Jeremiah 18:1-17
Expanded Bible
The Potter and the Clay
18 This is the word the Lord spoke to Jeremiah: 2 “Get up and go down to the potter’s house, and I will ·give you my message there [L make you hear my words].” 3 So I went down to the potter’s house and saw him working at the potter’s wheel. 4 He was using his hands to make a pot from clay, but something went wrong with it. So he used that clay to make another pot the way he wanted it to be.
5 Then the Lord spoke his word to me: 6 “·Family [L House] of Israel, can’t I do the same thing with you?” says the Lord. “You are in my hands like the clay in the potter’s hands. 7 There may come a time when I will ·speak about [declare concerning] a nation or a kingdom that I will ·pull [pluck] up by its roots or that I will ·pull [tear] down to destroy it [1:10]. 8 But if the people of that nation ·stop doing the evil they have done [turn back/repent from its evil concerning which I have spoken], I will ·change my mind [repent] and not carry out my plans to bring ·disaster to [evil on] them. 9 There may come another time when I will ·speak about a [declare concerning that] nation that I will build up and plant. 10 But if ·I see it doing evil [L it does evil in my eyes] by not ·obeying [listening to] me, I will ·change my mind [repent] and not carry out my plans to do good for them.
11 “·So [Now], say this to the people of Judah and those who live in Jerusalem: ‘This is what the Lord says: I am ·preparing [shaping] ·disaster [evil] for you and making plans against you. ·So stop doing evil [L Turn away from your evil way/path]. ·Change [Improve/Amend] your ·ways [paths] and ·do what is right [L your actions].’ 12 But they [C the people of Judah] will answer, ‘It won’t do any good to try! We will ·continue to do what we want [L go after our plans]. Each of us will do what his stubborn, evil heart wants!’”
13 So this is what the Lord says:
“Ask ·the people in other nations this question [L among the nations]:
‘·Have you ever [L Who has] heard anything like this?’
The ·people [L virgin daughter] of Israel have done a horrible thing.
14 ·The [L Does the…?] snow of Lebanon
·never melts from [ever leave the] the rocks of ·the fields [L or Sirion; C another name for Mount Hermon].
Its cool, ·flowing [L foreign; strange] streams
do not ·dry up [L get plucked up].
15 But my people have forgotten me.
They burn incense to ·worthless [useless; meaningless] idols
and ·have stumbled [L they make them stumble] in ·what they do [L their ways/paths]
and in the ·old ways of their ancestors [L ancient ways].
They walk along back roads
·and on poor [L ways/paths that are not] highways.
16 So ·Judah’s country [L their land] will become an ·empty desert [wasteland; desolation].
People will not stop ·making fun of [L hissing at] it.
They will shake their heads as they pass by;
they will be shocked at how the country was destroyed.
17 Like a strong east wind,
I will scatter them [C the people of Judah] before their enemies.
·At that awful time [L In the day of their calamity] ·they will not see me coming to help them;
they will see me leaving [L I will show them my back and not my face].”
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