Jeremiah 7

• 1. The LORD gave another message to Jeremiah. He said,
• 2. "Go to the entrance of the LORD's Temple, and give this message to the people: `O Judah, listen to this message from the LORD! Listen to it, all of you who worship here!
• 3. The LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Even now, if you quit your evil ways, I will let you stay in your own land.
• 4. But do not be fooled by those who repeatedly promise your safety because the Temple of the LORD is here.
• 5. I will be merciful only if you stop your wicked thoughts and deeds and are fair to others;
• 6. and if you stop exploiting foreigners, orphans, and widows; and if you stop your murdering; and if you stop worshiping idols as you now do to your own harm.
• 7. Then I will let you stay in this land that I gave to your ancestors to keep forever.
• 8. " `Do you think that because the Temple is here you will never suffer? Don't fool yourselves!
• 9. Do you really think you can steal, murder, commit adultery, lie, and worship Baal and all those other new gods of yours,
• 10. and then come here and stand before me in my Temple and chant, "We are safe!"--only to go right back to all those evils again?
• 11. Do you think this Temple, which honors my name, is a den of thieves? I see all the evil going on there, says the LORD.
• 12. " `Go to the place at Shiloh where I once put the Tabernacle to honor my name. See what I did there because of all the wickedness of my people, the Israelites.
• 13. While you were doing these wicked things, says the LORD, I spoke to you about it repeatedly, but you would not listen. I called out to you, but you refused to answer.
• 14. So just as I destroyed Shiloh, I will now destroy this Temple that was built to honor my name, this Temple that you trust for help, this place that I gave to you and your ancestors.
• 15. And I will send you into exile, just as I did your relatives, the people of Israel. '
• 16. "Pray no more for these people, Jeremiah. Do not weep or pray for them, and don't beg me to help them, for I will not listen to you.
• 17. Do you not see what they are doing throughout the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?
• 18. No wonder I am so angry! Watch how the children gather wood and the fathers build sacrificial fires. See how the women knead dough and make cakes to offer to the Queen of Heaven. And they give drink offerings to their other idol gods!
• 19. Am I the one they are hurting?" asks the LORD. "Most of all, they hurt themselves, to their own shame."
• 20. So the Sovereign LORD says: "I will pour out my terrible fury on this place. Its people, animals, trees, and crops will be consumed by the unquenchable fire of my anger."
• 21. This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: "Away with your burnt offerings and sacrifices! Eat them yourselves!
• 22. When I led your ancestors out of Egypt, it was not burnt offerings and sacrifices I wanted from them.
• 23. This is what I told them: `Obey me, and I will be your God, and you will be my people. Only do as I say, and all will be well!'
• 24. "But my people would not listen to me. They kept on doing whatever they wanted, following the stubborn desires of their evil hearts. They went backward instead of forward.
• 25. From the day your ancestors left Egypt until now, I have continued to send my prophets--day in and day out.
• 26. But my people have not listened to me or even tried to hear. They have been stubborn and sinful--even worse than their ancestors.
• 27. "Tell them all this, but do not expect them to listen. Shout out your warnings, but do not expect them to respond.
• 28. Say to them, `This is the nation whose people will not obey the LORD their God and who refuse to be taught. Truth has vanished from among them; it is no longer heard on their lips.
• 29. O Jerusalem, shave your head in mourning, and weep alone on the mountains. For the LORD has rejected and forsaken this generation that has provoked his fury.'
• 30. "The people of Judah have sinned before my very eyes," says the LORD. "They have set up their abominable idols right in my own Temple, defiling it.
• 31. They have built the pagan shrines of Topheth in the valley of the son of Hinnom, where they sacrifice their little sons and daughters in the fire. I have never commanded such a horrible deed; it never even crossed my mind to command such a thing!
• 32. So beware, for the time is coming," says the LORD, "when that place will no longer be called Topheth or the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. They will bury so many bodies in Topheth that there won't be room for all the graves.
• 33. The corpses of my people will be food for the vultures and wild animals, and no one will be left to scare them away.
• 34. I will put an end to the happy singing and laughter in the streets of Jerusalem. The joyful voices of bridegrooms and brides will no longer be heard in the towns of Judah. The land will lie in complete desolation.

Jeremiah 8

• 1. "In that day," says the LORD, "the enemy will break open the graves of the kings and officials of Judah, and the graves of the priests, prophets, and common people.
• 2. They will dig out their bones and spread them out on the ground before the sun, moon, and stars--the gods my people have loved, served, and worshiped. Their bones will not be gathered up again or buried but will be scattered on the ground like dung.
• 3. And the people of this evil nation who survive will wish to die rather than live where I will send them. I, the LORD Almighty, have spoken!
• 4. "Jeremiah, say to the people, `This is what the LORD says: When people fall down, don't they get up again? When they start down the wrong road and discover their mistake, don't they turn back?
• 5. Then why do these people keep going along their self-destructive path, refusing to turn back, even though I have warned them?
• 6. I listen to their conversations, and what do I hear? Is anyone sorry for sin? Does anyone say, "What a terrible thing I have done"? No! All are running down the path of sin as swiftly as a horse rushing into battle!
• 7. The stork knows the time of her migration, as do the turtledove, the swallow, and the crane. They all return at the proper time each year. But not my people! They do not know what the LORD requires of them.
• 8. " `How can you say, "We are wise because we have the law of the LORD," when your teachers have twisted it so badly?
• 9. These wise teachers will be shamed by exile for their sin, for they have rejected the word of the LORD. Are they so wise after all?
• 10. I will give their wives and their farms to others. From the least to the greatest, they trick others to get what does not belong to them. Yes, even my prophets and priests are like that.
• 11. They offer superficial treatments for my people's mortal wound. They give assurances of peace when all is war.
• 12. Are they ashamed when they do these disgusting things? No, not at all--they don't even blush! Therefore, they will lie among the slaughtered. They will be humbled when they are punished, says the LORD.
• 13. I will take away their rich harvests of figs and grapes. Their fruit trees will all die. All the good things I prepared for them will soon be gone. I, the LORD, have spoken!'
• 14. "Then the people will say, `Why should we wait here to die? Come, let's go to the fortified cities to die there. For the LORD our God has decreed our destruction and has given us a cup of poison to drink because we sinned against the LORD.
• 15. We hoped for peace, but no peace came. We hoped for a time of healing, but found only terror.
• 16. The snorting of the enemies' warhorses can be heard all the way from the land of Dan in the north! The whole land trembles at the approach of the terrible army, for it is coming to devour the land and everything in it--cities and people alike.'
• 17. "I will send these enemy troops among you like poisonous snakes you cannot charm," says the LORD. "No matter what you do, they will bite you, and you will die."
• 18. My grief is beyond healing; my heart is broken.
• 19. Listen to the weeping of my people; it can be heard all across the land. "Has the LORD abandoned Jerusalem?" the people ask. "Is her King no longer there?Oh, why have they angered me with their carved idols and worthless gods?" asks the LORD.
• 20. "The harvest is finished, and the summer is gone," the people cry, "yet we are not saved!"
• 21. I weep for the hurt of my people. I am stunned and silent, mute with grief.
• 22. Is there no medicine in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why is there no healing for the wounds of my people?

Jeremiah 9

• 1. Oh, that my eyes were a fountain of tears; I would weep forever! I would sob day and night for all my people who have been slaughtered.
• 2. Oh, that I could go away and forget them and live in a shack in the desert, for they are all adulterous and treacherous.
• 3. "My people bend their tongues like bows to shoot lies. They refuse to stand up for the truth. And they only go from bad to worse! They care nothing for me," says the LORD.
• 4. "Beware of your neighbor! Beware of your brother! They all take advantage of one another and spread their slanderous lies.
• 5. They all fool and defraud each other; no one tells the truth. With practiced tongues they tell lies; they wear themselves out with all their sinning.
• 6. They pile lie upon lie and utterly refuse to come to me," says the LORD.
• 7. Therefore, the LORD Almighty says, "See, I will melt them in a crucible and test them like metal. What else can I do with them?
• 8. For their tongues aim lies like poisoned arrows. They promise peace to their neighbors while planning to kill them.
• 9. Should I not punish them for this?" asks the LORD. "Should I not avenge myself against a nation such as this?"
• 10. I will weep for the mountains and wail for the desert pastures. For they are desolate and empty of life; the lowing of cattle is heard no more; the birds and wild animals all have fled.
• 11. "I will make Jerusalem into a heap of ruins," says the LORD. "It will be a place haunted by jackals. The towns of Judah will be ghost towns, with no one living in them."
• 12. Who is wise enough to understand all this? Who has been instructed by the LORD and can explain it to others? Why has the land been ruined so completely that no one even dares to travel through it?
• 13. The LORD replies, "This has happened because my people have abandoned the instructions I gave them; they have refused to obey my law.
• 14. Instead, they have stubbornly followed their own desires and worshiped the images of Baal, as their ancestors taught them.
• 15. So now, listen to what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Look! I will feed them with bitterness and give them poison to drink.
• 16. I will scatter them around the world, and they will be strangers in distant lands. Their enemies will chase them with the sword until I have destroyed them completely."
• 17. This is what the LORD Almighty says: "Think about what is going on! Call for the mourners to come.
• 18. Quick! Begin your weeping! Let the tears flow from your eyes.
• 19. Hear the people of Jerusalem crying in despair, `We are ruined! Disaster has come upon us! We must leave our land, because our homes have been torn down.'"
• 20. Listen, you women, to the words of the LORD; open your ears to what he has to say. Teach your daughters to wail; teach one another how to lament.
• 21. For death has crept in through our windows and has entered our mansions. It has killed off the flower of our youth: Children no longer play in the streets, and young men no longer gather in the squares.
• 22. And the LORD says, "Bodies will be scattered across the fields like dung, or like bundles of grain after the harvest. No one will be left to bury them."
• 23. This is what the LORD says: "Let not the wise man gloat in his wisdom, or the mighty man in his might, or the rich man in his riches.
• 24. Let them boast in this alone: that they truly know me and understand that I am the LORD who is just and righteous, whose love is unfailing, and that I delight in these things. I, the LORD, have spoken!
• 25. "A time is coming," says the LORD, "when I will punish all those who are circumcised in body but not in spirit--
• 26. the Egyptians, Edomites, Ammonites, Moabites, the people who live in distant places, and yes, even the people of Judah. Like all these pagan nations, the people of Israel also have uncircumcised hearts."

New Living Translation: 261 of 324 days.