My days have passed, my plans are shattered, even the desires of my heart.

The fiery bellows of judgment burn fiercely. But there is too much dross to be removed. The process of refining them has proved useless. The wicked have not been purged.

But our tents have been destroyed. The ropes that held them in place have been ripped apart. Our children are gone and are not coming back. There is no survivor to put our tents back up, no one left to hang their tent curtains in place.

The priests carrying the ark of the covenant of the Lord came up from the middle of the Jordan, and as soon as they set foot on dry land, the water of the Jordan flowed again and returned to flood stage.

I will go to the leaders and speak with them. Surely they know what the Lord demands. Surely they know what their God requires of them.” Yet all of them, too, have rejected his authority and refuse to submit to him.