1 “At that time, declares the Lord, the bones of the kings of Judah, the bones of its officials, the bones of the priests, the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem shall be brought out of their tombs. 2 And they shall be spread before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven, which they have loved and served, which they have gone after, and which they have sought and worshiped. And they shall not be gathered or buried. pThey shall be as dung on the surface of the ground. 3 qDeath shall be preferred to life by all the remnant that remains of this evil family in all the places rwhere I have driven them, declares the Lord of hosts.
Sin and Treachery
4 “You shall say to them, Thus says the Lord:
When men fall, do they not rise again?
If one turns away, does he not return?
5 Why then has this people turned away
in perpetual backsliding?
They hold fast to deceit;
they refuse to return.
6 I have paid attention and listened,
but they have not spoken rightly;
no man relents of his evil,
saying, ‘What have I done?’
Everyone turns to his own course,
like a horse plunging headlong into battle.
7 sEven the stork in the heavens
knows her times,
and the turtledove, swallow, and crane1
keep the time of their coming,
but my people know not
the rules2 of the Lord.
8 “How can you say, ‘We are wise,
and the law of the Lord is with us’?
But behold, the lying pen of the scribes
has made it into a lie.
9 The wise men shall be put to shame;
they shall be dismayed and taken;
behold, they have rejected the word of the Lord,
so what wisdom is in them?
10 Therefore I will give ttheir wives to others
and their fields to conquerors,
because ufrom the least to the greatest
everyone is greedy for unjust gain;
from prophet to priest,
everyone deals falsely.
11 vThey have healed the wound of my people lightly,
wsaying, ‘Peace, peace,’
when there is no peace.
12 xWere they ashamed when they committed abomination?
No, they were not at all ashamed;
they did not know how to blush.
Therefore they shall fall among the fallen;
when I punish them, they shall be overthrown,
says the Lord.
13 yWhen I would gather them, declares the Lord,
there are no grapes on the vine,
nor figs on the fig tree;
even the leaves are withered,
and what I gave them has passed away from them.”3
14 Why do we sit still?
Gather together; let us go into the fortified cities
and perish there,
for the Lord our God has doomed us to perish
and has zgiven us poisoned water to drink,
because we have sinned against the Lord.
15 aWe looked for peace, but no good came;
for a time of healing, but behold, terror.
16 “The snorting of their horses is heard from Dan;
at the sound of the neighing of their stallions
the whole land quakes.
They come and devour the land and all that fills it,
the city and those who dwell in it.
17 For behold, I am sending among you serpents,
adders that cannot be charmed,
and they shall bite you,”
declares the Lord.
Jeremiah Grieves for His People
18 My joy is gone; grief is upon me;4
my heart is sick within me.
19 Behold, the cry of the daughter of my people
from the length and breadth of the land:
“Is the Lord not in Zion?
bIs her King not in her?”
“Why have they provoked me to anger with their carved images
and cwith their foreign idols?”
20 “The harvest is past, the summer is ended,
and we are not saved.”
21 dFor the wound of the daughter of my people is my heart wounded;
I mourn, and dismay has taken hold on me.
22 Is there no ebalm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then has the health of the daughter of my people
not been restored?
1 5 Oh that my head were waters,
and my eyes a fountain of ftears,
that I might weep day and night
for the slain of the daughter of my people!
2 6 Oh that I had in the desert
a travelers’ lodging place,
that I might leave my people
and go away from them!
For they are all gadulterers,
a company of treacherous men.
3 They bend their tongue like a bow;
falsehood and not truth has grown strong7 in the land;
for they proceed from evil to evil,
and they do not know me, declares the Lord.
4 Let everyone hbeware of his neighbor,
and put no trust in any brother,
for every brother is a deceiver,
and every neighbor goes about as a islanderer.
5 Everyone deceives his neighbor,
and no one speaks the truth;
they have taught their tongue to speak lies;
they weary themselves committing iniquity.
6 Heaping oppression upon oppression, and deceit upon deceit,
they refuse to know me, declares the Lord.
7 Therefore thus says the Lord of hosts:
“Behold, I will jrefine them and test them,
for what else can I do, because of my people?
8 Their tongue is a deadly arrow;
it speaks deceitfully;
with his mouth each speaks peace to his neighbor,
but in his heart he plans an ambush for him.
9 kShall I not punish them for these things? declares the Lord,
and shall I not avenge myself
on a nation such as this?
10 “I will take up weeping and wailing for the mountains,
and a lamentation for the pastures of the wilderness,
because they are laid waste so that no one passes through,
and the lowing of cattle is not heard;
both the lbirds of the air and the beasts
have fled and are gone.
11 I will make Jerusalem a mheap of ruins,
a lair of njackals,
and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation,
without inhabitant.”
12 Who is the man so wise that he can understand this? To whom has the mouth of the Lord spoken, that he may declare it? Why is the land ruined and laid waste like a wilderness, so that no one passes through? 13 And the Lord says: “Because they have forsaken my law that I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice or walked in accord with it, 14 but have stubbornly followed their own hearts and have ogone after the Baals, as their fathers taught them. 15 pTherefore thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will feed this people with bitter food, and give them poisonous water to drink. 16 I will qscatter them among the nations whom neither they nor their fathers have known, and rI will send the sword after them, until I have consumed them.”
17 Thus says the Lord of hosts:
“Consider, and call for the mourning women to come;
send for the skillful women to come;
18 let them make haste and raise a wailing over us,
that our eyes may run down with stears
and our eyelids flow with water.
19 For a sound of wailing is heard from Zion:
‘How we are ruined!
We are utterly shamed,
because we have left the land,
because they have cast down our dwellings.’”
20 Hear, O women, the word of the Lord,
and let your ear receive the word of his mouth;
teach to your daughters a lament,
and each to her neighbor a dirge.
21 For death has come up into our windows;
it has entered our palaces,
cutting off the tchildren from the streets
and the young men from the squares.
22 Speak: “Thus declares the Lord,
‘The dead bodies of men shall fall
like dung upon the open field,
like sheaves after the reaper,
and none shall gather them.’”
23 Thus says the Lord: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, 24 but ulet him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the Lord.”
25 “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will punish all those who are circumcised merely in the flesh— 26 Egypt, Judah, Edom, the sons of Ammon, Moab, and all who dwell in the desert who vcut the corners of their hair, for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are wuncircumcised in heart.”
1 gLet all who are under a yoke as bondservants1 regard their own masters as worthy of all honor, hso that the name of God and the teaching may not be reviled. 2 Those who have believing masters must not be disrespectful on the ground that they are ibrothers; rather they must serve all the better since those who benefit by their good service are believers and beloved.
False Teachers and True Contentment
Teach and urge jthese things. 3 If anyone kteaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the lsound2 words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching mthat accords with godliness, 4 he is npuffed up with conceit and ounderstands nothing. He has an unhealthy craving for pcontroversy and for qquarrels about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, 5 and constant friction among people who are rdepraved in mind and deprived of the truth, simagining that godliness is a means of gain. 6 But tgodliness with ucontentment is great gain, 7 for we brought nothing into the world, and3 we vcannot take anything out of the world. 8 But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. 9 But wthose who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a xsnare, into many senseless and harmful desires that yplunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.
Fight the Good Fight of Faith
11 But as for you, O zman of God, aflee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. 12 Fight the bgood fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good cconfession in the presence of many witnesses. 13 I dcharge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his etestimony before4 Pontius Pilate made the good confession, 14 to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the fappearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15 which he will display gat the proper time—he who is the hblessed and only Sovereign, the iKing of kings and Lord of lords, 16 who alone has immortality, jwho dwells in unapproachable light, kwhom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
17 As for the rich in lthis present age, charge them not to be mhaughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, nbut on God, owho richly provides us with everything to enjoy. 18 They are to do good, to be prich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, 19 thus qstoring up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.
20 O Timothy, guard the deposit rentrusted to you. Avoid the sirreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called “knowledge,” 21 for by professing it some have tswerved from the faith.
