Jeremiah 46:13-17. The prophecy of Jeremiah regarding "the coming of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon to smite the land of Egypt." The Lord says Jeremiah is to declare in Egypt and its outermost cities that the people should stand prepared, "for the sword shall devour round about you." He is to ask the Egyptians why their gods have fled and failed to protect them? Because the true God has thrust them down. The Jews in Egypt will look around and realize that they would be better off returning home to Israel. Pharaoh shall be called "Noisy one who lets the hour go by."

See how God protects his people, even when they are apart from him?! Here God is calling his people home from Egypt, back to the Promised Land. God knows that because they have become so comfortable in Egypt, they will not leave until things get bad, so Jeremiah is telling them things are about to get bad. An invading force from Babylon will descend, and Egypt will fall to it. Nebuchadrezzar will "smite the land of Egypt." But Jeremiah tells the Jews "the sword shall devour round about you." So this destruction and death will be will not touch them, but will be necessary for them to say "Arise, and let us go back to our own people and the land of our birth, because of the sword of the oppressor."

This reminds me of how God protected the Jews in Egypt during the plagues. They didn't realize that they were being protected, and they needed not to know that, but they certainly were. The Jews in Egypt then needed to experience the anxiety, misery, and pain going on all around them in order to be prompted to leave the "safety" of slavery in Egypt for an unknown future. By Jeremiah's time, the Jews who were again living in Egypt knew the promise, and that the Promised Land was their true home, they just need to return to it. As do we all.