Jeremiah 18:1-17

This is the word the LORD spoke to Jeremiah: “Go down to the potter’s house, and I will give you my message there.” So I went down to the potter’s house and saw him working at the potter’s wheel. He was using his hands to make a pot from clay, but something went wrong with it. So he used that clay to make another pot the way he wanted it to be. Then the LORD spoke his word to me: “Family of Israel, can’t I do the same thing with you?” says the LORD. “You are in my hands like the clay in the potter’s hands. There may come a time when I will speak about a nation or a kingdom that I will pull up by its roots or that I will pull down to destroy it. But if the people of that nation stop doing the evil they have done, I will change my mind and not carry out my plans to bring disaster to them. There may come another time when I will speak about a nation that I will build up and plant. But if I see it doing evil by not obeying me, I will change my mind and not carry out my plans to do good for them. “So, say this to the people of Judah and those who live in Jerusalem: ‘This is what the LORD says: I am preparing disaster for you and making plans against you. So stop doing evil. Change your ways and do what is right.’ But the people of Judah will answer, ‘It won’t do any good to try! We will continue to do what we want. Each of us will do what his stubborn, evil heart wants!’ ” So this is what the LORD says: “Ask the people in other nations this question: ‘Have you ever heard anything like this?’ The people of Israel have done a horrible thing. The snow on the mountains of Lebanon never melts from the rocks. Its cool, flowing streams do not dry up. But my people have forgotten me. They burn incense to worthless idols and have stumbled in what they do and in the old ways of their ancestors. They walk along back roads and on poor highways. So Judah’s country will become an empty desert. People will not stop making fun of it. They will shake their heads as they pass by; they will be shocked at how the country was destroyed. Like a strong east wind, I will scatter them before their enemies. At that awful time they will not see me coming to help them; they will see me leaving.”