Jeremiah 16–24

Jeremiah’s Life-Style and Message

16The word of the Lord also came to me, saying, ²“You shall not take a wife, nor shall you have sons or daughters in this place.” ³For thus says the Lord concerning the sons and daughters who are born in this place, and concerning their mothers who bore them and their fathers who begot them in this land: ⁴“They shall die ^agruesome deaths; they shall not be ^blamented nor shall they be ^cburied, but they shall be ^dlike refuse on the face of the earth. They shall be consumed by the sword and by famine, and their ^ecorpses shall be meat for the birds of heaven and for the beasts of the earth.”

⁵For thus says the Lord: ^f“Do not enter the house of mourning, nor go to lament or bemoan them; for I have taken away My peace from this people,” says the Lord, “lovingkindness and mercies. ⁶Both the great and the small shall die in this land. They shall not be buried; ^gneither shall men lament for them, ^hcut themselves, nor ⁱmake themselves bald for them. ⁷Nor shall men break bread in mourning for them, to comfort them for the dead; nor shall men give them the cup of consolation to ^jdrink for their father or their mother. ⁸Also you shall not go into the house of feasting to sit with them, to eat and drink.”

⁹For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: “Behold, ^kI will cause to cease from this place, before your eyes and in your days, the voice of ¹mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.

¹⁰“And it shall be, when you show this people all these words, and they say to you, ^l‘Why has the Lord pronounced all this great disaster against us? Or what is our iniquity? Or what is our sin that we have committed against the Lord our God?’ ¹¹then you shall say to them, ^m‘Because your fathers have forsaken Me,’ says the Lord; ‘they have walked after other gods and have served them and worshiped them, and have forsaken Me and not kept My law. ¹²And you have done ⁿworse than your fathers, for behold, ^oeach one ²follows the dictates of his own evil heart, so that no one listens to Me. ^13pTherefore I will cast you out of this land ^qinto a land that you do not know, neither you nor your fathers; and there you shall serve other gods day and night, where I will not show you favor.’

God Will Restore Israel

¹⁴“Therefore behold, the ^rdays are coming,” says the Lord, “that it shall no more be said, ‘The Lord lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of Egypt,’ ¹⁵but, ‘The Lord lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of the ^snorth and from all the lands where He had driven them.’ For ^tI will bring them back into their land which I gave to their fathers.

¹⁶“Behold, I will send for many ^ufishermen,” says the Lord, “and they shall fish them; and afterward I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill, and out of the holes of the rocks. ¹⁷For My ^veyes are on all their ways; they are not hidden from My face, nor is their iniquity hidden from My eyes. ¹⁸And first I will repay ^wdouble for their iniquity and their sin, because ^xthey have defiled My land; they have filled My inheritance with the carcasses of their detestable and abominable idols.”

¹⁹O Lord, ^ymy strength and my fortress,

^zMy refuge in the day of affliction,

The Gentiles shall come to You

From the ends of the earth and say,

“Surely our fathers have inherited lies,

Worthlessness and ^aunprofitable things.”

²⁰Will a man make gods for himself,

^bWhich are not gods?

²¹“Therefore behold, I will this once cause them to know,

I will cause them to know

My hand and My might;

And they shall know that ^cMy name is the Lord.

Judah’s Sin and Punishment

17“The sin of Judah is ^awritten with a ^bpen of iron;

With the point of a diamond it is ^cengraved

On the tablet of their heart,

And on the horns of your altars,

²While their children remember

Their altars and their ^dwooden ¹images

By the green trees on the high hills.

³O My mountain in the field,

I will give as plunder your wealth, all your treasures,

And your high places of sin within all your borders.

⁴And you, even yourself,

Shall let go of your heritage which I gave you;

And I will cause you to serve your enemies

In ^ethe land which you do not know;

For ^fyou have kindled a fire in My anger which shall burn forever.”

⁵Thus says the Lord:

^g“Cursed is the man who trusts in man

And makes ^hflesh his ²strength,

Whose heart departs from the Lord.

⁶For he shall be ⁱlike a shrub in the desert,

And ^jshall not see when good comes,

But shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness,

^kIn a salt land which is not inhabited.

⁷“Blessed ^lis the man who trusts in the Lord,

And whose hope is the Lord.

⁸For he shall be ^mlike a tree planted by the waters,

Which spreads out its roots by the river,

And will not ³fear when heat comes;

But its leaf will be green,

And will not be anxious in the year of drought,

Nor will cease from yielding fruit.

⁹“The ⁿheart is deceitful above all things,

And ⁴desperately wicked;

Who can know it?

¹⁰I, the Lord, ^osearch the heart,

I test the ⁵mind,

^pEven to give every man according to his ways,

According to the fruit of his doings.

¹¹“As a partridge that ⁶broods but does not hatch,

So is he who gets riches, but not by right;

It ^qwill leave him in the midst of his days,

And at his end he will be ^ra fool.”

¹²A glorious high throne from the beginning

Is the place of our sanctuary.

¹³O Lord, ^sthe hope of Israel,

^tAll who forsake You shall be ashamed.

“Those who depart from Me

Shall be ^uwritten in the earth,

Because they have forsaken the Lord,

The ^vfountain of living waters.”

Jeremiah Prays for Deliverance

¹⁴Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed;

Save me, and I shall be saved,

For ^wYou are my praise.

¹⁵Indeed they say to me,

^x“Where is the word of the Lord?

Let it come now!”

¹⁶As for me, ^yI have not hurried away from being a shepherd who follows You,

Nor have I desired the woeful day;

You know what came out of my lips;

It was right there before You.

¹⁷Do not be a terror to me;

^zYou are my hope in the day of doom.

^18aLet them be ashamed who persecute me,

But ^bdo not let me be put to shame;

Let them be dismayed,

But do not let me be dismayed.

Bring on them the day of doom,

And ^cdestroy ⁷them with double destruction!

Hallow the Sabbath Day

¹⁹Thus the Lord said to me: “Go and stand in the gate of the children of the people, by which the kings of Judah come in and by which they go out, and in all the gates of Jerusalem; ²⁰and say to them, ^d‘Hear the word of the Lord, you kings of Judah, and all Judah, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, who enter by these gates. ²¹Thus says the Lord: ^e“Take heed to yourselves, and bear no burden on the Sabbath day, nor bring it in by the gates of Jerusalem; ²²nor carry a burden out of your houses on the Sabbath day, nor do any work, but hallow the Sabbath day, as I ^fcommanded your fathers. ^23gBut they did not obey nor incline their ear, but ⁸made their neck stiff, that they might not hear nor receive instruction.

²⁴“And it shall be, ^hif you heed Me carefully,” says the Lord, “to bring no burden through the gates of this city on the ⁱSabbath day, but hallow the Sabbath day, to do no work in it, ^25jthen shall enter the gates of this city kings and princes sitting on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their princes, accompanied by the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and this city shall remain forever. ²⁶And they shall come from the cities of Judah and from ^kthe places around Jerusalem, from the land of Benjamin and from ^lthe ⁹lowland, from the mountains and from ^mthe ¹South, bringing burnt offerings and sacrifices, grain offerings and incense, bringing ⁿsacrifices of praise to the house of the Lord.

²⁷“But if you will not heed Me to hallow the Sabbath day, such as not carrying a burden when entering the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day, then ^oI will kindle a fire in its gates, ^pand it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall not be ^qquenched.” ’ ”

The Potter and the Clay

18The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying: ²“Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause you to hear My words.” ³Then I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was, making something at the ¹wheel. ⁴And the vessel that he ²made of clay was ³marred in the hand of the potter; so he made it again into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to make.

⁵Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying: ⁶“O house of Israel, ^acan I not do with you as this potter?” says the Lord. “Look, ^bas the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel! ⁷The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to ^cpluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, ^8dif that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, ^eI will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. ⁹And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, ¹⁰if it does evil in My sight so that it does not obey My voice, then I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it.

¹¹“Now therefore, speak to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord: “Behold, I am fashioning a disaster and devising a plan against you. ^fReturn now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings ^ggood.” ’ ”

God’s Warning Rejected

¹²And they said, ^h“That is hopeless! So we will walk according to our own plans, and we will every one ⁴obey the ⁱdictates ⁵of his evil heart.”

¹³Therefore thus says the Lord:

^j“Ask now among the Gentiles,

Who has heard such things?

The virgin of Israel has done ^ka very horrible thing.

¹⁴Will a man ⁶leave the snow water of Lebanon,

Which comes from the rock of the field?

Will the cold flowing waters be forsaken for strange waters?

¹⁵“Because My people have forgotten ^lMe,

They have burned incense to worthless idols.

And they have caused themselves to stumble in their ways,

From the ^mancient paths,

To walk in pathways and not on a highway,

¹⁶To make…