Jeremiah 45:3–4

¹THEREFORE seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not;

¹⁶For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.

⁹And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.

¹³But ye, brethren, be not weary in well doing.

³⁴And Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.

³⁵And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted; and he said, For I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him.

³⁶And Jacob their father said unto them, Me have ye bereaved of my children: Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away: all these things are against me.

³⁷And Reuben spake unto his father, saying, Slay my two sons, if I bring him not to thee: deliver him into my hand, and I will bring him to thee again.

³⁸And he said, My son shall not go down with you; for his brother is dead, and he is left alone: if mischief befall him by the way in the which ye go, then shall ye bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.

³For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

⁴Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.

⁵And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him:

¹⁰¶ Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent on usury, nor men have lent to me on usury; yet every one of them doth curse me.

¹¹The Lord said, Verily it shall be well with thy remnant; verily I will cause the enemy to entreat thee well in the time of evil and in the time of affliction.

¹²Shall iron break the northern iron and the steel?

¹³Thy substance and thy treasures will I give to the spoil without price, and that for all thy sins, even in all thy borders.

¹⁴And I will make thee to pass with thine enemies into a land which thou knowest not: for a fire is kindled in mine anger, which shall burn upon you.

¹⁵¶ O Lord, thou knowest: remember me, and visit me, and revenge me of my persecutors; take me not away in thy longsuffering: know that for thy sake I have suffered rebuke.

¹⁶Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by thy name, O Lord God of hosts.

¹⁷I sat not in the assembly of the mockers, nor rejoiced; I sat alone because of thy hand: for thou hast filled me with indignation.

¹⁸Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuseth to be healed? wilt thou be altogether unto me as a liar, and as waters that fail?

¹⁹¶ Therefore thus saith the Lord, If thou return, then will I bring thee again, and thou shalt stand before me: and if thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth: let them return unto thee; but return not thou unto them.

²⁰And I will make thee unto this people a fenced brasen wall: and they shall fight against thee, but they shall not prevail against thee: for I am with thee to save thee and to deliver thee, saith the Lord.

²¹And I will deliver thee out of the hand of the wicked, and I will redeem thee out of the hand of the terrible.

⁷¶ O Lord, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived: thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed: I am in derision daily, every one mocketh me.

⁸For since I spake, I cried out, I cried violence and spoil; because the word of the Lord was made a reproach unto me, and a derision, daily.

⁹Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.

¹⁰¶ For I heard the defaming of many, fear on every side. Report, say they, and we will report it. All my familiars watched for my halting, saying, Peradventure he will be enticed, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him.

¹¹But the Lord is with me as a mighty terrible one: therefore my persecutors shall stumble, and they shall not prevail: they shall be greatly ashamed; for they shall not prosper: their everlasting confusion shall never be forgotten.

¹²But, O Lord of hosts, that triest the righteous, and seest the reins and the heart, let me see thy vengeance on them: for unto thee have I opened my cause.

¹³Sing unto the Lord, praise ye the Lord: for he hath delivered the soul of the poor from the hand of evildoers.

¹⁴¶ Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.

¹⁵Cursed be the man who brought tidings to my father, saying, A man child is born unto thee; making him very glad.

¹⁶And let that man be as the cities which the Lord overthrew, and repented not: and let him hear the cry in the morning, and the shouting at noontide;

¹⁷Because he slew me not from the womb; or that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb to be always great with me.

¹⁸Wherefore came I forth out of the womb to see labour and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?

¹⁸¶ When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint in me.

¹OH that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!

¹¹God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked.

¹²I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark.

¹³His archers compass me round about, he cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground.

²Even to day is my complaint bitter: my stroke is heavier than my groaning.

⁷And Joshua said, Alas, O Lord God, wherefore hast thou at all brought this people over Jordan, to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us? would to God we had been content, and dwelt on the other side Jordan!

⁸O Lord, what shall I say, when Israel turneth their backs before their enemies!

⁹For the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land shall hear of it, and shall environ us round, and cut off our name from the earth: and what wilt thou do unto thy great name?

¹³From above hath he sent fire into my bones, and it prevaileth against them: he hath spread a net for my feet, he hath turned me back: he hath made me desolate and faint all the day.

²²Let all their wickedness come before thee; and do unto them, as thou hast done unto me for all my transgressions: for my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.

¹I AM the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.

²He hath led me, and brought me into darkness, but not into light.

³Surely against me is he turned; he turneth his hand against me all the day.

⁴My flesh and my skin hath he made old; he hath broken my bones.

⁵He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travail.

⁶He hath set me in dark places, as they that be dead of old.

⁷He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy.

⁸Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer.

⁹He hath inclosed my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my paths crooked.

¹⁰He was unto me as a bear lying in wait, and as a lion in secret places.

¹¹He hath turned aside my ways, and pulled me in pieces: he hath made me desolate.

¹²He hath bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.

¹³He hath caused the arrows of his quiver to enter into my reins.

¹⁴I was a derision to all my people; and their song all the day.

¹⁵He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with wormwood.

¹⁶He hath also broken my teeth with gravel stones, he hath covered me with ashes.

¹⁷And thou hast removed my soul far off from peace: I forgat prosperity.

¹⁸And I said, My strength and my hope is perished from the Lord:

¹⁹Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.

³²But though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies.

¹¹And Moses said unto the Lord, Wherefore hast thou afflicted thy servant? and wherefore have I not found favour in thy sight, that thou layest the burden of all this people upon me?

¹²Have I conceived all this people? have I begotten them, that thou shouldest say unto me, Carry them in thy bosom, as a nursing father beareth the sucking child, unto the land which thou swarest unto their fathers?

¹³Whence should I have flesh to give unto all this people? for they weep unto me, saying, Give us flesh, that we may eat.

¹⁴I am not able to bear all this people alone, because it is too heavy for me.

¹⁵And if thou deal thus with me, kill me, I pray thee, out of hand, if I have found favour in thy sight; and let me not see my wretchedness.

¹⁰If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.

⁵Woe is me, that I sojourn in Mesech, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar!

¹³I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

⁷Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts: all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me.

⁶I am weary with my groaning; all the night make I my bed to swim; I water my couch with my tears.

³I am weary of my crying: my throat is dried: mine eyes fail while I wait for my God.

³I remembered God, and was troubled: I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah.

⁴Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak.

¹⁰See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.

⁷At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it;

⁸If that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.

⁹And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it;

¹⁰If it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good, wherewith I said I would benefit them.

²⁸And it shall come to pass, that like as I have watched over them, to pluck up, and to break down, and to throw down, and to destroy, and to afflict; so will I watch over them, to build, and to plant, saith the Lord.

⁶And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

⁷And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.

²And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.

³And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard.

⁴What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?

⁵And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down:

⁶And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.

⁷For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.

¹⁷For the Lord of hosts, that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee, for the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have done against themselves to provoke me to anger in offering incense unto Baal.

⁸Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it.

⁹Thou preparedst room before it, and didst cause it to take deep root, and it filled the land.

¹⁰The hills were covered with the shadow of it, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars.

¹¹She sent out her boughs unto the sea, and her branches unto the river.

¹²Why hast thou then broken down her hedges, so that all they which pass by the way do pluck her?

¹³The boar out of the wood doth waste it, and the wild beast of the field doth devour it.

¹⁴Return, we beseech thee, O God of hosts: look down from heaven, and behold, and visit this vine;

¹⁵And the vineyard which thy right hand hath planted, and the branch that thou madest strong for thyself.

¹⁶It is burned with fire, it is cut down: they perish at the rebuke of thy countenance.