Jeremiah 9:2-6
The Message
9 1-2 I wish my head were a well of water
and my eyes fountains of tears
So I could weep day and night
for casualties among my dear, dear people.
At times I wish I had a wilderness hut,
a backwoods cabin,
Where I could get away from my people
and never see them again.
They’re a faithless, feckless bunch,
a congregation of degenerates.
* * *
3-6 “Their tongues shoot out lies
like a bow shoots arrows—
A mighty army of liars,
the sworn enemies of truth.
They advance from one evil to the next,
ignorant of me.”
God’s Decree.
“Be wary of even longtime neighbors.
Don’t even trust your grandmother!
Brother schemes against brother,
like old cheating Jacob.
Friend against friend
spreads malicious gossip.
Neighbors gyp neighbors,
never telling the truth.
They’ve trained their tongues to tell lies,
and now they can’t tell the truth.
They pile wrong upon wrong, stack lie upon lie,
and refuse to know me.”
God’s Decree.
Jeremiah 9:2-4
New International Version
2 Oh, that I had in the desert(A)
a lodging place for travelers,
so that I might leave my people
and go away from them;
for they are all adulterers,(B)
a crowd of unfaithful(C) people.
3 “They make ready their tongue
like a bow, to shoot lies;(D)
it is not by truth
that they triumph[a] in the land.
They go from one sin to another;
they do not acknowledge(E) me,”
declares the Lord.
4 “Beware of your friends;(F)
do not trust anyone in your clan.(G)
For every one of them is a deceiver,[b](H)
and every friend a slanderer.(I)
Footnotes
- Jeremiah 9:3 Or lies; / they are not valiant for truth
- Jeremiah 9:4 Or a deceiving Jacob
Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson
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