Jeremiah 17:1-27

YAHWEH says: “People of Judah, your sins are engraved indelibly on the stone tablets of your hearts and on the horns of your altars, engraved with an iron pen and a chisel with a diamond point. Your people have set up pagan altars to the goddess Asherah everywhere in your land—under large trees, on hills and mountains, and in open fields. So, as punishment for all your sins, I will take your treasures—everything you own, including your altars —and give them all to your enemies. You will forfeit, by your own deeds, the wonderful inheritance I have given you to possess. I will make you serve your enemies in a foreign land you have never known, for you have kindled the flame of my anger, which will burn forever.” YAHWEH said to me: “Even a strong person is cursed when his confidence rests in his own strength. To place your confidence in the strength of man means that you are turning your heart away from me. That person is like a desert tumbleweed in a dry and dusty desert, in a rocky wilderness without inhabitant. Even when goodness is all around him, he won’t experience it. “I will bless with happiness the one who trusts in me, the one who trusts in me alone. He is like a tree planted on the riverbank, extending its roots into streams of water. It does not fear when scorching heat comes, for its leaves remain fresh and never fading even in a year of drought. It has no anxieties but continues to bear luscious fruit.” There is nothing more deceitful than the heart of man; who can understand it? Man’s heart is sick, in need of healing. “I, YAHWEH, probe the heart, and I thoroughly test the inner being to give to all people what they deserve according to their ways and based on their deeds.” Go ahead and cheat others dishonestly, but by mid-life, everything you’ve gained will fly away, like birds hatched from stolen eggs. You will be proven a fool in the end. Our sacred sanctuary is a throne radiating the glory of YAHWEH. YAHWEH, you are the only hope of Israel! All who forsake you will be covered with shame. Those who turn away from you will be written in the dirt. To forsake you, YAHWEH, is to forsake the fountain of living waters. YAHWEH, you alone are my praise. Heal me, and I will be perfectly healed; save me, and I will be completely saved. Listen to what the people keep saying to me: “Where is the word of YAHWEH? Let it come to pass!” But I have not stopped running after you and being a true shepherd. Nor have I secretly longed for the day of disaster. You know every word my lips have spoken, for they were spoken in your presence. Do not cause me disappointment. You are my safe place in a day of calamity. Let those who persecute me be ashamed, and don’t let me be disgraced; let them be the ones who are disheartened and not me. Bring on them the day of disaster, and shatter them with double destruction. YAHWEH said to me: “Go and stand in the public gate of Jerusalem by which the kings of Judah enter and leave, and then go to all the gates of Jerusalem and preach to the people: ‘Hear the word of YAHWEH, you kings and people of Judah, and all who live in Jerusalem who enter by these gates! “ ‘YAHWEH declares: If you value your lives, stop carrying any loads on the Sabbath day, bringing them through the gates of Jerusalem. Nor shall you carry any loads out of your houses on the Sabbath day or do any work; rather, you must set apart that day to honor me as I commanded your ancestors. (Yet they would not listen or obey; they stubbornly refused and would not obey or accept instruction.) If you listen to me, declares YAHWEH, and do not bring in any load through the gates of this city on the Sabbath day but observe the Sabbath day as set apart for me and do no work that day, then kings of David’s lineage will pass through the city’s gates. The kings and their officials will be riding in chariots or riding horses and will be accompanied by the people of Judah and the people of Jerusalem. There will always be people living here. Then people will come from the towns of Judah and from the villages around Jerusalem and from the land of Benjamin, from the lowlands west of Jerusalem, from the hill country, and from the southern desert of Judah, bringing burnt offerings and sacrifices, grain offerings and frankincense, and offerings of thanksgiving to YAHWEH’s house. But if you do not listen to me, if you treat the Sabbath as any other day on which you carry loads through the gates of Jerusalem, then I will set its gates on fire, and that fire will consume even the palaces of Jerusalem, and no one will be able to extinguish it!’ ”