Jeremiah 7:16-28

16“As for you, do not pray for these people. Do not offer a cry or a prayer on their behalf, and do not beg me, for I will not listen to you.

17Don’t you see how they behave in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

18The sons gather wood, the fathers light the fire, and the women knead dough to make cakes for the queen of heaven, and they pour out drink offerings to other gods so that they provoke me to anger.

19But are they really provoking me?” This is the Lord’s declaration. “Isn’t it they themselves being provoked to disgrace?”

20Therefore, this is what the Lord God says: “Look, my anger — my burning wrath — is about to be poured out on this place, on people and animals, on the tree of the field, and on the produce of the land. My wrath will burn and not be quenched.”

21This is what the Lord of Armies, the God of Israel, says: “Add your burnt offerings to your other sacrifices, and eat the meat yourselves,

22for when I brought your ancestors out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak with them or command them concerning burnt offering and sacrifice.

23However, I did give them this command: ‘Obey me, and then I will be your God, and you will be my people. Follow every way I command you so that it may go well with you.’

24Yet they didn’t listen or pay attention but followed their own advice and their own stubborn, evil heart. They went backward and not forward.

25Since the day your ancestors came out of the land of Egypt until today, I have sent all my servants the prophets to you time and time again.

26However, my people wouldn’t listen to me or pay attention but became obstinate; they did more evil than their ancestors.

27“When you speak all these things to them, they will not listen to you. When you call to them, they will not answer you.

28Therefore, declare to them, ‘This is the nation that would not listen to the Lord their God and would not accept discipline. Truth has perished — it has disappeared from their mouths.