Jeremiah
Chapter 9
1 I wish my head were full of water, and my eyes were a stream of tears, so I could cry day and night for the people who have been killed.
2 I wish I had a traveler’s shelter in the desert so I could leave my people and get away from them; they are all unfaithful, a group of liars.
3 They twist their words like a bow for lies; they are not brave for the truth on earth; they go from one bad act to another and do not know me, says God.
4 Be careful of everyone around you, and don’t trust any brother fully; for every brother may betray you, and every neighbor might spread lies.
5 Everyone will trick their neighbor and not tell the truth; they have trained their tongue to lie and exhaust themselves doing wrong.
6 Your home is in the middle of lies; because of these lies, they choose not to know me, says God.
7 So this is what God says: “Look, I will test them and refine them; because what else can I do for my people’s children?”
8 Their tongue is like a shot arrow; it tells lies. They talk kindly to their neighbor with their mouth, but in their heart, they set a trap.
9 Won’t I punish them for these acts? says God. Won’t I take revenge on a nation like this with all my being?
10 I will cry and wail for the mountains, and mourn for the desert settlements, because they are scorched and no one can travel through them; no one can hear the cattle, and the birds of the sky and the animals have fled; they have disappeared.
11 I will turn Jerusalem into piles of rubble, a home for dragons; I will make the towns of Judah empty, with no one living there.
12 Who is the wise person who can understand this? And who has God spoken to so they can explain it, why the land is dying and scorched like a desert, empty and unused?
13 God says, “They have left my law which I gave them, have not listened to my voice, or followed it.”
14 But they followed the desires of their own heart and worshiped Baal, as their ancestors taught them.
15 So this is what God, the God of Israel, says: Look, I will make them, this nation, eat bitter plants, and drink poisoned water.
16 I will spread them among nations that neither they nor their ancestors have known, and I will chase them with a sword until they are destroyed.
17 God says, “Think about this, and ask the weeping women to come; invite the skilled women to come too.”
18 Let them hurry and cry for us, so our eyes fill with tears, and our eyelids overflow with water.
19 A sound of crying comes from Zion, “We are ruined! We are totally ashamed because we left our land, our homes have thrown us out.”
20 Listen to God’s word, women, take in his message, show your daughters how to cry, and teach each other how to mourn.
21 Death has climbed through our windows and entered our palaces, to take away children from outside, and young men from the streets.
22 Say this, God says, “Dead bodies will lie like waste on the ground, like cut grain left by the reaper, with no one to pick them up.”
23 God says, “Don’t let the wise man boast about his wisdom, don’t let the strong man boast about his strength, don’t let the rich man boast about his wealth.”
24 But if anyone wants to boast, let them boast about this: that they understand and know God, who shows kindness, fairness, and what is right on the earth, because God takes pleasure in these things.
25 Look, a time is coming, says God, when I will punish both the circumcised and the uncircumcised.
26 Egypt, Judah, Edom, Ammon’s children, Moab, and everyone from faraway places living in the desert: all these nations are not circumcised, and all Israel’s people are not circumcised in heart.