Study Desk

I heard the crowds whisper, "Everyone is afraid. Now's our chance to accuse Jeremiah!" All of my so-called friends are just waiting for me to make a mistake. They say, "Maybe Jeremiah can be tricked. Then we can overpower him and get even at last."

He deserves to die for not killing me before I was born. Then my mother's body would have been my grave.

King Zedekiah of Judah sent for Pashhur son of Malchiah and for a priest named Zephaniah son of Maaseiah. Then he told them,"Talk with Jeremiah for me." So they came to me and said,

"King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia has attacked Judah. Please ask the Lord to work miracles for our people, as he has done in the past, so that Nebuchadnezzar will leave us alone."

I'll send troops to tear it apart, and its beautiful cedar beams will be used for firewood.

The Lord said: King Josiah is dead, so don't cry for him. Instead, cry for his son King Jehoahaz, dragged off to another country, never to return.

You will be given a burial fit for a donkey; your body will be dragged outside the city gates and tossed in the dirt. I, the Lord , have spoken.

You were supposed to take care of my people, but instead you chased them away. So now I'll really take care of you, and believe me, you will pay for your crimes!

I promise to choose leaders who will care for them like real shepherds. All of my people will be there, and they will never again be frightened.

Their dreams and my truth are as different as straw and wheat. But when prophets speak for me, they must say only what I have told them.

The Lord said to me: Jeremiah, when a prophet or a priest or anyone else comes to you and asks, "Does the Lord have news for us?" tell them, "You people are a nuisance to the Lord , and he will get rid of you."

People of Judah, the good figs stand for those of you I sent away as exiles to Babylonia,

The rotten figs stand for King Zedekiah of Judah, his officials, and all the others who were not taken away to Babylonia, whether they stayed here in Judah or went to live in Egypt.

For twenty-three years now, ever since the thirteenth year that Josiah was king, I have been telling you what the Lord has told me. But you have not listened.

This country will be as empty as a desert, because I will make all of you the slaves of the king of Babylonia for seventy years.

When that time is up, I will punish the king of Babylonia and his people for everything they have done wrong, and I will turn that country into a wasteland forever.

I will pay back the Babylonians for every wrong they have done. Great kings from many other nations will conquer the Babylonians and force them to be slaves.

Jeremiah, I have a message for everyone who comes from the towns of Judah to worship in my temple. Go to the temple courtyard and speak every word that I tell you.

Maybe the people will listen this time. And if they stop doing wrong, I will change my mind and not punish them for their sins.

and as soon as I finished, they all crowded around me and started shouting, "Why did you preach that the Lord will destroy this temple, just as he destroyed Shiloh? Why did you say that Jerusalem will be empty and lie in ruins? You ought to be put to death for saying such things in the Lord 's name!" Then they had me arrested.