In Jeremiah, chapter twenty-five, verse one, “the word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah, that was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon.” This year was important because Nebuchadnezzar’s reign marked the beginning of four successive kingdoms that were to have world dominion.
Nebuchadnezzar, the powerful king of the Neo-Babylonian empire, took certain hostages from Jerusalem to Babylon during his reign, beginning a seventy-year captivity of Judah that was prophesied during that time. He was able to invade, creating destruction and captivity, on three different occasions. During the first invasion, Nebuchadnezzar conquered Jehoiachin, the temple treasures and royal personnel were taken, including the servant of God Daniel, his three Hebrew friends, and the king, bound in chains, taken to Babylon.
Jerusalem was invaded again by Nebuchadnezzar. This time, King Jehoiachin and the rest of the temple treasures, and ten thousand men with Prophet Ezekiel were carried away to Babylon. The Babylonians invaded a final time, capturing Zedekiah, destroying the city and its temple, and deporting some of the poorest people to Babylon.
Nebuchadnezzar’s impact on God’s people was necessary because of their apostasy following Manasseh, who carried them captive. God gave them over to an apostasy king since the people of God were rebelling. Nebuchadnezzar was a king who was able to captivate; a person who held others in captivity.
Today, many followers of God attempt to follow His ways but fall into temptation and abandon the straight and narrow way for the wrong reasons. Sometimes God will allow a person, a king like Nebuchadnezzar, to beset or captivate a situation to inform the godly person that this is not the way to go. Still, the situation is left to the follower.