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The Potter and the Clay

18 The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: “Come, go down to the potter’s house, and there I will let you hear my words.”(A) So I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was working at his wheel. The vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as seemed good to him.

Then the word of the Lord came to me: Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done? says the Lord. Just like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.(B) At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it.(C) And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it,(D) 10 but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it.(E) 11 Now, therefore, say to the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus says the Lord: Look, I am a potter shaping evil against you and devising a plan against you. Turn now, all of you, from your evil way, and amend your ways and your doings.(F)

Israel’s Stubborn Idolatry

12 But they say, “It is no use! We will follow our own plans, and each of us will act according to the stubbornness of our evil will.”(G)

13 Therefore thus says the Lord:
Ask among the nations:
    Who has heard the like of this?
The virgin Israel has done
    a most horrible thing.(H)
14 Does the snow of Lebanon leave
    the crags of Sirion?[a]
Do the mountain[b] waters run dry,[c]
    the cold flowing streams?
15 But my people have forgotten me;
    they burn offerings to a delusion;
they have stumbled[d] in their ways,
    in the ancient roads,
and have gone into bypaths,
    not the highway,(I)
16 making their land a horror,
    a thing to be hissed at forever.
All who pass by it are horrified
    and shake their heads.(J)
17 Like the wind from the east,
    I will scatter them before the enemy.
I will show them my back, not my face,
    in the day of their calamity.(K)

A Plot against Jeremiah

18 Then they said, “Come, let us make plots against Jeremiah, for instruction shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, let us bring charges against him,[e] and let us not heed any of his words.”(L)

19 Give heed to me, O Lord,
    and listen to what my adversaries say!
20 Is evil a recompense for good?
    Yet they have dug a pit for my life.
Remember how I stood before you
    to speak good for them,
    to turn away your wrath from them.(M)
21 Therefore give their children over to famine;
    hurl them out to the power of the sword;
let their wives become childless and widowed.
    May their men meet death by pestilence,
    their youths be slain by the sword in battle.(N)
22 May a cry be heard from their houses
    when you bring the marauder suddenly upon them!
For they have dug a pit to catch me
    and laid snares for my feet.(O)
23 Yet you, O Lord, know
    all their plotting to kill me.
Do not forgive their iniquity;
    do not blot out their sin from your sight.
Let them be tripped up before you;
    deal with them while you are angry.(P)

The Broken Earthenware Jug

19 Thus said the Lord: Go and buy a potter’s earthenware jug. Take with you[f] some of the elders of the people and some of the senior priests, and go out to the valley of the son of Hinnom at the entry of the Potsherd Gate, and proclaim there the words that I tell you.(Q) You shall say: Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: I am going to bring such disaster upon this place that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle.(R) Because the people have forsaken me and have profaned this place by making offerings in it to other gods whom neither they nor their ancestors nor the kings of Judah have known, and because they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent(S) and gone on building the high places of Baal to burn their children in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or decree, nor did it enter my mind,(T) therefore the days are surely coming, says the Lord, when this place shall no more be called Topheth or the valley of the son of Hinnom but the valley of Slaughter.(U) And in this place I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem and will make them fall by the sword before their enemies and by the hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies for food to the birds of the air and to the wild animals of the earth.(V) And I will make this city a horror, a thing to be hissed at; everyone who passes by it will be horrified and will hiss because of all its disasters.(W) And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and all shall eat the flesh of their neighbors in the siege and in the distress with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them.(X)

10 Then you shall break the jug in the sight of those who go with you 11 and shall say to them: Thus says the Lord of hosts: So will I break this people and this city as one breaks a potter’s vessel, so that it can never be mended. In Topheth they shall bury until there is no more room to bury.(Y) 12 Thus will I do to this place, says the Lord, and to its inhabitants, making this city like Topheth. 13 And the houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah shall be defiled like the place of Topheth—all the houses upon whose roofs offerings have been made to the whole host of heaven and libations have been poured out to other gods.(Z)

14 When Jeremiah came from Topheth, where the Lord had sent him to prophesy, he stood in the court of the Lord’s house and said to all the people:(AA) 15 Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: I am now bringing upon this city and upon all its towns all the disaster that I have pronounced against it, because they have stiffened their necks, refusing to hear my words.(AB)

Footnotes

  1. 18.14 Cn: Heb of the field
  2. 18.14 Cn: Heb foreign
  3. 18.14 Cn: Heb Are . . . plucked up?
  4. 18.15 Gk Syr Vg: Heb they made them stumble
  5. 18.18 Heb strike him with the tongue
  6. 19.1 Syr Tg Compare Gk: Heb lacks take with you

Godlessness in the Last Days

You must understand this, that in the last days distressing times will come. For people will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy,(A) unfeeling, implacable, slanderers, profligates, brutes, haters of good,(B) treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God,(C) holding to the outward form of godliness but denying its power. Avoid them! For among them are those who make their way into households and captivate immature women, overwhelmed by their sins and swayed by all kinds of desires,(D) who are always studying yet never able to recognize truth. As Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these people, of corrupt mind and counterfeit faith, also oppose the truth.(E) But they will not make much progress because, as in the case of those two men,[a] their folly will become plain to everyone.

Paul’s Charge to Timothy

10 Now you have observed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness,(F) 11 my persecutions, and my sufferings, the things that happened to me in Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra. What persecutions I endured! Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them.(G) 12 Indeed, all who want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.(H) 13 But wicked people and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving others and being deceived.(I) 14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it 15 and how from childhood you have known sacred writings that are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All scripture is inspired by God and is[b] useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,(J) 17 so that the person of God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.(K)

Footnotes

  1. 3.9 Gk lacks two men
  2. 3.16 Or Every scripture inspired by God is also