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The LORD is king. He is clothed with majesty and strength. The earth is set firmly in place and cannot be moved.
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Your throne, O LORD, has been firm from the beginning, and you existed before time began.
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The ocean depths raise their voice, O LORD; they raise their voice and roar.
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The LORD rules supreme in heaven, greater than the roar of the ocean, more powerful than the waves of the sea.
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Your laws are eternal, LORD, and your Temple is holy indeed, forever and ever.
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"Go down to the potter's house, where I will give you my message."
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So I went there and saw the potter working at his wheel.
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Whenever a piece of pottery turned out imperfect, he would take the clay and make it into something else.
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Then the LORD said to me,
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"Don't I have the right to do with you people of Israel what the potter did with the clay? You are in my hands just like clay in the potter's hands.
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If at any time I say that I am going to uproot, break down, or destroy any nation or kingdom,
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but then that nation turns from its evil, I will not do what I said I would.
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On the other hand, if I say that I am going to plant or build up any nation or kingdom,
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but then that nation disobeys me and does evil, I will not do what I said I would.
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Now then, tell the people of Judah and of Jerusalem that I am making plans against them and getting ready to punish them. Tell them to stop living sinful lives---to change their ways and the things they are doing.
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They will answer, 'No, why should we? We will all be just as stubborn and evil as we want to be.' "
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The LORD says, "Ask every nation if such a thing has ever happened before. The people of Israel have done a terrible thing!
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Are Lebanon's rocky heights ever without snow? Do its cool mountain streams ever run dry?
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Yet my people have forgotten me; they burn incense to idols. They have stumbled in the way they should go; they no longer follow the old ways; they walk on unmarked paths.
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They have made this land a thing of horror, to be despised forever. All who pass by will be shocked at what they see; they will shake their heads in amazement.
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I will scatter my people before their enemies, like dust blown by the east wind. I will turn my back on them; I will not help them when the disaster comes."
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Then the people said, "Let's do something about Jeremiah! There will always be priests to instruct us, the wise to give us counsel, and prophets to proclaim God's message. Let's bring charges against him and stop listening to what he says."
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So I prayed, " LORD, hear what I am saying and listen to what my enemies are saying about me.
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Is evil the payment for good? Yet they have dug a pit for me to fall in. Remember how I came to you and spoke on their behalf, so that you would not deal with them in anger.
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But now, LORD, let their children starve to death; let them be killed in war. Let the women lose their husbands and children; let the men die of disease and the young men be killed in battle.
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Send a mob to plunder their homes without warning; make them cry out in terror. They have dug a pit for me to fall in and have set traps to catch me.
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But, LORD, you know all their plots to kill me. Do not forgive their evil or pardon their sin. Throw them down in defeat and deal with them while you are angry."
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The LORD told me to go and buy a clay jar. He also told me to take some of the elders of the people and some of the older priests,
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and to go through Potsherd Gate out to Hinnom Valley. There I was to proclaim the message that he would give me.
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The LORD told me to say, "Kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem, listen to what I, the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, have to say. I am going to bring such a disaster on this place that everyone who hears about it will be stunned.
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I am going to do this because the people have abandoned me and defiled this place by offering sacrifices here to other gods---gods that neither they nor their ancestors nor the kings of Judah have known anything about. They have filled this place with the blood of innocent people,
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and they have built altars for Baal in order to burn their children in the fire as sacrifices. I never commanded them to do this; it never even entered my mind.
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So then, the time will come when this place will no longer be called Topheth or Hinnom Valley. Instead, it will be known as Slaughter Valley.
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In this place I will frustrate all the plans of the people of Judah and Jerusalem. I will let their enemies triumph over them and kill them in battle. I will give their corpses to the birds and the wild animals as food.
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I will bring such terrible destruction on this city that everyone who passes by will be shocked and amazed.
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The enemy will surround the city and try to kill its people. The siege will be so terrible that the people inside the city will eat one another and even their own children."
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Then the LORD told me to break the jar in front of those who had gone with me
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and to tell them that the LORD Almighty had said, "I will break this people and this city, and it will be like this broken clay jar that cannot be put together again. People will bury their dead even in Topheth because there will be nowhere else to bury them.
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I promise that I will make this city and its inhabitants like Topheth.
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The houses of Jerusalem, the houses of the kings of Judah, and indeed all the houses on whose roofs incense has been burned to the stars and where wine has been poured out as an offering to other gods---they will all be as unclean as Topheth."
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Then I left Topheth, where the LORD had sent me to proclaim his message. I went and stood in the court of the Temple and told all the people
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that the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, had said, "I am going to bring on this city and on every nearby town all the punishment that I said I would, because you are stubborn and will not listen to what I say."
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When the priest Pashhur son of Immer, who was the chief officer of the Temple, heard me proclaim these things,
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he had me beaten and placed in chains near the upper Benjamin Gate in the Temple.
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The next morning, after Pashhur had released me from the chains, I said to him, "The LORD did not name you Pashhur. The name he has given you is 'Terror Everywhere.'
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The LORD himself has said, 'I am going to make you a terror to yourself and to your friends, and you will see them all killed by the swords of their enemies. I am going to put all the people of Judah under the power of the king of Babylonia; he will take some away as prisoners to his country and put others to death.
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I will also let their enemies plunder all the wealth of this city and seize all its possessions and property, even the treasures of the kings of Judah, and carry everything off to Babylonia.
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As for you, Pashhur, you and all your family will also be captured and taken off to Babylonia. There you will die and be buried, along with all your friends to whom you have told so many lies.' "
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LORD, you have deceived me, and I was deceived. You are stronger than I am, and you have overpowered me. Everyone makes fun of me; they laugh at me all day long.
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Whenever I speak, I have to cry out and shout, "Violence! Destruction!" LORD, I am ridiculed and scorned all the time because I proclaim your message.
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But when I say, "I will forget the LORD and no longer speak in his name," then your message is like a fire burning deep within me. I try my best to hold it in, but can no longer keep it back.
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I hear everybody whispering, "Terror is everywhere! So let's report him to the authorities!" Even my close friends wait for my downfall. "Perhaps he can be tricked," they say; "then we can catch him and get revenge."
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But you, LORD, are on my side, strong and mighty, and those who persecute me will fail. They will be disgraced forever, because they cannot succeed. Their disgrace will never be forgotten.
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But, Almighty LORD, you test people justly; you know what is in their hearts and minds. So let me see you take revenge on my enemies, for I have placed my cause in your hands.
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Sing to the LORD! Praise the LORD! He rescues the oppressed from the power of evil people.
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Curse the day I was born! Forget the day my mother gave me birth!
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Curse the one who made my father glad by bringing him the news, "It's a boy! You have a son!"
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May he be like those cities that the LORD destroyed without mercy. May he hear cries of pain in the morning and the battle alarm at noon,
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for not killing me before I was born. Then my mother's womb would have been my grave.
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Why was I born? Was it only to have trouble and sorrow, to end my life in disgrace?
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After Jesus finished saying this, he looked up to heaven and said, "Father, the hour has come. Give glory to your Son, so that the Son may give glory to you.
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For you gave him authority over all people, so that he might give eternal life to all those you gave him.
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And eternal life means to know you, the only true God, and to know Jesus Christ, whom you sent.
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I have shown your glory on earth; I have finished the work you gave me to do.
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Father! Give me glory in your presence now, the same glory I had with you before the world was made.
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"I have made you known to those you gave me out of the world. They belonged to you, and you gave them to me. They have obeyed your word,
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and now they know that everything you gave me comes from you.
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I gave them the message that you gave me, and they received it; they know that it is true that I came from you, and they believe that you sent me.
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"I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those you gave me, for they belong to you.
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All I have is yours, and all you have is mine; and my glory is shown through them.
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And now I am coming to you; I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world. Holy Father! Keep them safe by the power of your name, the name you gave me, so that they may be one just as you and I are one.
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While I was with them, I kept them safe by the power of your name, the name you gave me. I protected them, and not one of them was lost, except the man who was bound to be lost---so that the scripture might come true.
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And now I am coming to you, and I say these things in the world so that they might have my joy in their hearts in all its fullness.
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I gave them your message, and the world hated them, because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world.
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I do not ask you to take them out of the world, but I do ask you to keep them safe from the Evil One.
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Just as I do not belong to the world, they do not belong to the world.
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Dedicate them to yourself by means of the truth; your word is truth.
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I sent them into the world, just as you sent me into the world.
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And for their sake I dedicate myself to you, in order that they, too, may be truly dedicated to you.
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"I pray not only for them, but also for those who believe in me because of their message.
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I pray that they may all be one. Father! May they be in us, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they be one, so that the world will believe that you sent me.
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I gave them the same glory you gave me, so that they may be one, just as you and I are one:
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I in them and you in me, so that they may be completely one, in order that the world may know that you sent me and that you love them as you love me.
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"Father! You have given them to me, and I want them to be with me where I am, so that they may see my glory, the glory you gave me; for you loved me before the world was made.
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Righteous Father! The world does not know you, but I know you, and these know that you sent me.
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I made you known to them, and I will continue to do so, in order that the love you have for me may be in them, and so that I also may be in them."
