God’s Answer to Jeremiah

5 “If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in a peaceful land, how will you do in the thickets of the Jordan?

6 Even your brothers—your own father’s household—even they have betrayed you; even they have cried aloud against you. Do not trust them, though they speak well of you.

7 I have forsaken My house; I have abandoned My inheritance. I have given the beloved of My soul into the hands of her enemies.

8 My inheritance has become to Me like a lion in the forest. She has roared against Me; therefore I hate her.

9 Is [not] My inheritance to Me like a speckled bird of prey with [other] birds of prey[fn] circling against her? Go, gather all the beasts of the field; bring them to devour her.

10 Many shepherds have destroyed My vineyard; they have trampled My plot of ground. They have turned My pleasant field into a desolate wasteland.

11 They have made it a desolation; desolate before Me, it mourns. All the land is laid waste, but no man takes it to heart.

12 Over all the barren heights in the wilderness the destroyers have come, for the sword of the LORD devours from [one] end of the earth to the other No flesh has peace.

13 They have sown wheat but harvested thorns. They have exhausted themselves to no avail. Bear the shame of your harvest because of the fierce anger of the LORD.”