But if that nation does what displeases me and does not obey me, then I will cancel the good I promised to do to it.

Then Jeremiah left Topheth where the Lord had sent him to give that prophecy. He went to the Lord’s temple and stood ¹  in its courtyard and called out to all the people.

Cursed be the man who made my father very glad when he brought him the news that a baby boy had been born to him! ¹ 

May that man be like the cities ¹  that the Lord destroyed without showing any mercy. May he hear a cry of distress in the morning and a battle cry at noon.

For he will die in the country where they took him as a captive. He will never see this land again.” ¹ 

I will hand you over to those who want to take your life and of whom you are afraid. I will hand you over to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and his Babylonian ¹  soldiers.

Then I myself will regather those of my people ¹  who are still alive from all the countries where I have driven them. I will bring them back to their homeland. ²  They will greatly increase in number.

“So I, the Lord, say: ¹  ‘A new time will certainly come. ²  People now affirm their oaths with “I swear as surely as the Lord lives who delivered the people of Israel out of Egypt.”

How long will they go on plotting ¹  to make my people forget who I am ²  through the dreams they tell one another? That is just as bad as what their ancestors ³  did when they forgot who I am by worshiping the god Baal. ⁴ 

Let the prophet who has had a dream go ahead and tell his dream. Let the person who has received my message report that message faithfully. What is like straw cannot compare to what is like grain! ¹  I, the Lord, affirm it! ² 

I will punish any prophet, priest, or other person who says “The Lord’s message is burdensome.” ¹  I will punish both that person and his whole family.’” ² 

So ¹  I will carry you far off ²  and throw you away. I will send both you and the city I gave to you and to your ancestors out of my sight. ³ 

One basket had very good-looking figs in it. They looked like those that had ripened early. ¹  The other basket had very bad-looking figs in it, so bad they could not be eaten.

I will bring such disaster on them that all the kingdoms of the earth will be horrified. I will make them an object of reproach, a proverbial example of disaster. I will make them an object of ridicule, an example to be used in curses. ¹  That is how they will be remembered wherever I banish them. ² 

I will bring war, starvation, and disease ¹  on them until they are completely destroyed from the land I gave them and their ancestors.’” ² 

So the prophet Jeremiah spoke to all the people of Judah and to all the people who were living in Jerusalem. ¹ 

So I took the cup from the Lord’s hand. I made all the nations to whom he sent me drink the wine of his wrath. ¹ 

all the kings of Tyre, ¹  all the kings of Sidon; ²  all the kings of the coastlands along the sea; ³ 

Maybe they will pay attention and each of them will stop living the evil way they do. ¹  If they do that, then I will forgo destroying them ²  as I had intended to do because of the wicked things they have been doing. ³ 

Tell them that the Lord says, ¹  ‘You must obey me! You must live according to the way I have instructed you in my laws. ²