15 Again, God's Message: "Listen to this! Laments coming out of Ramah, wild and bitter weeping. It's Rachel weeping for her children, Rachel refusing all solace. Her children are gone, gone - long gone into exile." 16 But God says, "Stop your incessant weeping, hold back your tears. Collect wages from your grief work." God's Decree. "They'll be coming back home! 17 There's hope for your children." God's Decree.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Jeremiah 31:15-17
Commentary on Jeremiah 31:10-17
(Read Jeremiah 31:10-17)
He that scattered Israel, knows where to find them. It is comfortable to observe the goodness of the Lord in the gifts of providence. But our souls are never valuable as gardens, unless watered with the dews of God's Spirit and grace. A precious promise follows, which will not have full accomplishment except in the heavenly Zion. Let them be satisfied of God's loving-kindness, and they will be satisfied with it, and desire no more to make them happy. Rachel is represented as rising from her grave, and refusing to be comforted, supposing her offspring rooted out. The murder of the children at Bethlehem, by Herod, Matthew 2:16-18, in some degree fulfilled this prediction, but could not be its full meaning. If we have hope in the end, concerning an eternal inheritance, for ourselves and those belonging to us, all temporal afflictions may be borne, and will be for our good.