Jeremiah’s Message at the Temple Gate

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, 2 “Stand in the gate of the house of the LORD and proclaim this message: Hear the word of the LORD, all you people of Judah who enter through these gates to worship the LORD. 3 Thus says the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: Correct your ways and deeds, and I will let you live in this place. 4 Do not trust in deceptive words, saying:

‘[This is] the temple of the LORD,

the temple of the LORD,

the temple of the LORD.’

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For if you really correct your ways and deeds, if you act justly toward one another, 6 if you no longer oppress the foreigner [and] the fatherless and the widow, and [if you] no longer shed innocent blood in this place or follow other gods to your own harm 7 then I will let you live in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers forever and ever.

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But look, you keep trusting in deceptive words to no avail. 9 Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury burn incense to Baal, and follow other gods that you have not known, 10 and then come and stand before Me in this house, which bears My Name and say,‘We are delivered, so we can continue with all these abominations’? 11 Has this house, which bears My Name, become a den of robbers[fn] in your sight? Yes, I too have seen it, declares the LORD.

12 

But go now to the place in Shiloh where I first made a dwelling for My Name and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel. 13 And now, because you have done all these things, declares the LORD, and because I have spoken to you again and again but you would not listen, and I have called to you but you would not answer, 14 therefore what I did to Shiloh I will now do to the house that bears My Name [the house] in which you trust the place that I gave to you and your fathers 15 And I will cast you out of My presence, just as I have cast out all your brothers, all the descendants of Ephraim.

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