Jeremiah 10:17-25

17Your enemies are all around and they are ready to attack you. So get all your things together. Prepare to leave your country.

18This is what the Lord says: ‘I will now throw out the people who live in this land. I will bring much trouble to them, and they will be in pain.’

19‘A terrible thing has happened to us! We have received a very bad wound. We thought, “We are very ill, but one day we will get better.”

20But now they have destroyed our tent. They have broken the ropes that held it. Our children have gone, and none of them remain. There is nobody still alive who can help us build our homes again.

21Our leaders are fools. They do not ask the Lord for his advice. So they have failed to take care of us, and all their people have disappeared.

22Listen! We have heard the news! There is the noise of a great army in the north. It is marching towards us! It is coming to attack the towns of Judah. It will make them heaps of stones. Only wild animals will live in them.

23Lord, I know that nobody controls their own life. Nobody can decide what will happen to them.

24Lord, teach us what is right, but do it carefully. Please do not punish us in your anger. That would be the end of us.

25Instead, be angry with the nations that do not respect you. Be angry with the people who do not worship you. Those are the people who have destroyed Jacob's descendants. They have killed our people. They have destroyed our land and our homes.’