Jeremiah 20:7–18

⁷O Lord, ^tyou have deceived me,

and I was deceived;

^uyou are stronger than I,

and you have prevailed.

^vI have become a laughingstock all the day;

everyone mocks me.

⁸For whenever I speak, I cry out,

I shout, ^w“Violence and destruction!”

For ^xthe word of the Lord has become for me

^ya reproach and ^yderision all day long.

⁹If I say, “I will not mention him,

or speak any more in his name,”

^zthere is in my heart as it were a burning fire

shut up in my bones,

and ^aI am weary with holding it in,

and I cannot.

^10bFor I hear many whispering.

^cTerror is on every side!

“Denounce him! ^dLet us denounce him!”

say all my ^eclose friends,

^fwatching for ^gmy fall.

“Perhaps he will be deceived;

then ^hwe can overcome him

and take our revenge on him.”

¹¹But ⁱthe Lord is with me as a dread warrior;

therefore my persecutors will stumble;

ⁱthey will not overcome me.

^jThey will be greatly shamed,

for they will not succeed.

Their ^keternal dishonor

will never be forgotten.

¹²O Lord of hosts, who tests the righteous,

^lwho sees the heart and the mind,¹

let me see your vengeance upon them,

for to you have I committed my cause.

^13mSing to the Lord;

praise the Lord!

For he has delivered the life of the needy

from the hand of evildoers.

¹⁴ⁿCursed be the day

on which I was born!

The day when my mother bore me,

let it not be blessed!

¹⁵Cursed be the man who brought the news to my father,

“A son is born to you,”

^omaking him very glad.

¹⁶Let that man be like ^pthe cities

that the Lord overthrew without pity;

^qlet him hear a cry in the morning

and an alarm at noon,

^17rbecause he did not kill me in the womb;

so my mother would have been my grave,

and her womb forever great.

^18sWhy did I come out from the womb

^tto see toil and sorrow,

and spend my days in shame?