Jeremiah 3
1 “If a man sends his wife away, and she leaves him and becomes another man’s wife, will he take her back? Wouldn’t that land be completely defiled? You have prostituted yourself with many lovers, yet return to me!” says the LORD.
2 Look up at the bare hills and see: Where have you not been violated? You sat by the roads, waiting for them, like an Arab in the wilderness, and defiled the land with your prostitution and wickedness.
3 So the showers were withheld, and there was no spring rain. Yet you had the brazen face of a prostitute and refused to feel shame.
4 Haven’t you just now called to me, ‘My father, you are the friend of my youth’?
5 ‘Will he stay resentful forever? Will he be angry to the end?’ Look, you say this, but you do evil and have your way.”
6 The LORD said to me in the days of King Josiah: “Have you seen what faithless Israel did? She went up every high hill and went under every leafy tree, and there she prostituted herself.
7 I thought, ‘After doing all this, she will return to me.’ But she did not return. And her sister, treacherous Judah, saw it.
8 I saw that for all her adulteries, I sent faithless Israel away and gave her a certificate of divorce. But treacherous Judah, her sister, was not afraid; she too went and prostituted herself.
9 Because she treated her prostitution lightly, she defiled the land and committed adultery with stone and wood.
10 Even after all this, treacherous Judah, her sister, did not return to me with all her heart, but only with deceit,” says the LORD.
11 The LORD said to me: “Faithless Israel has proved more righteous than treacherous Judah.
12 Go and proclaim these words toward the north: ‘Return, faithless Israel,’ says the LORD. ‘I will not look on you in anger, for I am faithful,’ says the LORD. ‘I will not stay resentful forever.
13 Only acknowledge your guilt: you rebelled against the LORD your God, scattered your favors among strangers under every leafy tree, and you did not listen to my voice,” says the LORD.
14 ‘Return, rebellious children,’ says the LORD, ‘for I am your husband. I will take you, one from each city and two from each clan, and bring you to Zion.
15 I will give you shepherds after my own heart, and they will shepherd you with knowledge and understanding.
16 When you multiply and become fruitful in the land, in those days,” says the LORD, “people will no longer say, ‘The ark of the covenant of the LORD.’ It will not come to mind; no one will remember it or miss it, and it will not be made again.
17 At that time Jerusalem will be called the Throne of the LORD, and all the nations will gather there, to the name of the LORD, in Jerusalem. They will no longer follow the stubbornness of their evil hearts.
18 In those days the house of Judah will walk together with the house of Israel, and they will come together from the land of the north to the land I gave your ancestors as an inheritance.
19 I thought, ‘How I long to place you among my children and give you a desirable land, the most splendid inheritance among the nations!’ I thought you would call me ‘My father’ and never turn away from following me.
20 But just as a woman betrays her companion, so you have betrayed me, house of Israel,” says the LORD.
21 A voice is heard on the bare hills: the weeping and pleading of the people of Israel, because they have twisted their way and forgotten the LORD their God.
22 “Return, rebellious children, and I will heal your faithlessness.” “Here we are; we have come to you, for you are the LORD our God.
23 Surely the clamor on the hills, the uproar on the mountains, is a lie. Surely the salvation of Israel is in the LORD our God.
24 But Shame has devoured the labor of our ancestors from our youth: their sheep and cattle, their sons and daughters.
25 Let us lie down in our shame, and let our disgrace cover us, for we have sinned against the LORD our God, we and our ancestors, from our youth until this day, and we have not listened to the voice of the LORD our God.”
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