The Hebrew Prophets

I will smash them against one another, fathers and sons alike, declares the LORD. I will allow no mercy or pity or compassion to keep Me from destroying them.’”

Listen and give heed. Do not be arrogant, for the LORD has spoken.

Give glory to the LORD your God before He brings darkness, before your feet stumble on the dusky mountains. You wait for light, but He turns it into deep gloom and thick darkness.

But if you do not listen, I will weep in secret because of your pride. My eyes will overflow with tears, because the LORD’s flock has been taken captive.

Say to the king and to the queen mother: “Take a lowly seat, for your glorious crowns have fallen from your heads.”

The cities of the Negev have been shut tight, and no one can open them. All Judah has been carried into exile, wholly taken captive.

Lift up your eyes and see those coming from the north. Where is the flock entrusted to you, the sheep that were your pride?

What will you say when He sets over you close allies whom you yourself trained? Will not pangs of anguish grip you, as they do a woman in labor?

And if you ask yourself, “Why has this happened to me?” It is because of the magnitude of your iniquity that your skirts have been stripped off and your body has been exposed.

Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? Neither are you able to do good— you who are accustomed to doing evil.

“I will scatter you like chaff driven by the desert wind.

This is your lot, the portion I have measured to you,” declares the LORD, “because you have forgotten Me and trusted in falsehood.

So I will pull your skirts up over your face, that your shame may be seen.

Your adulteries and lustful neighings, your shameless prostitution on the hills and in the fields— I have seen your detestable acts. Woe to you, O Jerusalem! How long will you remain unclean?”

This is the word of the LORD that came to Jeremiah concerning the drought:

“Judah mourns and her gates languish. Her people wail for the land, and a cry goes up from Jerusalem.

The nobles send their servants for water; they go to the cisterns, but find no water; their jars return empty. They are ashamed and humiliated; they cover their heads.

The ground is cracked because no rain has fallen on the land. The farmers are ashamed; they cover their heads.

Even the doe in the field deserts her newborn fawn because there is no grass.

Wild donkeys stand on barren heights; they pant for air like jackals; their eyes fail for lack of pasture.”

Although our iniquities testify against us, O LORD, act for the sake of Your name. Indeed, our rebellions are many; we have sinned against You.

O Hope of Israel, its Savior in times of distress, why are You like a stranger in the land, like a traveler who stays but a night?

Why are You like a man taken by surprise, like a warrior powerless to save? Yet You are among us, O LORD, and we are called by Your name. Do not forsake us!

This is what the LORD says about this people: “Truly they love to wander; they have not restrained their feet. So the LORD does not accept them; He will now remember their guilt and call their sins to account.”

Then the LORD said to me, “Do not pray for the well-being of this people.