JEREMIAH COMPELLED TO PREACH

7 You deceivedt me, Lord, and I was deceived.

You seized me and prevailed.

I am a laughingstock all the time;u

everyone ridicules me.

8 For whenever I speak, I cry out,

I proclaim, “Violence and destruction!”v

so the word of the Lord has become my

constant disgrace and derision.

9 I say, “I won’t mention him

or speak any longer in his name.”w

But his message becomes a fire burning in my heart,x

shut up in my bones.

I become tired of holding it in,y

and I cannot prevail.

10 For I have heard the gossip of many people,

“Terror is on every side!z

Report him; let’s report him!”

Everyone I trustedB watches for my fall.aa

“Perhaps he will be deceived

so that we might prevail against him

and take our vengeance on him.”

11 But the Lord is with me like a violent warrior.ab

Therefore, my persecutors will stumble and not prevail.

Since they have not succeeded, they will be utterly shamed,

an everlasting humiliation that will never be forgotten.ac

12 Lord of Armies, testing the righteous

and seeing the heartC and mind,

let me see your vengeance on them,

for I have presented my case to you.ad

13 Sing to the Lord!

Praise the Lord,

for he rescues the life of the needy

from evil people.

JEREMIAH’S LAMENT

14 May the day I was born

be cursed.a

May the day my mother bore me

never be blessed.

15 May the man be cursed

who brought the news to my father, saying,

“A male child is born to you,”

bringing him great joy.

16 Let that man be like the cities

the Lord demolished without compassion.b

Let him hear an outcry in the morningc

and a war cry at noontime

17 because he didn’t kill me in the wombd

so that my mother might have been my grave,

her womb eternally pregnant.

18 Why did I come out of the womb

to see only struggle and sorrow,e

to end my life in shame?