Jeremiah 5:1-15

1Walk around the streets of Jerusalem. Look around, and think about these things. Search the city squares. See if you can find anyone who does what is right and seeks the truth. Then I will forgive Jerusalem.

2People say, “As the Lord lives …” Yet, they lie when they take this oath.

3Lord, your eyes look for the truth. You strike these people, but they don’t feel it. You crush them, but they refuse to be corrected. They are more stubborn than rocks. They refuse to turn back.

4I thought, “These are poor, foolish people. They don’t know the way of the Lord and the justice that God demands.

5Let me go to important people and speak to them. They know the way of the Lord and the justice that God demands.” But they, too, had broken off their yokes and torn off their chains.

6That is why a lion from the forest will attack them. A wolf from the wilderness will destroy them. A leopard will lie in ambush outside their cities. All who leave the cities will be torn to pieces, because they rebel so often and they become more and more unfaithful.

7“Why should I forgive you? Your children abandoned me. They took godless oaths. They committed adultery, even though I satisfied their needs. They traveled in crowds to the houses of prostitutes.

8They are like well-fed stallions that are wild with desire. They neigh for their neighbors’ wives.

9I will punish them for these things,” declares the Lord. “I will punish this nation.

10“Go among Jerusalem’s rows of grapevines and destroy them, but don’t destroy all of them. Cut off the branches because they don’t belong to the Lord.

11The nations of Israel and Judah are unfaithful to me,” declares the Lord.

12They lie about the Lord and say, “He doesn’t exist! Nothing bad will happen to us. We won’t experience war or famine.

13The prophets are nothing but windbags. The Lord hasn’t spoken through them, so let what they say happen to them.”

14This is what the Lord God of Armies says: Because you’ve talked like this, I’m going to put my words in your mouth like a fire. These people will be like wood. My words will burn them up.

15Nation of Israel, I’m going to bring a nation from far away to attack you, declares the Lord. It is a nation that has lasted a long time. It is an ancient nation. You don’t know the language of this nation. You can’t understand what its people say.