Jerusalem, God’s chosen city, was meant to be a beacon of righteousness to the nations—a living example of how people blessed by God should live. Instead, it became a mirror image of the nations around it, consumed by greed, selfishness, and deceit. The people of God stopped acting like the people of God. They were supposed to love Him and love one another, but instead they oppressed, cheated, and trampled one another in their race for wealth and power. In Jeremiah 6:6, God issues a chilling command to the Babylonians: “Cut down her trees; cast up a siege mound against Jerusalem. This is the city that must be punished; there is nothing but oppression within her.” God’s people had forgotten their calling, so He sent an army to remind them. It sounds harsh, but a parent who loves his children sometimes has to resort to discipline. In this case, God’s “spanking” came with siege engines.
Human nature has not changed much since the days of Jeremiah. When we stop loving God and start loving things, relationships crumble and communities unravel. History shows that oppression and selfishness always follow the same path. God disciplines His people not because He enjoys punishment, but because He loves them enough to correct them. As the author of Hebrews writes, “For the Lord disciplines the one He loves, and chastises every son whom He receives” (Hebrews 12:6). Of course, our culture has a hard time accepting that truth. In 1977, psychologist John Valusek claimed that spanking children promotes violence, calling it “the first half inch on the yardstick of violence.” By that logic, feeding a child would be the first half inch on the yardstick of gluttony! There is a world of difference between loving discipline and destructive violence. To confuse them is to misunderstand love itself. A God who never disciplines would not be loving—He would be negligent.
The same love that moved God to discipline Israel is the love that moved Him to send Jesus. On the cross, divine justice and mercy met perfectly. “The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:6). God’s punishment fell not on His rebellious children but on His obedient Son. Through Jesus, we receive correction without condemnation. Paul wrote, “God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). The city that needed a spanking reminds us that sin has consequences, but the Savior who took our punishment proves that grace always has the final word.