Jeremiah accuses God of injustice
1LORD, I know you’re a fair judge of people,
But it doesn’t look that way right now.
Let me ask you some questions.
Why do you let evil people get away with it?
Why do they succeed and get rich?
They grow and load themselves with fruit.
You are always on their lips,
But never in their hearts.
3LORD, you know I’m not like that.
My heart is your property.
Cut the evil sheep from the flock.
Tag them for slaughter on butchering day.
4How long will this drought go on because of them?
How much longer will our fields wither and die?
Even our animals are dying.
And it’s all because wicked folks say,
“He doesn’t see what we’re doing.”
God’s shocking answer to Jeremiah
5You think it’s exhausting to race fellow runners?
Wait until you find yourself running from horses. [1]
You live in a peaceful land right now.
But how will you handle the jungles of Jordan? [2]
They trash you loud and hard behind your back.
Those friendly words they say to your face
Are nothing like what they say when you’re not around.
Judah in the hands of an angry God
7I have left home [3]
And walked away from my people.
I love them.
But now I give them to their enemies.
They attack me like a jungle lion.
That makes them my enemy,
And I hate them for it.
9My people are like a speckled bird
Attracting a sky full of vultures.
Go call all the wild animals
To devour her.
10Over the years, many kings destroyed my land
Like shepherds and flocks trampling a vineyard.
They turned my beautiful land
Into a deserted wasteland. [4]
11The desolate land cries out to me.
The people are gone,
And farms destroyed,
But no one’s left to care.
12Invaders cross the deserts
And crest the hills.
They carry the sword of the LORD
And kill people throughout the land.
No one is safe.
13Judah’s people planted wheat
But grew thorns instead,
Because of God’s anger.
They worked themselves bone tired.
But have nothing to show for it.
This harvest of nothing
Will shame them all.
God’s warning to Israel’s neighbors
14This is the LORD’s message to Israel’s evil neighbors who raided the land that God had promised to the people of Israel:I’m going to kick you out of your land. I’ll do the same to Judah, separately. 15But the difference is that I’ll show Judah’s people mercy and eventually bring them home. [5] Every family will get back their land.
16If they learn the way of living that I gave them, and if they devote themselves to me like they once devoted themselves to Baal, I’ll take care of them. 17But if they ignore me again, I the LORD will tear them out of the land like I’m uprooting a tree and I’ll destroy them.
