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And even make this city as Tophet - A place of slaughter and destruction.

The potter's vessel, after it is hardened, can never be pieced again when it is broken. And as the bottle was broken, so shall Judah and Jerusalem be broken by the Chaldeans. No human hand can repair it; but if they return to the Lord he will heal. As they filled Tophet with the slain sacrificed to their idols, so will God fill the whole city with the slain that shall fall as sacrifices to his justice. Whatever men may think, God will appear as terrible against sin and sinners as the Scriptures state; nor shall the unbelief of men make his promise or his threatenings of no effect. The obstinacy of sinners in sinful ways, is their own fault; if they are deaf to the word of God, it is because they have stopped their ears. We have need to pray that God, by his grace, would deliver us from hardness of heart, and contempt of his word and commandments.

Although the sentence of doom had been clearly pronounced, its awful import could scarcely be understood by the multitudes who heard. That deeper impressions might be made, the Lord sought to illustrate the meaning of the words spoken. He bade Jeremiah liken the fate of the nation to the draining of a cup filled with the wine of divine wrath. Among the first to drink of this cup of woe was to be “Jerusalem, and the cities of Judah, and the kings thereof.” Others were to partake of the same cup—“Pharaoh king of Egypt, and his servants, and his princes, and all his people,” and many other nations of earth—until God's purpose should have been fulfilled. See Jeremiah 25. PK 431.1

To illustrate further the nature of the swift-coming judgments, the prophet was bidden to “take of the ancients of the people, and of the ancients of the priests; and go forth unto the valley of the son of Hinnom,” and there, after reviewing the apostasy of Judah, he was to dash to pieces “a potter's earthen bottle,” and declare in behalf of Jehovah, whose servant he was, “Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter's vessel, that cannot be made whole again.” PK 431.2

The prophet did as he was commanded. Then, returning to the city, he stood in the court of the temple and declared in the hearing of all the people, “Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will bring upon this city and upon all her towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have hardened their necks, that they might not hear My words.” See Jeremiah 19. PK 431.3

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