria, and the Druze, some of the Druze special forces, because the Druze are in the Israeli army, the Druze from Israel, and Israel has sent some of the Druze special forces in to defend the Druze that are by Damascus, and plus they have also sent some of their own other Israeli forces and armaments in there to defend them.
That’s going on there. At the same time, this current regime in Syria, up in the northern portion of Syria, in this area right here, where Turkey, Iraq, and Syria meet, that’s where the Kurds live, and the Kurds used to be the Medes. You know, if you look at historically, a lot of the Bible comes to life if you just understand the people that are currently there.
Now, the Kurds and the Medes, or the Medes at the time of the scriptures being written, they currently live up in here. They’re currently being attacked by Turkey, they’re being attacked by Iranian forces from Iraq, and they’re also being attacked by the current leader of Syria. And the Bible is talking about here the destruction of Damascus, and Jeremiah is bringing about the destruction of Damascus.
Well, it hasn’t happened completely yet, but the Bible says it’s going to. One of the things that is referred to as a sign of the last days, now that we’re getting closer to it, will be when Damascus is destroyed, and it’s going to be a complete destruction this time, because it says that no one will inhabit Damascus again. So how would that happen? Well, there’s a number of ways that it could happen.
We had Iran that continually wants to get nuclear weapons, Israel has nuclear weapons, and if a city is going to be totally destroyed so it cannot be inhabited again, that would be one way currently in the present world that that could happen. But the Bible is specific that it will happen. I don’t know if you’ve been watching the news, but because of what the current leader, and Damascus is the capital of Syria, by the way, and the current leader of Syria with all of what he has done to try and really it’s genocide that he’s doing, Israel gets accused of genocide, but the current leader of Syria is committing genocide against the Alawites, against Christians, against the Druze, and also he’s coming against the Kurds.
Israel is defending it, and they have gone in, and they have bombed some of the outer regions of Damascus and actually have bombed fairly far into the city over the last, I suppose, last couple months at various times. So in all, with the current things that are happening in the Middle East, Damascus being completely destroyed is a real possibility. And one of the things that I was thinking about too is, and this isn’t scripture, but you look at the ability of Iran and some of these other countries to fire their rockets.
They don’t seem to have very good coordinates on their rockets, so they land in places they’re not supposed to, and you very well could have a rocket that’s fired by Iran, or a rocket that’s fired down here from Yemen, which is down here, and that’s where the Alawites are, towards Israel, and end up hitting Damascus. And if you had those people that got a nuclear warhead that put on a rocket, it could devastate the city. But the Bible specifically speaks, and Jeremiah says, God’s going to judge Damascus.
There’s going to be great fear there. The people will flee as it’s judged. The next one he talks about judgment coming against is found in verse 28, and this is against what is referred to as Arabia.
Today we would call it Saudi Arabia. This is the Arabian Peninsula, and as I mentioned, this is where Abraham sent his other sons by Keturah, as well as Ishmael. Now, Abraham gave them a blessing, and he gave them flocks and some riches and sent them off, but the majority of his inheritance was given to Isaac, because Isaac was the son of promise given by the Lord, and Isaac was born of Sarah and Abraham, and was that son.
The other sons to Keturah were born after Sarah died, and Ishmael, we know, was born after Abraham and Sarah. They didn’t believe that God was going to give them a son, and so they took it in their own hands, and that has created problems during the time of Ishmael being alive, and is still creating some problems today, where the other sons of Abraham have not always been friendly towards Israel, which is the descendants of Isaac and Jacob.
Judgment on Kedar and Hazor
- Description of nomadic tribes and their confidence in isolation.
- Prophecy of destruction and desolation.
- Lesson: False security cannot protect against God’s judgment.
28 Concerning Kedar, and concerning the kingdoms of Hazor, which Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon shall smite, thus saith the Lord;
Arise ye, go up to Kedar,
and spoil the men of the east.
Now, Nebuchadnezzar, during his reign, did in fact come from Babylon and came down in here into this area and attacked those tribes down there. And so we see that this happened during his time.
29 Their tents and their flocks shall they take away:
they shall take to themselves their curtains,
and all their vessels, and their camels;
and they shall cry unto them,
Fear is on every side.
Now I want you to look at the fact that people today say that Israel is the oppressor, and Israel is the one that’s always… I want you to know, there’s always been wars going on all over the Middle East, and Israel, for the most part, has been the one that has been outside of those wars, or the one that has been attacked by the other nations. But Israel has not been the oppressor unless they have been attacked first.
And that’s currently the same thing you find in the Middle East today. And so we see that the other descendants of Abraham that are living in the Saudi Arabian Peninsula were attacked by Nebuchadnezzar at this time, and it says,
30 Flee, get you far off, dwell deep,
O ye inhabitants of Hazor, saith the Lord;
for Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon hath taken counsel against you,31 Arise, get you up unto the wealthy nation,
that dwelleth without care, saith the Lord,
which have neither gates nor bars, which dwell alone.32a And their camels shall be a booty,
and the multitude of their cattle a spoil:
In other words, they’re going to be trading all of their animals for their safety, and there won’t be much left for them after Nebuchadnezzar came down to attack them
32b and I will scatter into all winds them that are in the utmost corners;
and I will bring their calamity from all sides thereof, saith the Lord.
And their camels shall be a booty, and the multitude of their cattle a spoil. In other words, they’re going to be trading all of their animals for their safety, and there won’t be much left for them after Nebuchadnezzar came down to attack them.
I will scatter into all the winds them that are in the utmost corners, and I will bring their calamity from all sides thereof, saith the Lord. And Hazor shall be a dwelling for dragons and desolation forever, and there shall no man abide there, nor any son of man dwell in it. And so, God’s judgment against these nations is going to be real, and it’s going to be complete against some of the portions of the nations.
Here we see Hazor, which is one of the areas in cities of the Sinai Peninsula, or Arabian Peninsula rather, and it would be south in this area here is where that judgment would come. Then he talks about Elam. And Elam, as we said, is currently what today is referred to as Iraq.
The word of the Lord that came to Jeremiah the prophet against Elam in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah, king of Judah, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Behold, I will break the bow of Elam, the chief of their might, and upon Elam will I bring four winds from the four quarters of the heaven, and I will scatter them toward all those winds, and there shall be no nation whither the outcasts of Elam shall not come. For I will cause Elam to be dismayed before their enemies and before them that seek their life, and I will bring evil upon them, even my fierce anger, saith the Lord, and I will send the sword after them till I have consumed them. And I will set my throne in Elam, and I will destroy from thence the king and the princes, saith the Lord.
But it shall come to pass in the latter days that I will bring again the captivity of Elam, saith the Lord.” And as we see here, God in the last days, when He establishes His kingdom in Judah, a lot of what’s going to happen is all of these earlier judgments that have come against the Middle East, many of these people will be restored. We know that in the Scriptures talk about some of the tribes down here as in the last days when Russia, the Bible talks about that Russia, which is up here, is going to join with Turkey, and is going to join with Iran, and is going to join with Sudan, and is going to join with Libya. And all of that confederation of nations is going to attack Israel.
And it’s going to appear that Israel has no hope, and the Lord is going to be the one that delivers them. And the Lord will miraculously deliver them from that attack, and He’ll ultimately destroy those armies. At the time He’s doing this, it talks about these tribes down here, and if you look at what’s happening in our world today, you have what is referred to as the Abraham Accords.
The Abraham Accords are Saudi Arabia, and I forget the other nations right off hand, but there’s some Arab nations that have joined together, and the Abrahamic Accords, they’ve set up in Saudi Arabia a place where they’re going to have a place for Christians, a place for Jews, and a place for Muslims, that are the descendants, supposedly the descendants of the Arabs, descendants of the religions that came from Abraham. And what the Bible says is that when all of these nations, Libya, Sudan, Russia, Turkey, and Iran, attack Israel, and I just want you to look at this. You talk about Israel, they are totally surrounded just by those nations, and plus you also have at this particular time other Muslim nations that have been the proxies of Iran, and have also been joining to fight with Iran.
And when Israel first came into the land in 1948, you had Jordan, Arabia, Syria, and Iraq that attacked Israel all at the same time. And as you see, Israel is only that big. And look at how much land area and how many more people are in those other nations.
But what’s going to happen, the scriptures tell us, when all of these nations attack them, Saudi Arabia and the kingdom down there, which are really, they’re the other descendants of Abraham by his other wives, they will condemn Russia for attacking and putting this coalition together and attacking, but they’re not going to do anything to come to Israel’s defense. They’ll give verbal, say, why are you doing that? You shouldn’t do that. But they won’t stop them from it.
And ultimately, God will have to come to their defense. And that’s the battle that’s referred to in Ezekiel chapter 38. And we see that after that, as they are defeated, things that are happening right now in the world, especially in Europe, are pointing to what is going to be the last battle and the events that will transpire after this battle has occurred.
There’s interesting things that are happening in Europe. Europe has been invaded by Islam and the cultures of the countries are being destroyed by the Islamic invasion. Many of the European countries are currently becoming very frustrated with their leadership because they’re allowing this Islamic invasion to occur.
And one of the things I was talking to, not only T.A. McMahon today, but I was also talking to Warren Smith, and with the recent things that happened in our own country, you’re hearing much about revival occurring in our country, but yet you don’t hear revival around the truth of God’s word because you have Roman Catholicism being promoted, you have the New Apostolic Reformation being promoted, you have Calvinism being promoted, and they’re all crying for revival, but there’s not purity of truth and doctrine and there isn’t a real repentance upon the people within the church. Revival begins within the church and it’s when the church becomes, it sees their need to repent and turn to the Lord and confess their sins and get back to his word. And right now you see this revival and it’s being really promoted a lot around Catholicism.
At the same time, in Europe, you’re seeing a strong movement to bring really the nations back to what they once were and to stop the Islamic influence and the current pope is also very strong in promoting, bringing everybody together just like the previous two popes or three popes have done. And I believe that you’re seeing the beginning of the setting for the one world government which is going to be centered, the scriptures talk about the resurrection of the Roman Empire that we see in Daniel as we’ve been studying Daniel. And as that happens, everything in the world seems to be pointing towards that direction.
And at the center of all of it is Israel. And you stop and think about this little itty-bitty spot here and then you look at Europe, you look at Asia, you look at the Middle East, the rest of the Muslim countries around there and then you’ve got this little itty-bitty spot right there that is Israel. That’s the attention of everything.
And what’s happening right now in Israel, Israel is becoming very close to destroying Hamas. I just was reading an article by a gentleman and he was talking about the fact that if Hamas had attacked the United States the same way that they attacked Israel, if we had a little country the size of Hamas, which is, I mean, the size of the Gaza Strip, which was by the United States and they came in and did what they did to Israel on October 7th and they did that to us, he said we probably would have blown them off the map right away. But Israel has not.
Israel has been systematically warning the people, moving the people, attacking and destroying Hamas and if any other country was doing what Hamas is doing, that is using schools and hospitals and apartment buildings to house their soldiers and to shoot rockets from, they’d be being condemned by everybody in the world. But they’re not being and Israel is the one that’s being condemned.
Q1: What is Jeremiah 49:23–39 about?
Jeremiah 49:23–39 records God’s judgment on four nations—Damascus, Kedar, Hazor, and Elam. The passage reveals God’s sovereignty over nations and His power to humble even the strongest.
Q2: Why does God judge Damascus in Jeremiah 49?
Damascus was a powerful city known for trade and influence. God judged it for pride, idolatry, and opposition to His people. The prophecy shows that no city or nation is beyond His reach.
Q3: Who were Kedar and Hazor in the Bible?
Kedar and Hazor were nomadic Arab tribes. They lived in remote areas and trusted their isolation for safety. Jeremiah 49 warns that false security cannot protect against God’s judgment.
Q4: What is the prophecy about Elam in Jeremiah 49:34–39?
God declares He will scatter Elam across the nations and break its strength. Yet in verse 39, He promises to restore Elam “in the latter days,” pointing to both judgment and hope.
Q5: How does Jeremiah 49 apply to us today?
This passage teaches that God is still sovereign over nations. Modern powers that rely on wealth, military strength, or self-reliance should take warning. For believers, it is a call to trust God’s justice and mercy.
Jeremiah 8:1-3 – Jeremiah 9:1,3,4,15,17-22
Prophet Jeremiah – Kings of Judah, Commissioned to Proclaim the Truth, Part 6
Prophet Jeremiah – Kings of Judah, Commissioned to Proclaim the Truth, Part 7
Prophet Jeremiah – Kings of Judah, Commissioned to Proclaim the Truth, Part 8