Daily Text and Bible Reading: Thursday, August 21 [Press play below]

8.1 “At that time,” declares Jehovah, “the bones of the kings of Judah, the bones of its princes, the bones of the priests, the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem will be taken from their graves.
8.2 They will be spread out to the sun and to the moon and to all the army of the heavens that they loved and served and followed and sought after and bowed down to. They will not be gathered, nor will they be buried. They will become like manure on the surface of the ground.”
8.3 “And the remnant of this evil family who survive will choose death over life in all the places where I disperse them,” declares Jehovah of armies.
8.4 “And you must say to them, ‘This is what Jehovah says: “Will they fall and not get up again? If one would turn back, will the other not also turn back?
8.5 Why is this people, Jerusalem, unfaithful with an enduring unfaithfulness? They hold fast to deception; They refuse to turn back.
8.6 I paid attention and kept listening, but the way they spoke was not right. Not a man repented over his wickedness or asked, ‘What have I done?’ Each one keeps returning to the popular course, like a horse dashing into the battle.
8.7 Even the stork in the sky knows its seasons; The turtledove and the swift and the thrush keep to the time of their return. But my own people do not understand the judgment of Jehovah.”’
8.8 ‘How can you say: “We are wise, and we have the law of Jehovah”? For in fact, the lying stylus of the scribes has been used only for falsehood.
8.9 The wise have been put to shame. They have become terrified and will be caught. Look! They have rejected the word of Jehovah, And what wisdom do they have?
8.10 So I will give their wives to other men, Their fields to other owners; For from the least to the greatest, each one is making dishonest gain; From the prophet to the priest, each one is practicing fraud.
8.11 And they try to heal the breakdown of the daughter of my people lightly, saying, “There is peace! There is peace!” When there is no peace.
8.12 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.
8.13 ‘When I gather them, I will bring them to their end,’ declares Jehovah. ‘There will be no grapes left on the vine, no figs on the fig tree, and the leaves will wither. And what I gave to them will be lost to them.’”
8.14 “Why are we sitting here? Let us gather together and enter the fortified cities and perish there. For Jehovah our God will do away with us, And he gives us poisoned water to drink, Because we have sinned against Jehovah.
8.15 There was a hope for peace, but nothing good came, For a time of healing, but there is terror!
8.16 From Dan is heard the snorting of his horses. At the sound of the neighing of his stallions, The whole land quakes. They come in and devour the land and everything in it, The city and its inhabitants.”
8.17 “For here I am sending in serpents among you, Poisonous snakes that cannot be charmed, And they will certainly bite you,” declares Jehovah.
8.18 My grief is incurable; My heart is sick.
8.19 From a distant land there is a cry for help From the daughter of my people: “Is Jehovah not in Zion? Or is her king not in her?” “Why have they offended me with their graven images, With their worthless foreign gods?”
8.20 “The harvest has passed, the summer has ended, But we have not been saved!”
8.21 I am shattered over the breakdown of the daughter of my people; I am dejected. Horror has seized me.
8.22 Is there no balsam in Gilead? Or is there no healer there? Why has the daughter of my people not been restored to health?
Chapter 9

9.1 O that my head were waters, My eyes a fountain of tears! Then I would weep day and night For the slain ones of my people.
9.2 O that I had a traveler’s lodging place in the wilderness! Then I would leave my people and go away from them, For they are all adulterers, A band of treacherous people.
9.3 They bend their tongue like a bow; Falsehood, not faithfulness, prevails in the land. “They advance from evil to evil, And they pay no attention to me,” declares Jehovah.
9.4 “Everyone, be on guard against your neighbor, And do not trust even your brother. For every brother is a betrayer, And every neighbor is a slanderer.
9.5 Each one cheats his neighbor, And no one speaks truth. They have taught their tongue to speak falsehood. They wear themselves out doing what is wrong.
9.6 You are living in the midst of deception. In their deception they refused to know me,” declares Jehovah.
9.7 Therefore this is what Jehovah of armies says: “I will smelt them and test them, For what else can I do with the daughter of my people?
9.8 Their tongue is a deadly arrow that speaks deception. With his mouth a person speaks of peace to his neighbor, But inside he lays an ambush.”
9.9 “Should I not call them to account for these things?” declares Jehovah. “Should I not avenge myself on such a nation?
9.10 I will weep and lament over the mountains And take up a dirge over the pastures of the wilderness, For they have been burned up so that no man passes through, And the sound of livestock is not heard. The birds of heaven and the beasts have fled; they are gone.
9.11 I will make Jerusalem piles of stones, the lair of jackals, And I will make the cities of Judah desolate, without an inhabitant.
9.12 Who is wise enough to understand this? To whom has the mouth of Jehovah spoken, that he may declare it? Why has the land perished? Why is it scorched like the wilderness, So that no one is passing through?”
9.13 Jehovah replied: “Because of their rejecting my law that I set before them, and because they have not followed it and obeyed my voice.
9.14 Instead, they stubbornly followed their own hearts, and they followed the Baal images, as their fathers had taught them to do.
9.15 Therefore this is what Jehovah of armies, the God of Israel, says, ‘Here I am making this people eat wormwood, and I will make them drink poisoned water.
9.16 I will scatter them among the nations that they and their fathers have not known, and I will send a sword after them until I will have exterminated them.’
9.17 This is what Jehovah of armies says, ‘Behave with understanding. Summon the women who sing dirges, And send for the skilled women to come,
9.18 So that they may hurry and raise a lamentation for us, So that our eyes may stream with tears And our eyelids trickle with water.
9.19 For the sound of lamentation has been heard from Zion: “How we have been devastated! How great our shame is! For we have left the land, and they have thrown down our homes.”
9.20 You women, hear the word of Jehovah. May your ear receive the word of his mouth. Teach your daughters this lamentation, And teach one another this dirge.
9.21 For death has come up through our windows; It has entered our fortified towers To take away the children from the streets And the young men from the public squares.’
9.22 Say, ‘This is what Jehovah declares: “The dead bodies of people will fall like manure on the surface of the field, Like a row of newly cut grain after the reaper, With no one to gather them up.”’”
9.23 This is what Jehovah says: “Let not the wise man boast about his wisdom; Let not the mighty man boast about his mightiness; And let not the rich man boast about his riches.”
9.24 “But let the one boasting boast about this: That he has insight and knowledge of me, That I am Jehovah, the One showing loyal love, justice, and righteousness in the earth, For in these things I take delight,” declares Jehovah.
9.25 “Look! Days are coming,” declares Jehovah, “and I will hold an accounting with everyone circumcised and yet uncircumcised,
9.26 with Egypt and Judah and Edom and the Ammonites and Moab and with all of those with hair clipped at the temples who are dwelling in the wilderness; for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.”
Chapter 10

10.1 Hear the word that Jehovah has spoken against you, O house of Israel.
10.2 This is what Jehovah says: “Do not learn the way of the nations, And do not be terrified by the signs of the heavens Because the nations are terrified by them.
10.3 For the customs of the peoples are a delusion. It is just a tree of the forest that is cut down, Worked by the hands of the craftsman with his tool.
10.4 They adorn it with silver and gold And fasten it with hammer and nails so that it will not fall over.
10.5 Like a scarecrow in a cucumber field, they cannot speak; They have to be carried, for they cannot walk. Do not fear them, for they can do no harm, Nor can they do any good.”
10.6 No one is like you, O Jehovah. You are great, and your name is great and mighty.
10.7 Who should not fear you, O King of the nations, for it is fitting; Because among all the wise ones of the nations and among all their kingdoms, There is no one at all like you.
10.8 They are all unreasoning and stupid. Instruction from a tree is an utter delusion.
10.9 Silver plates are imported from Tarshish and gold from Uphaz, The work of a craftsman, of the hands of a metalworker. Their clothing is blue thread and purple wool. They are all made by skilled workers.
10.10 But Jehovah is truly God. He is the living God and the eternal King. Because of his indignation the earth will quake, And no nations will endure his denunciation.
10.11 This is what you should say to them: “The gods that did not make the heavens and the earth Will perish from the earth and from under these heavens.”
10.12 He is the Maker of the earth by his power, The One who established the productive land by his wisdom And who stretched out the heavens by his understanding.
10.13 When he makes his voice heard, The waters in the heavens are in turmoil, And he causes clouds to ascend from the ends of the earth. He makes lightning for the rain, And he brings the wind out of his storehouses.
10.14 Every man acts unreasonably and without knowledge. Every metalworker will be put to shame because of the carved image; For his metal image is a falsehood, And there is no spirit in them.
10.15 They are a delusion, a work of mockery. When their day of reckoning comes, they will perish.
10.16 The Share of Jacob is not like these things, For he is the One who formed everything, And Israel is the staff of his inheritance. Jehovah of armies is his name.
10.17 Gather up your bundle from the ground, O woman dwelling under siege.
10.18 For this is what Jehovah says: “Here I am hurling the inhabitants out of the land at this time, And I will cause them to experience distress.”
10.19 Woe to me because of my breakdown! My wound is incurable. And I said: “Surely this is my sickness, and I must bear it.
10.20 My tent has been devastated, and my tent cords have all been torn apart. My sons have left me and are no more. There is no one left to stretch out my tent or raise up my tent cloths.
10.21 For the shepherds have behaved senselessly, And they have not inquired of Jehovah. That is why they have not acted with insight, And all their flocks have been scattered.”
10.22 Listen! A report! It is coming! A great pounding from the land of the north, To make the cities of Judah desolate, a lair of jackals.
10.23 I well know, O Jehovah, that man’s way does not belong to him. It does not belong to man who is walking even to direct his step.
10.24 Correct me, O Jehovah, with judgment, But not in your anger, that you may not reduce me to nothing.
10.25 Pour out your wrath on the nations who ignore you And on the families who do not call on your name. For they have devoured Jacob, Yes, they have devoured him to the point of extermination, And they have desolated his homeland.