Bible in a Year · Day 245 of 365
Today’s reading: Jeremiah 22–24 (3 chapters)
Read the passage below, or open your own Bible and follow along. The text here is the World English Bible, a public-domain translation, printed in full so the day’s reading is all on one page.
About Jeremiah
Jeremiah prophesied through the last decades of Judah, from the reforms of Josiah to the burning of Jerusalem. He is often called the weeping prophet, and the book shows why: he is forbidden to marry, beaten, put in stocks, thrown into a cistern, and accused of treason for telling the truth. His temple sermon in chapter 7 and his letter to the exiles in chapter 29 are among the most quoted passages in Scripture. The book also carries the promise of a new covenant written on the heart, made in the middle of a story that is falling apart.
What to watch for. Watch the tension between Jeremiah's call and his cost, and read chapter 31 slowly. Notice that the new covenant is promised while the old one is being broken, not after everything is repaired.
Jeremiah 22
1Thus said Yahweh: “Go down to the house of the king of Judah, and speak there this word, 2‘Hear Yahweh’s word, king of Judah, who sits on David’s throne, you, and your servants, and your people who enter in by these gates. 3Yahweh says: “Execute justice and righteousness, and deliver him who is robbed out of the hand of the oppressor. Do no wrong. Do no violence, to the foreigner, the fatherless, nor the widow; neither shed innocent blood in this place. 4For if you do this thing indeed, then shall there enter in by the gates of this house kings sitting on David’s throne, riding in chariots and on horses, he, and his servants, and his people. 5But if you will not hear these words, I swear by myself,” says Yahweh, “that this house shall become a desolation.”’”
6For Yahweh says concerning the house of the king of Judah: “You are Gilead to me, the head of Lebanon. Yet surely I will make you a wilderness, cities which are not inhabited. 7I will prepare destroyers against you, everyone with his weapons, and they will cut down your choice cedars, and cast them into the fire. 8“Many nations will pass by this city, and they will each ask his neighbor, ‘Why has Yahweh done this to this great city?’ 9Then they shall answer, ‘Because they abandoned the covenant of Yahweh their God, and worshiped other gods, and served them.’” 10Don’t weep for the dead, neither bemoan him; but weep bitterly for him who goes away; for he shall return no more, nor see his native country.
11For Yahweh says touching Shallum the son of Josiah, king of Judah, who reigned instead of Josiah his father, and who went out of this place: “He shall not return there any more. 12But in the place where they have led him captive, there shall he die, and he shall see this land no more.” 13“Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness, and his rooms by injustice; who uses his neighbor’s service without wages, and doesn’t give him his hire; 14who says, ‘I will build me a wide house and spacious rooms,’ and cuts out windows for himself; and it is ceiling with cedar, and painted with vermilion. 15“Shall you reign, because you strive to excel in cedar? Didn’t your father eat and drink, and do justice and righteousness? Then it was well with him.
16He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Wasn’t this to know me?” says Yahweh. 17But your eyes and your heart are not but for your covetousness, and for shedding innocent blood, for oppression, and for doing violence.” 18Therefore Yahweh says concerning Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah: “They shall not lament for him, saying, ‘Ah my brother!’ or, ‘Ah sister!’ They shall not lament for him, saying ‘Ah lord!’ or, ‘Ah his glory!’ 19He shall be buried with the burial of a donkey, drawn and cast out beyond the gates of Jerusalem.” 20“Go up to Lebanon, and cry; and lift up your voice in Bashan, and cry from Abarim; for all your lovers are destroyed.
21I spoke to you in your prosperity; but you said, ‘I will not listen.’ This has been your way from your youth, that you didn’t obey my voice. 22The wind shall feed all your shepherds, and your lovers shall go into captivity. Surely then you will be ashamed and confounded for all your wickedness. 23Inhabitant of Lebanon, who makes your nest in the cedars, how greatly to be pitied you will be when pangs come on you, the pain as of a woman in travail! 24“As I live,” says Yahweh, “though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were the signet on my right hand, yet would I pluck you from there; 25and I would give you into the hand of those who seek your life, and into the hand of them of whom you are afraid, even into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of the Chaldeans.
26I will cast you out with your mother who bore you, into another country, where you were not born; and there you will die. 27But to the land to which their soul longs to return, there shall they not return.” 28Is this man Coniah a despised broken vessel? Is he a vessel in which no one delights? Why are they cast out, he and his offspring, and cast into a land which they don’t know? 29O earth, earth, earth, hear Yahweh’s word! 30Yahweh says, “Record this man as childless, a man who will not prosper in his days; for no more shall a man of his offspring prosper, sitting on David’s throne, and ruling in Judah.”
Jeremiah 23
1“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture!” says Yahweh. 2Therefore Yahweh, the God of Israel, says against the shepherds who feed my people: “You have scattered my flock, and driven them away, and have not visited them; behold, I will visit on you the evil of your doings,” says Yahweh. 3“I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries where I have driven them, and will bring them again to their folds; and they shall be fruitful and multiply. 4I will set up shepherds over them, who shall feed them; and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall any be lacking,” says Yahweh. 5“Behold, the days come,” says Yahweh, “that I will raise to David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.
6In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely. This is his name by which he shall be called: Yahweh our righteousness. 7“Therefore behold, the days come,” says Yahweh, “that they shall no more say, ‘As Yahweh lives, who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt;’ 8but, ‘As Yahweh lives, who brought up and who led the offspring of the house of Israel out of the north country, and from all the countries where I had driven them.’ Then they will dwell in their own land.” 9Concerning the prophets: My heart within me is broken. All my bones shake. I am like a drunken man, and like a man whom wine has overcome, because of Yahweh, and because of his holy words. 10For the land is full of adulterers; for because of the curse the land mourns. The pastures of the wilderness are dried up. Their course is evil, and their might is not right;
11for both prophet and priest are profane; yes, in my house I have found their wickedness,” says Yahweh. 12Therefore their way shall be to them as slippery places in the darkness. They shall be driven on, and fall therein; for I will bring evil on them, even the year of their visitation,” says Yahweh. 13“I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria. They prophesied by Baal, and caused my people Israel to err. 14In the prophets of Jerusalem also I have seen a horrible thing: they commit adultery, and walk in lies. They strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one returns from his wickedness. They have all become to me as Sodom, and its inhabitants as Gomorrah.” 15Therefore Yahweh of Armies says concerning the prophets: “Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall; for from the prophets of Jerusalem ungodliness has gone out into all the land.”
16Yahweh of Armies says, “Don’t listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you. They teach you vanity. They speak a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of Yahweh. 17They say continually to those who despise me, ‘Yahweh has said, “You shall have peace;”’ and to everyone who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart they say, ‘No evil shall come on you.’ 18For who has stood in the council of Yahweh, that he should perceive and hear his word? Who has listend to my word, and heard it? 19Behold, Yahweh’s storm, his wrath, has gone out. Yes, a whirling storm. It shall burst on the head of the wicked. 20Yahweh’s anger shall not return, until he has executed, and until he has performed the intents of his heart. In the latter days, you will understand it perfectly.
21I didn’t send these prophets, yet they ran. I didn’t speak to them, yet they prophesied. 22But if they had stood in my council, then they would have caused my people to hear my words, and would have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their doings. 23“Am I a God at hand,” says Yahweh, “and not a God afar off? 24Can anyone hide himself in secret places so that I can’t see him?” says Yahweh. “Don’t I fill heaven and earth?” says Yahweh. 25“I have heard what the prophets have said, who prophesy lies in my name, saying, ‘I had a dream! I had a dream!’
26How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies, even the prophets of the deceit of their own heart? 27They intend to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams which they each tell his neighbor, as their fathers forgot my name because of Baal. 28The prophet who has a dream, let him tell a dream; and he who has my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the straw to the wheat?” says Yahweh. 29“Isn’t my word like fire?” says Yahweh; “and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces? 30“Therefore behold, I am against the prophets,” says Yahweh, “who each steal my words from his neighbor.
31Behold, I am against the prophets,” says Yahweh, “who use their tongues, and say, ‘He says.’ 32Behold, I am against those who prophesy lying dreams,” says Yahweh, “who tell them, and cause my people to err by their lies, and by their vain boasting; yet I didn’t send them, nor command them; neither do they profit this people at all,” says Yahweh. 33“When this people, or the prophet, or a priest, shall ask you, saying, ‘What is the message from Yahweh?’ Then you shall tell them, ‘“What message? I will cast you off,” says Yahweh.’ 34As for the prophet, and the priest, and the people, who say, ‘The message from Yahweh,’ I will even punish that man and his household. 35You shall say everyone to his neighbor, and everyone to his brother, ‘What has Yahweh answered?’ and, ‘What has Yahweh spoken?’
36You shall mention the message from Yahweh no more: for every man’s own word has become his message; for you have perverted the words of the living God, of Yahweh of Armies, our God. 37You shall say to the prophet, ‘What has Yahweh answered you?’ and, ‘What has Yahweh spoken?’ 38Although you say, ‘The message from Yahweh;’ therefore Yahweh says: ‘Because you say this word, “The message from Yahweh,” and I have sent to you, telling you not to say, “The message from Yahweh;” 39therefore, behold, I will utterly forget you, and I will cast you off, and the city that I gave to you and to your fathers, away from my presence. 40I will bring an everlasting reproach on you, and a perpetual shame, which shall not be forgotten.’”
Jeremiah 24
1Yahweh showed me, and behold, two baskets of figs set before Yahweh’s temple, after that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, with the craftsmen and smiths, from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon. 2One basket had very good figs, like the figs that are first-ripe; and the other basket had very bad figs, which could not be eaten, they were so bad. 3Then Yahweh asked me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I said, “Figs. The good figs are very good, and the bad are very bad, so bad that can’t be eaten.” 4Yahweh’s word came to me, saying, 5“Yahweh, the God of Israel says: ‘Like these good figs, so will I regard the captives of Judah, whom I have sent out of this place into the land of the Chaldeans, for good.
6For I will set my eyes on them for good, and I will bring them again to this land. I will build them, and not pull them down. I will plant them, and not pluck them up. 7I will give them a heart to know me, that I am Yahweh: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God; for they shall return to me with their whole heart. 8“‘As the bad figs, which can’t be eaten, they are so bad,’ surely Yahweh says, ‘So I will give up Zedekiah the king of Judah, and his princes, and the remnant of Jerusalem, who remain in this land, and those who dwell in the land of Egypt. 9I will even give them up to be tossed back and forth among all the kingdoms of the earth for evil; to be a reproach and a proverb, a taunt and a curse, in all places where I shall drive them. 10I will send the sword, the famine, and the pestilence, among them, until they be consumed from off the land that I gave to them and to their fathers.’”
Next · Day 246: Jeremiah 25–28 →
Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB), a public-domain translation. Day numbering follows the calendar year; you can start at Day 1 on any date.
