Jeremiah 18:1 - 18:17 - Legacy Standard Bible

Jeremiah 18:1 - 18:17

The Potter and the Clay

The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh saying, 2 “Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will make you hear My words.” 3 Then I went down to the potter’s house, and behold, he was making something on the wheel. 4 But the vessel that he was making of clay was ruined in the hand of the potter, so he turned around and made it into another vessel, according to what was right in the eyes of the potter to make. 5 Then the word of Yahweh came to me saying, 6 “Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does?” declares Yahweh. “Behold, like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel. 7 At one moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to uproot, to tear down, or to make it perish; 8 but if that nation against which I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent concerning the calamity I planned to do against it. 9 Or at another moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to build up or to plant it; 10 but if it does evil in My sight by not listening to My voice, then I will relent concerning the good which I promised, to do good to it. 11 So now then, speak to the men of Judah and against the inhabitants of Jerusalem saying, ‘Thus says Yahweh, “Behold, I am forming calamity against you and devising a plan against you. Oh turn back, each of you from his evil way, and do good in your ways and your deeds.”’ 12 But they will say, ‘It’s hopeless! For we are going to follow our own plans, and each of us will act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart.’ 13 “Therefore thus says Yahweh,

‘Ask now among the nations,

Who ever heard the like of this?

The virgin of Israel

Has done a most appalling thing.

Does the snow of Lebanon forsake the rock of the open country?

Or is the cold flowing water from a strange land ever uprooted?

For My people have forgotten Me;

They burn incense to worthless gods,

And they have stumbled from their ways,

From the ancient paths,

To walk in bypaths,

Not on a highway,

To make their land an object of horror,

An object of perpetual hissing;

Everyone who passes by it will be horrified

And shake his head.

Like an east wind I will scatter them

Before the enemy;

I will show them My back and not My face

In the day of their disaster.’”