Jeremiah 13:1-11

Amplified Bible

The Ruined Waistband

13 Thus the Lord said to me, “Go and buy yourself a linen waistband and put it on your ^[a]loins, but do not put it in water.” ² So I bought the waistband according to the word of the Lord and put it on my loins. ³ Then the word of the Lord came to me a second time, saying, ⁴ “Get up and take the waistband that you have bought, which is [wrapped] around your loins, and go to the [river] Euphrates and hide it there in a crevice of the rock.” ⁵ So I went and hid it by the Euphrates, as the Lord had commanded me. ⁶ And after many days the Lord said to me, “Get up, go to the Euphrates and get the waistband which I commanded you to hide there.” ⁷ Then I went to the Euphrates and dug, and I took the waistband from the place where I had hidden it. And behold, the waistband was decayed and ruined; it was completely worthless.

⁸ Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, ⁹ “Thus says the Lord, ‘In this same way I shall destroy the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem. ¹⁰ These wicked and malevolent people, who refuse to listen to My words, who walk in the stubborn way of their heart and have followed other gods [which are nothing—just man-made carvings] to serve them and to worship them, let them be just like this waistband which is completely worthless. ¹¹ For as the waistband clings to the body of a man, so I caused the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah to cling to Me,’ says the Lord, ‘that they might be for Me a people, a name, a praise, and a glory; but they did not listen and obey.’