Jeremiah 10:17-22

New International Reader's Version

The Land Will Be Destroyed

¹⁷People of Jerusalem, your enemies have surrounded you.
    They are attacking you.
So gather up what belongs to you.
    Then leave the land.
¹⁸The Lord says,
    “I am about to throw out of this land
    everyone who lives in it.
I will bring trouble on them.
    They will be captured.”

¹⁹How terrible it will be for me!
    I’ve been wounded!
    And my wound can’t be healed!
In spite of that, I said to myself,
    “I’m sick. But I’ll have to put up with it.”
²⁰Jerusalem is like a tent that has been destroyed.
    All its ropes have snapped.
My people have gone away from me.
    Now no one is left to set up my tent.
    I have no one to set up my shelter.
²¹The leaders of my people are like shepherds
    who don’t have any sense.
    They don’t ask the Lord for advice.
That’s why they don’t succeed.
    And that’s why their whole flock
    is scattered like sheep.
²²Listen! A message is coming!
    I hear the sound of a great army
    marching down from the north!
It will turn Judah’s towns into a desert.
    They will become a home for wild dogs.