Individuals Are Challenged to Put Their Trust in the Lord12

17:5 The Lord says,

“I will put a curse on people

who trust in mere human beings,

who depend on mere flesh and blood for their strength,13

and whose hearts14 have turned away from the Lord.

17:6 They will be like a shrub15 in the desert.

They will not experience good things even when they happen.

It will be as though they were growing in the desert,

in a salt land where no one can live.

17:7 My blessing is on those people who trust in me,

who put their confidence in me.16

17:8 They will be like a tree planted near a stream

whose roots spread out toward the water.

It has nothing to fear when the heat comes.

Its leaves are always green.

It has no need to be concerned in a year of drought.

It does not stop bearing fruit.

17:9 The human mind is more deceitful than anything else.

It is incurably bad.17 Who can understand it?

17:10 I, the Lord, probe into people’s minds.

I examine people’s hearts.18

I deal with each person according to how he has behaved.

I give them what they deserve based on what they have done.

17:11 The person who gathers wealth by unjust means

is like the partridge that broods over eggs but does not hatch them.19

Before his life is half over he will lose his ill-gotten gains.20

At the end of his life it will be clear he was a fool.”21