17-19. (a) Why did Jeremiah make a long trip to the Euphrates? (b) How could Jeremiah’s obedience have been under test? (c) What was accomplished by Jeremiah’s actions involving the belt?

¹⁷ Jeremiah’s assignment involved obedience to God’s direction. If you had been Jeremiah, would you have accepted any such instructions given? At one point, Jehovah told Jeremiah to get a linen belt and wear it. Next, God commanded him to travel to the Euphrates. Consult a map, and you will see that this meant a trip of some 300 miles (500 km). Once there, Jeremiah was to hide the belt in the cleft of a crag and then travel all the way back to Jerusalem. And God later had him return to get the belt. (Read Jeremiah 13:1-9.) In all, Jeremiah would have traveled about 1,200 miles (1,900 km). Bible critics just cannot believe that he would travel so far, walking for months.b (Ezra 7:9) Still, that is what God said and what Jeremiah did.

¹⁸ Picture the prophet trekking through the Judean mountains and then, depending on his route, into a desert toward the Euphrates. All of that just to hide a linen belt! His long absence must have aroused the curiosity of his neighbors. When he returned, he did not have the linen belt with him. Then God told him to make the long trip again, to retrieve the belt, now rotten and “not fit for anything.” Imagine how easy it would have been to think: ‘Now that is just too much. I see no point to it.’ Yet, having been molded by God, he did not react that way. Rather than complain, he did as he was instructed!

¹⁹ It was only after the second journey that God explained matters. Jeremiah’s actions set the stage for him to deliver a potent message: “This bad people who are refusing to obey my words, who are walking in the stubbornness of their heart and who keep walking after other gods in order to serve them and to bow down to them, will also become just like this belt that is fit for nothing.” (Jer. 13:10) What an impressive way for Jehovah to teach his people! Jeremiah’s heartfelt obedience to Jehovah in what may have seemed trivial played a role in His efforts to reach the hearts of the people.​—Jer. 13:11.