Jeremiah 15 - 16

Yahweh Appoints Four Kinds of Doom

Then Yahweh said to me, “Even though Moses and Samuel were to stand before Me, My soul would not be with this people; send them away from My presence and let them go! 2 And it will be that when they say to you, ‘Where should we go?’ then you are to tell them, ‘Thus says Yahweh:

“Those destined for death, to death;

And those destined for the sword, to the sword;

And those destined for famine, to famine;

And those destined for captivity, to captivity.”’

3 I will appoint over them four kinds of doom,” declares Yahweh: “the sword to kill, the dogs to drag off, and the birds of the sky and the beasts of the earth to devour and bring to ruin. 4 I will give them over to be an example of terror among all the kingdoms of the earth because of Manasseh, the son of Hezekiah, the king of Judah, for what he did in Jerusalem. 5

“Indeed, who will spare you, O Jerusalem,

Or who will console you,

Or who will turn aside to ask about your well‑being?

You who have abandoned Me,” declares Yahweh,

“You keep going backward.

So I will stretch out My hand against you and bring you to ruin;

I am tired of relenting!

And I will winnow them with a winnowing fork

At the gates of the land;

I will bereave them of children; I will make My people perish;

They did not repent of their ways.

Their widows will be more numerous before Me

Than the sand of the seas;

I will bring against them, against the mother of a choice man,

A destroyer at noonday;

I will suddenly bring down on her

Anguish and terror.

She who bore seven sons languishes;

Her breathing is labored.

Her sun has set while it was yet day;

She has been shamed and humiliated.

So I will give over their survivors to the sword

Before their enemies,” declares Yahweh.

Jeremiah Pleads for Vengeance

Woe to me, my mother, that you have borne me

As a man of strife and a man of contention to all the land!

I have not lent, nor have men lent money to me,

Yet everyone curses me.

Yahweh said, “Surely I will set you free for purposes of good;

Surely I will cause the enemy to intercede with you

In a time of disaster and a time of distress.

“Can anyone smash iron,

Iron from the north, or bronze?

Your wealth and your treasures

I will give for plunder without cost,

Even for all your sins

And within all your borders.

Then I will cause your enemies to pass it over

Into a land you do not know,

For a fire has been kindled in My anger;

It will burn upon you.”

You who know, O Yahweh,

Remember me, take notice of me,

And take vengeance for me on my persecutors.

Do not, in view of Your patience, take me away;

Know that for Your sake I endure reproach.

Your words were found, and I ate them,

And Your words became for me joy and gladness in my heart,

For I have been called by Your name,

O Yahweh God of hosts.

I did not sit in the circle of merrymakers,

Nor did I exult.

Because of Your hand upon me I sat alone,

For You filled me with indignation.

Why has my pain been perpetual

And my wound incurable, refusing to be healed?

Will You indeed be to me like a deceptive stream

With water that is unreliable?

Yahweh’s Answer

19 Therefore thus says Yahweh,

“If you return, then I will cause you to return—

Before Me you will stand;

And if you extract the precious from the worthless,

You will become My mouthpiece.

They for their part may turn to you,

But as for you, you must not turn to them.

Then I will make you to this people

A fortified wall of bronze;

And they will fight against you,

But they will not prevail against you,

For I am with you to save you

And deliver you,” declares Yahweh.

“So I will deliver you from the hand of the evil ones,

And I will redeem you from the grasp of the ruthless ones.”

Yahweh Withdraws His Favor

The word of Yahweh also came to me saying, 2 “You shall not take a wife for yourself nor have sons or daughters in this place.” 3 For thus says Yahweh concerning the sons and daughters born in this place and concerning their mothers who bear them and their fathers who beget them in this land: 4 “They will die of deadly diseases; they will not be lamented or buried; they will be as dung on the surface of the ground and come to an end by sword and famine, and their carcasses will become food for the birds of the sky and for the beasts of the earth.” 5 For thus says Yahweh, “Do not enter the house of the funeral meal, or go to lament or to console them; for I have withdrawn My peace from this people,” declares Yahweh, “My lovingkindness and compassion. 6 Both great men and small will die in this land; they will not be buried; they will not be lamented, nor will anyone gash himself or shave his head for them. 7 Men will not break bread in mourning for them, to comfort anyone for the dead, nor give them a cup of comforting to drink for anyone’s father or mother. 8 Moreover you shall not go into a house of feasting to sit with them to eat and drink.” 9 For thus says Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel: “Behold, I am going to cause to cease from this place, before your eyes and in your days, the voice of rejoicing and the voice of gladness, the voice of the groom and the voice of the bride. 10 “Now when you tell this people all these words, they will say to you, ‘For what reason has Yahweh declared all this great calamity against us? And what is our iniquity, or what is our sin which we have committed against Yahweh our God?’ 11 Then you are to say to them, ‘It is because your fathers have forsaken Me,’ declares Yahweh, ‘and have walked after other gods and served them and worshiped them; but Me they have forsaken and have not kept My law. 12 You too have done evil, even more than your fathers; for behold, you are each one walking according to the stubbornness of his own evil heart, without listening to Me. 13 So I will hurl you out of this land into the land which you have not known, neither you nor your fathers; and there you will serve other gods day and night, for I will grant you no favor.’

They Shall Know My Name Is Yahweh

14 “Therefore behold, days are coming,” declares Yahweh, “when it will no longer be said, ‘As Yahweh lives, who brought up the sons of Israel out of the land of Egypt,’ 15 but, ‘As Yahweh lives, who brought up the sons of Israel from the land of the north and from all the lands where He had banished them.’ For I will return them to their own land which I gave to their fathers. 16 “Behold, I am going to send for many fishermen,” declares Yahweh, “and they will fish for them; and afterwards I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt them from every mountain and every hill and from the crevices of the rocks. 17 For My eyes are on all their ways; they are not hidden from My face, nor is their iniquity concealed from My eyes. 18 I will first doubly repay their iniquity and their sin because they have profaned My land; they have filled My inheritance with the carcasses of their detestable idols and with their abominations.” 19

O Yahweh, my strength and my strong defense,

And my refuge in the day of distress,

To You the nations will come

From the ends of the earth and say,

“Our fathers have inherited nothing but lies,

Futility and things of no profit.”

Can man make gods for himself?

Yet they are not gods!

“Therefore behold, I am going to make them know—

This time I will make them know

My power and My might;

And they shall know that My name is Yahweh.”

Romans 7

Released from the Law

Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is master over a person as long as he lives? 2 For the married woman has been bound by law to her husband while he is living, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning the husband. 3 So then, if while her husband is living she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress though she is joined to another man. 4 So, my brothers, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. 6 But now we have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were constrained, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. 7 What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! Rather, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law. For I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, taking opportunity through the commandment, worked out in me coveting of every kind. For apart from the Law sin is dead. 9 Now I was once alive apart from the Law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died; 10 and this commandment, which was to lead to life, was found to lead to death for me. 11 For sin, taking an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So, the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.

The Conflict of Two Natures

13 Therefore did that which is good become a cause of death for me? May it never be! Rather it was sin, in order that it might be shown to be sin by working out my death through that which is good, so that through the commandment sin would become utterly sinful. 14 For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, having been sold into bondage under sin. 15 For what I am working out, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. 16 But if I do the very thing I do not want, I agree with the Law, that it is good. 17 So now, no longer am I the one working it out, but sin which dwells in me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the working out of the good is not. 19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. 20 But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one working it out, but sin which dwells in me. 21 I find then the principle that in me evil is present—in me who wants to do good. 22 For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, 23 but I see a different law in my members, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a captive to the law of sin which is in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from the body of this death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

Psalm 104

The Glory of Yahweh Endures Forever

Bless Yahweh, O my soul!

O Yahweh my God, You are very great;

You are clothed with splendor and majesty,

Wrapping Yourself with light as with a cloak,

Stretching out the heavens like a tent curtain.

He lays the beams of His upper chambers in the waters;

He sets up the clouds to be His chariot;

He walks upon the wings of the wind;

He makes His angels the winds,

His ministers flaming fire.

He founded the earth upon its place,

So that it will not shake forever and ever.

You covered it with the deep as with a garment;

The waters were standing above the mountains.

At Your rebuke they fled,

At the sound of Your thunder they hurried away in alarm.

The mountains went up; the valleys went down

To the place which You founded for them.

You set a boundary that they may not pass over,

So that they will not return to cover the earth.

He sends forth springs in the valleys;

They flow between the mountains;

They give water to every beast of the field;

The wild donkeys quench their thirst.

Above them the birds of the heavens dwell;

They give forth their voices among the branches.

He gives water to the mountains from His upper chambers;

The earth is satisfied with the fruit of His works.

He causes the grass to grow for the cattle,

And vegetation for man’s cultivation,

To bring forth food from the earth,

And wine which makes man’s heart glad,

To make his face glisten more than oil,

And food which sustains man’s heart.

The trees of Yahweh are satisfied,

The cedars of Lebanon which He planted,

Where the birds build their nests,

The stork’s home is in the fir trees.

The high mountains are for the wild goats;

The cliffs are a refuge for the shephanim.

He made the moon for the seasons;

The sun knows the place of its setting.

You appoint darkness so that it becomes night,

In which all the beasts of the forest creep about.

The young lions roar to go after their prey

And to seek their food from God.

When the sun rises they gather together

And lie down in their dens.

Man goes forth to his work

And to his labor until evening.

How numerous are Your works, O Yahweh!

In wisdom You have made them all;

The earth is full of Your possessions.

This is the sea, great and broad,

There the creeping things are without number,

Creatures both small and great.

There the ships move along,

And Leviathan, which You have formed to play in it.

They all wait for You

To give them their food in due season.

You give to them, they gather it up;

You open Your hand, they are satisfied with good.

You hide Your face, they are dismayed;

You take away their spirit, they breathe their last

And return to their dust.

You send forth Your Spirit, they are created;

And You renew the face of the ground.

Let the glory of Yahweh endure forever;

Let Yahweh be glad in His works;

He looks at the earth, and it trembles;

He touches the mountains, and they smoke.

I will sing to Yahweh throughout my life;

I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.

Let my musing be pleasing to Him;

As for me, I shall be glad in Yahweh.

Let sinners be consumed from the earth

And let the wicked be no more.

Bless Yahweh, O my soul.

Praise Yah!