Daily Text and Bible Reading: Wednesday, August 20 [Press play below]

6.1 Take shelter, O sons of Benjamin, away from Jerusalem. Blow the horn in Tekoa; Light a fire signal over Beth-haccherem! For a calamity looms from the north, a great disaster.
6.2 The daughter of Zion resembles a beautiful and delicate woman.
6.3 The shepherds and their droves will come. They will pitch their tents all around her, Each grazing the flock in his care.
6.4 “Prepare for war against her! Rise up, and let us attack her at midday!” “Woe to us, for the day is declining, For the shadows of evening are getting longer!”
6.5 “Rise up, and let us attack during the night And destroy her fortified towers.”
6.6 For this is what Jehovah of armies says: “Cut down wood and raise up a siege rampart against Jerusalem. She is the city that must be held to account; There is nothing but oppression within her.
6.7 As a cistern keeps its water cool, So she keeps her wickedness cool. Violence and destruction are heard in her; Sickness and plague are constantly before me.
6.8 Be warned, O Jerusalem, or I will turn away from you in disgust; I will make you desolate, a land without inhabitants.”
6.9 This is what Jehovah of armies says: “They will thoroughly glean the remnant of Israel as the last grapes on a vine. Pass your hand again like one gathering grapes from the vines.”
6.10 “To whom should I speak and give warning? Who will listen? Look! Their ears are closed, so that they are unable to pay attention. Look! The word of Jehovah has become something they scorn; They find no pleasure in it.
6.11 So I am filled with the wrath of Jehovah, And I am tired of holding it in.” “Pour it out on the child in the street, On the groups of young men gathered together. They will all be captured, a man along with his wife, The old men along with the very old.
6.12 Their houses will be turned over to others, Together with their fields and their wives. For I will stretch my hand out against the inhabitants of the land,” declares Jehovah.
6.13 “For from the least to the greatest, each one is making dishonest gain; From the prophet to the priest, each one is practicing fraud.
6.14 And they try to heal the breakdown of my people lightly, saying, ‘There is peace! There is peace!’ When there is no peace.
6.15 Do they feel ashamed of the detestable things they have done? They feel no shame at all! They do not even know how to feel humiliated! So they will fall among the fallen. When I bring punishment on them they will stumble,” says Jehovah.
6.16 This is what Jehovah says: “Stand at the crossroads and see. Ask about the ancient roadways, Ask where the good way is, and walk in it, And find rest for yourselves.” But they say: “We will not walk in it.”
6.17 “And I appointed watchmen who said, ‘Pay attention to the sound of the horn!’” But they said: “We will not pay attention.”
6.18 “Therefore hear, O nations! And know, O assembly, What will happen to them.
6.19 Listen, O earth! I am bringing calamity on this people As the fruitage of their own schemes, For they paid no attention to my words And they rejected my law.”
6.20 “What do I care that you bring frankincense from Sheba And sweet cane from a distant land? Your whole burnt offerings are not acceptable, And your sacrifices do not please me.”
6.21 Therefore this is what Jehovah says: “Here I am setting for this people stumbling blocks, And they will stumble over them, Fathers and sons together, A neighbor and his companion, And they will all perish.”
6.22 This is what Jehovah says: “Look! A people is coming from the land of the north, And a great nation will be awakened from the remotest parts of the earth.
6.23 They will grab hold of the bow and the javelin. They are cruel and will have no mercy. Their voice will roar like the sea, And they ride on horses. They draw up in battle order like a man of war against you, O daughter of Zion.”
6.24 We have heard the report about it. Our hands fall limp; Distress has seized us, Anguish like that of a woman giving birth.
6.25 Do not go out into the field, And do not walk on the road, For the enemy has a sword; There is terror all around.
6.26 O daughter of my people, Put on sackcloth and roll in the ashes. Mourn as for an only son, with bitter wailing, For suddenly the destroyer will come upon us.
6.27 “I have made you a metal tester among my people, One making a thorough search; You must take note and examine their way.
6.28 All of them are the most stubborn men, Walking about as slanderers. They are like copper and iron; All of them are corrupt.
6.29 The bellows have been scorched. Out from their fire there is lead. One keeps refining intensely simply for nothing, And those who are bad have not been separated.
6.30 Rejected silver is what people will certainly call them, For Jehovah has rejected them.”
Chapter 7

7.1 This is the word that came to Jeremiah from Jehovah, saying:
7.2 “Stand in the gate of the house of Jehovah and proclaim there this message, ‘Hear the word of Jehovah, all you people of Judah who enter these gates to bow down to Jehovah.
7.3 This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, says: “Reform your ways and your actions, and I will allow you to keep residing in this place.
7.4 Do not put your trust in deceptive words and say, ‘This is the temple of Jehovah, the temple of Jehovah, the temple of Jehovah!’
7.5 For if you truly reform your ways and actions; if you truly uphold justice between a man and his neighbor;
7.6 if you do not oppress foreign residents, orphans, and widows; if you do not shed innocent blood in this place; and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm;
7.7 then I will allow you to keep residing in this place, in the land I gave to your forefathers for all time.”’”
7.8 “But you are putting your trust in deceptive words—it will bring absolutely no benefit.
7.9 Can you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make sacrifices to Baal, and follow after gods you had not known,
7.10 and then come and stand before me in this house that bears my name and say, ‘We will be saved,’ despite your doing all these detestable things?
7.11 Has this house that bears my name become a cave of robbers in your eyes? Here I have seen it for myself,” declares Jehovah.
7.12 “‘However, go now to my place in Shiloh, where I first caused my name to reside, and see what I did to it because of the badness of my people Israel.
7.13 But you kept doing all these things,’ declares Jehovah, ‘and even though I spoke to you again and again, you did not listen. I kept calling you, but you would not answer.
7.14 So I will do to the house that bears my name, in which you are trusting, and to this place that I gave to you and your forefathers, just as I did to Shiloh.
7.15 I will throw you out of my sight, just as I threw out all your brothers, all the descendants of Ephraim.’
7.16 “As for you, do not pray in behalf of this people. Do not cry out or offer a prayer or plead with me in their behalf, for I will not listen to you.
7.17 Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?
7.18 The sons are gathering wood, the fathers are lighting the fire, and the wives are kneading dough in order to make sacrificial cakes to the Queen of Heaven, and they are pouring out drink offerings to other gods to offend me.
7.19 ‘But am I the one they are hurting?’ declares Jehovah. ‘Is it not they themselves, to their own shame?’
7.20 Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord Jehovah says, ‘Look! My anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place, on man and beast, on the trees of the field and the fruitage of the ground; it will burn and will not be extinguished.’
7.21 “This is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, says, ‘Go ahead, add your whole burnt offerings to your other sacrifices, and eat the flesh yourselves.
7.22 For on the day I brought your forefathers out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak with them or command them concerning whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.
7.23 But I did give them this command: “Obey my voice, and I will become your God, and you will become my people. You must walk in all the way that I command, so that it may go well with you.”’
7.24 But they did not listen or incline their ear; instead, they walked in their own schemes, stubbornly following their wicked heart, and they went backward, not forward,
7.25 from the day your forefathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day. So I kept sending all my servants the prophets to you, sending them each day, again and again.
7.26 But they refused to listen to me, and they did not incline their ear. Instead, they were stubborn, and they acted worse than their forefathers!
7.27 “You will speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you; you will call to them, but they will not answer you.
7.28 And you will say to them, ‘This is the nation that did not obey the voice of Jehovah their God and refused to accept discipline. Faithfulness has perished and is not even mentioned among them.’
7.29 “Shear off your uncut hair and throw it away, and on the bare hills raise a dirge, for Jehovah has rejected and will abandon this generation that has infuriated him.
7.30 ‘For the people of Judah have done what is bad in my eyes,’ declares Jehovah. ‘They have set up their disgusting idols in the house that bears my name, in order to defile it.
7.31 They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, in order to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, something that I had not commanded and that had never even come into my heart.’
7.32 “‘Therefore look! the days are coming,’ declares Jehovah, ‘when it will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom but the Valley of the Slaughter. They will bury in Topheth until there is no place left.
7.33 And the dead bodies of this people will become food for the birds of the heavens and for the beasts of the earth, with no one to frighten them away.
7.34 I will put an end to the sound of exultation and the sound of rejoicing, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, for the land will be reduced to ruins.’”