Jeremiah 8:18-9:6

Common English Bible

¹⁸No healing,
    only grief;
        my heart is broken.^[a]
¹⁹Listen to the weeping of my people
        all across the land:
    “Isn’t the Lord in Zion?
        Is her king no longer there?”
Why then did they anger me with their images,
    with pointless foreign gods?
²⁰“The harvest is past,
    the summer has ended,
        yet we aren’t saved.”
²¹Because my people are crushed,
    I am crushed;
    darkness and despair overwhelm me.

What to do with God’s people

²²Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then have my people
not been restored to health?

9 ^[b] If only my head were a spring of water,
    and my eyes a fountain of tears,
I would weep day and night
    for the wounds of my people.
²^[c] If only I could flee for shelter in the desert,
    to leave my people
        and forget them—
    for they are all adulterers,
        a bunch of crooks.
³They bend their tongues like bows
        to spew out lies;
    they are renowned in the land,
        but not for truth.
They go from bad to worse.
    They don’t know me!
        declares the Lord.
⁴Be wary of your friends!
    Don’t trust your sibling!^[d]
    Every sibling is a cheater,
        and every friend traffics in slander.
⁵One cheats the other;
    no one tells the truth;
        they train themselves to lie;
        they wear themselves out by doing wrong.
⁶You live in a world of deceit,
    and in their deceit
    they refuse to know me,^[e]
        declares the Lord.