To The Word – Day 179

_1-3The LORD sent me to the gate of the Temple where the people of Judah went in to worship. He told me to stand there and announce what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, had to say to them: “Change the way you are living and the things you are doing, and I will let you go on living here. ₄Stop believing those deceitful words, ‘We are safe! This is the LORD's Temple, this is the LORD's Temple, this is the LORD's Temple!’

₅“Change the way you are living and stop doing the things you are doing. Be fair in your treatment of one another. ₆Stop taking advantage of aliens, orphans, and widows. Stop killing innocent people in this land. Stop worshipping other gods, for that will destroy you. ₇If you change, I will let you go on living here in the land which I gave your ancestors as a permanent possession.

₈“Look, you put your trust in deceitful words. ₉You steal, murder, commit adultery, tell lies under oath, offer sacrifices to Baal, and worship gods that you had not known before. ₁₀You do these things I hate, and then you come and stand in my presence, in my own Temple, and say, ‘We are safe!’ ₁₁Do you think that my Temple is a hiding place for robbers? I have seen what you are doing. ₁₂Go to Shiloh, the first place where I chose to be worshipped, and see what I did to it because of the sins of my people Israel. ₁₃You have committed all these sins, and even though I spoke to you over and over again, you refused to listen. You would not answer when I called you. ₁₄And so, what I did to Shiloh I will do to this Temple of mine, in which you trust. Here in this place that I gave to your ancestors and to you, I will do the same thing that I did to Shiloh. ₁₅I will drive you out of my sight as I drove out your relatives, the people of Israel. I, the LORD, have spoken.”

₁₆The LORD said, “Jeremiah, do not pray for these people. Do not cry or pray on their behalf; do not plead with me, for I will not listen to you. ₁₇Don't you see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? ₁₈The children gather firewood, the men build fires, and the women mix dough to bake cakes for the goddess they call the Queen of Heaven. They also pour out wine offerings to other gods, in order to hurt me. ₁₉But am I really the one they are hurting? No, they are hurting themselves and bringing shame on themselves. ₂₀And so I, the Sovereign LORD, will pour out my fierce anger on this Temple. I will pour it out on people and animals alike, and even on the trees and the crops. My anger will be like a fire that no one can put out.

₂₁“My people, some sacrifices you burn completely on the altar, and some you are permitted to eat. But what I, the LORD, say is that you might as well eat them all. ₂₂I gave your ancestors no commands about burnt offerings or any other kinds of sacrifices, when I brought them out of Egypt. ₂₃But I did command them to obey me, so that I would be their God and they would be my people. And I told them to live as I had commanded them, so that things would go well for them. ₂₄But they did not obey or pay any attention. Instead, they did whatever their stubborn and evil hearts told them to do, and they became worse instead of better. ₂₅From the day that your ancestors came out of Egypt until this very day, I have kept on sending my servants, the prophets, to you. ₂₆Yet no one listened or paid any attention. Instead, you became more stubborn and rebellious than your ancestors.

₂₇“So, Jeremiah, you will speak all these words to my people, but they will not listen to you; you will call them, but they will not answer. ₂₈You will tell them that their nation does not obey me, the LORD their God, or learn from their punishment. Faithfulness is dead. No longer is it even talked about.

₃₀“The people of Judah have done an evil thing. They have placed their idols, which I hate, in my Temple and have defiled it. ₃₁In the Valley of Hinnom they have built an altar called Topheth, so that they can sacrifice their sons and daughters in the fire. I did not command them to do this — it did not even enter my mind. ₃₂And so, the time will come when it will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. They will bury people there because there will be nowhere else to bury them. ₃₃The corpses will be food for the birds and wild animals, and there will be no one to scare them off. ₃₄The land will become a desert. In the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem I will put an end to the sounds of joy and gladness and to the happy sounds of wedding feasts.

₁“At that time the bones of the kings and of the officials of Judah, as well as the bones of the priests, of the prophets, and of the other people who lived in Jerusalem, will be taken out of their graves. ₂Instead of being gathered and buried, their bones will be like manure lying on the ground. They will be spread out before the sun, the moon, and the stars, which these people have loved and served, and which they have consulted and worshipped. ₃And the people of this evil nation who survive, who live in the places where I have scattered them, will prefer to die rather than to go on living. I, the LORD Almighty, have spoken.”

₄The LORD told me to say to his people, “When someone falls down, doesn't he get back up? If someone misses the road, doesn't he turn back? ₅Why then, my people, do you turn away from me without ever turning back? You cling to your idols and refuse to return to me. ₆I listened carefully, but you did not speak the truth. Not one of you has been sorry for his wickedness; not one of you has asked, ‘What have I done wrong?’ Everyone keeps on going his own way, like a horse rushing into battle. ₇Even storks know when it is time to return; doves, swallows, and thrushes know when it is time to migrate. But, my people, you do not know the laws by which I rule you. ₈How can you say that you are wise, and that you know my laws? Look, the laws have been changed by dishonest scribes. ₉Your wise men are put to shame; they are confused and trapped. They have rejected my words; what wisdom have they got now? ₁₀So I will give their fields to new owners and their wives to other men. Everyone, great and small, tries to make money dishonestly. Even prophets and priests cheat the people. ₁₁They act as if my people's wounds were only scratches. ‘All is well,’ they say, when all is not well. ₁₂My people, were you ashamed because you did these disgusting things? No, you were not ashamed at all; you don't even know how to blush! And so you will fall as others have fallen; when I punish you, that will be the end of you. I, the LORD, have spoken.

₁₃“I wanted to gather my people, as a farmer gathers a harvest; but they are like a vine with no grapes, like a fig tree with no figs; even the leaves have withered. Therefore, I have allowed outsiders to take over the land.”

₁₄“Why are we sitting still?” God's people ask. “Come on, we will run to the fortified cities, and die there. The LORD our God has condemned us to die; he has given us poison to drink, because we have sinned against him. ₁₅We hoped for peace and a time of healing, but it was no use; terror came instead. ₁₆Our enemies are already in the city of Dan; we hear the snorting of their horses. The whole land trembles when their horses neigh. Our enemies have come to destroy our land and everything in it, our city and all its people.”

₁₇“Watch out!” the LORD says, “I am sending snakes among you, poisonous snakes that cannot be charmed, and they will bite you.”

The LORD says,

₁₂I asked, “LORD, why is the land devastated and dry as a desert, so that no one travels through it? Who is wise enough to understand this? To whom have you explained it so that he can tell others?”

₁₃The LORD answered, “This has happened because my people have abandoned the teaching that I gave them. They have not obeyed me or done what I told them. ₁₄Instead, they have been stubborn and have worshipped the idols of Baal as their ancestors taught them to do. ₁₅So then, listen to what I, the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, will do: I will give my people bitter plants to eat and poison to drink. ₁₆I will scatter them among nations that neither they nor their ancestors have heard about, and I will send armies against them until I have completely destroyed them.”

₁₇The LORD Almighty said,

₁₈The people said,

₁₉Listen to the sound of crying in Zion,

₂₀I said,

₂₃The LORD says,

_25-26The LORD says, “The time is coming when I will punish the people of Egypt, Judah, Edom, Ammon, Moab, and the desert people, who have their hair cut short. All these people are circumcised, but have not kept the covenant it symbolizes. None of these people and none of the people of Israel have kept my covenant.”

₁People of Israel, listen to the message that the LORD has for you. ₂He says,

₁₁(You people must tell them that the gods who did not make the earth and the sky will be destroyed. They will no longer exist anywhere on earth.)

₁₇People of Jerusalem, you are under siege! Gather up your belongings. ₁₈The LORD is going to throw you out of this land; he is going to crush you until not one of you is left. The LORD has spoken.

₁₉The people of Jerusalem cried out,

₁The LORD said to me, ₂“Listen to the terms of the covenant. Tell the people of Judah and of Jerusalem ₃that I, the LORD God of Israel, have placed a curse on everyone who does not obey the terms of this covenant. ₄It is the covenant I made with their ancestors when I brought them out of Egypt, the land that was like a blazing furnace to them. I told them to obey me and to do everything that I had commanded. I told them that if they obeyed, they would be my people and I would be their God. ₅Then I would keep the promise I made to their ancestors that I would give them the rich and fertile land which they now have.”

I said, “Yes, LORD.”

₆Then the LORD said to me, “Go to the cities of Judah and to the streets of Jerusalem. Proclaim my message there and tell the people to listen to the terms of the covenant and to obey them. ₇When I brought their ancestors out of Egypt, I solemnly warned them to obey me, and I have kept on warning the people until this day. ₈But they did not listen or obey. Instead, everyone continued to be as stubborn and evil as ever. I had commanded them to keep the covenant, but they refused. So I brought on them all the punishments described in it.”

₉Then the LORD said to me, “The people of Judah and of Jerusalem are plotting against me. ₁₀They have gone back to the sins of their ancestors, who refused to do what I said; they have worshipped other gods. Both Israel and Judah have broken the covenant that I made with their ancestors. ₁₁So now, I, the LORD, warn them that I am going to bring destruction on them, and they will not escape. And when they cry out to me for help, I will not listen to them. ₁₂Then the people of Judah and of Jerusalem will go to the gods to whom they offer sacrifices and will cry out to them for help. But those gods will not be able to save them when this destruction comes. ₁₃The people of Judah have as many gods as they have cities, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem have set up as many altars for sacrifices to that disgusting god Baal as there are streets in the city. ₁₄Jeremiah, don't pray to me or plead with me on behalf of these people. When they are in trouble and call to me for help, I will not listen to them.”

₁₅The LORD says, “The people I love are doing evil things. What right have they to be in my Temple? Do they think they can prevent disaster by making promises and by offering animal sacrifices? Will that make them happy? ₁₆I once called them a leafy olive tree, full of beautiful fruit; but now, with a roar like thunder I will set its leaves on fire and break its branches.

₁₇“I, the LORD Almighty, planted Israel and Judah; but now I threaten them with disaster. They have brought this on themselves because they have done wrong; they have made me angry by offering sacrifices to Baal.”

₁₈The LORD informed me of the plots that my enemies were making against me. ₁₉I was like a trusting lamb taken out to be killed, and I did not know that it was against me that they were planning evil things. They were saying, “Let's chop down the tree while it is still healthy; let's kill him so that no one will remember him any more.”

₂₀Then I prayed, “Almighty LORD, you are a just judge; you test people's thoughts and feelings. I have placed my cause in your hands; so let me watch you take revenge on these people.”

₂₁The people of Anathoth wanted me killed, and they told me that they would kill me if I kept on proclaiming the LORD's message. ₂₂So the LORD Almighty said, “I will punish them! Their young men will be killed in war; their children will die of starvation. ₂₃I have set a time for bringing disaster on the people of Anathoth, and when that time comes, none of them will survive.”

₅The LORD said,

₇The LORD says,

₁₄The LORD says, “I have something to say about Israel's neighbours who have ruined the land I gave to my people Israel. I will take those wicked people away from their countries like an uprooted plant, and I will rescue Judah from them. ₁₅But after I have taken them away, I will have mercy on them; I will bring each nation back to its own land and to its own country. ₁₆If with all their hearts they will accept the religion of my people and will swear, ‘As the LORD lives’ — as they once taught my people to swear by Baal — then they will also be a part of my people and will prosper. ₁₇But if any nation will not obey, then I will completely uproot it and destroy it. I, the LORD, have spoken.”