Jeremiah 4:17

Having eyes, don’t you see? Having ears, don’t you hear? Don’t you remember?

Then he answered and spoke to me, saying, “This is Yahweh’s word to Zerubbabel, saying, ‘Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says Yahweh of Armies.

Rejoice greatly, daughter of Zion! Shout, daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King comes to you! He is righteous, and having salvation; lowly, and riding on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

but have done evil above all who were before you, and have gone and made for yourself other gods, molten images, to provoke me to anger, and have cast me behind your back;

Hear, heavens, and listen, earth; for Yahweh has spoken: “I have nourished and brought up children and they have rebelled against me.

“I have struck your children in vain. They received no correction. Your own sword has devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion.

‘Hear this now, foolish people without understanding, who have eyes, and don’t see, who have ears, and don’t hear:

Sing and rejoice, daughter of Zion; for, behold, I come, and I will dwell within you,’ says Yahweh.

“Don’t be afraid, daughter of Zion. Behold, your King comes, sitting on a donkey’s colt.”

Yahweh said, “My Spirit will not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; so his days will be one hundred twenty years.”

Pharaoh sent and called for Moses and Aaron, and said to them, “I have sinned this time. Yahweh is righteous, and I and my people are wicked.

Yes, when they had made themselves a molded calf, and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,’ and had committed awful blasphemies;

It yields much increase to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. Also they have power over our bodies and over our livestock, at their pleasure, and we are in great distress.

He builds his house as the moth, as a booth which the watchman makes.

So I let them go after the stubbornness of their hearts, that they might walk in their own counsels.

This very day he will halt at Nob. He shakes his hand at the mountain of the daughter of Zion, the hill of Jerusalem.

Woe to those who deeply hide their counsel from Yahweh, and whose deeds are in the dark, and who say, “Who sees us?” and “Who knows us?”

Yahweh has sworn by his right hand, and by the arm of his strength, “Surely I will no more give your grain to be food for your enemies, and foreigners will not drink your new wine, for which you have labored,

“They have heard that I sigh. There is no one to comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my trouble. They are glad that you have done it. You will bring the day that you have proclaimed, and they will be like me.

“but I will scatter them with a whirlwind among all the nations which they have not known. Thus the land was desolate after them, so that no man passed through nor returned: for they made the pleasant land desolate.”

Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they don’t see, and hearing, they don’t hear, neither do they understand.

saying, ‘Go to this people and say, in hearing, you will hear, but will in no way understand. In seeing, you will see, but will in no way perceive.

They will eat the fruit of your livestock and the fruit of your ground, until you are destroyed. They also won’t leave you grain, new wine, oil, the increase of your livestock, or the young of your flock, until they have caused you to perish.

for when Jezebel cut off Yahweh’s prophets, Obadiah took one hundred prophets, and hid them by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water.)

He said, “I have been very jealous for Yahweh, the God of Armies; for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.”

Who gave Jacob as plunder, and Israel to the robbers? Didn’t Yahweh, he against whom we have sinned? For they would not walk in his ways, and they disobeyed his law.

Bring out the blind people who have eyes, and the deaf who have ears.

Behold, Yahweh has proclaimed to the end of the earth, “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your salvation comes! Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him!’ ”

I have spread out my hands all day to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, after their own thoughts;

For, behold, I will call all the families of the kingdoms of the north,” says Yahweh. “They will come, and they will each set his throne at the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem, and against all its walls all around, and against all the cities of Judah.

Behold, I will bring a nation on you from far away, house of Israel,” says Yahweh. “It is a mighty nation. It is an ancient nation, a nation whose language you don’t know and don’t understand what they say.

They will eat up your harvest and your bread, which your sons and your daughters should eat. They will eat up your flocks and your herds. They will eat up your vines and your fig trees. They will beat down your fortified cities in which you trust with the sword.

“But this people has a revolting and a rebellious heart. They have revolted and gone.

They are all grievous rebels, going around to slander. They are bronze and iron. All of them deal corruptly.

You are righteous, Yahweh, when I contend with you; yet I would like to reason the cause with you. Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why are they all at ease who deal very treacherously?

“The words of Jonadab the son of Rechab that he commanded his sons, not to drink wine, are performed; and to this day they drink none, for they obey their father’s commandment; but I have spoken to you, rising up early and speaking, and you have not listened to me.

“Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look, and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow, which is brought on me, with which Yahweh has afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.

He said to me, “Son of man, these are the men who devise iniquity, and who give wicked counsel in this city;

In his right hand was the lot for Jerusalem, to set battering rams, to open the mouth in the slaughter, to lift up the voice with shouting, to set battering rams against the gates, to cast up mounds, and to build forts.

therefore, behold, I will deliver you to the children of the east for a possession. They will set their encampments in you, and make their dwellings in you. They will eat your fruit and they will drink your milk.

Ephraim is oppressed, he is crushed in judgment; Because he is intent in his pursuit of idols.

In them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says, ‘By hearing you will hear, and will in no way understand; Seeing you will see, and will in no way perceive:

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets, and stones those who are sent to her! How often I would have gathered your children together, even as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not!

“You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit! As your fathers did, so you do.

According as it is written, “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, to this very day.”

If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and though they chasten him, will not listen to them,

They encamped against them, and destroyed the increase of the earth, until you come to Gaza. They left no sustenance in Israel, and no sheep, ox, or donkey.

It was so because the children of Israel had sinned against Yahweh their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods,

but they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and scoffed at his prophets, until Yahweh’s wrath arose against his people, until there was no remedy.

and testified against them, that you might bring them again to your law. Yet they were arrogant, and didn’t listen to your commandments, but sinned against your ordinances (which if a man does, he shall live in them), turned their backs, stiffened their neck, and would not hear.

since you hate instruction, and throw my words behind you?

I will dwell in your tent forever. I will take refuge in the shelter of your wings.

Forty long years I was grieved with that generation, and said, “It is a people that errs in their heart. They have not known my ways.”

“Don’t say, ‘A conspiracy!’ concerning all about which this people say, ‘A conspiracy!’ neither fear their threats, nor be terrorized.

“Woe to the rebellious children”, says Yahweh, “who take counsel, but not from me; and who make an alliance, but not with my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin,

this is the word which Yahweh has spoken concerning him. The virgin daughter of Zion has despised you and ridiculed you. The daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head at you.

Then Isaiah the prophet came to king Hezekiah, and asked him, “What did these men say? From where did they come to you?” Hezekiah said, “They have come from a country far from me, even from Babylon.”

But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit. Therefore he turned and became their enemy, and he himself fought against them.

I will cut off the beautiful and delicate one, the daughter of Zion.

If you say in your heart, “Why have these things come on me?” Your skirts are uncovered because of the greatness of your iniquity, and your heels suffer violence.

Therefore I will also uncover your skirts on your face, and your shame will appear.

“Yahweh has spoken concerning you, remnant of Judah, ‘Don’t go into Egypt!’ Know certainly that I have testified to you today.

All her people sigh. They seek bread. They have given their pleasant things for food to refresh their soul. “Look, Yahweh, and see; for I have become despised.”

Yahweh has done that which he planned. He has fulfilled his word that he commanded in the days of old. He has thrown down, and has not pitied. He has caused the enemy to rejoice over you. He has exalted the horn of your adversaries.

“We have transgressed and have rebelled. You have not pardoned.

He said to me, “Son of man, I send you to the children of Israel, to a nation of rebels who have rebelled against me. They and their fathers have transgressed against me even to this very day.

I have made your forehead as a diamond, harder than flint. Don’t be afraid of them, neither be dismayed at their looks, though they are a rebellious house.”

therefore see, I will gather all your lovers, with whom you have taken pleasure, and all those who you have loved, with all those who you have hated. I will even gather them against you on every side, and will uncover your nakedness to them, that they may see all your nakedness.

“ ‘ “But the children rebelled against me. They didn’t walk in my statutes, and didn’t keep my ordinances to do them, which if a man does, he shall live in them. They profaned my Sabbaths. Then I said I would pour out my wrath on them, to accomplish my anger against them in the wilderness.

Utter a parable to the rebellious house, and tell them, ‘The Lord Yahweh says, “Put the cauldron on the fire. Put it on, and also pour water into it.

Woe to them! For they have wandered from me. Destruction to them! For they have trespassed against me. Though I would redeem them, yet they have spoken lies against me.

It has come to pass that, as he called, and they refused to listen, so they will call, and I will not listen,” said Yahweh of Armies;

The farmers took his servants, beat one, killed another, and stoned another.

At the proper season, he sent a servant to the farmers to collect his share of the fruit of the vineyard. But the farmers beat him, and sent him away empty.

Which of the prophets didn’t your fathers persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, of whom you have now become betrayers and murderers.

But according to your hardness and unrepentant heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath, revelation, and of the righteous judgment of God;

searching for who or what kind of time the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, pointed to, when he predicted the sufferings of Christ, and the glories that would follow them.

For no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but holy men of God spoke, being moved by the Holy Spirit.

A nation which you don’t know will eat the fruit of your ground and all of your work. You will only be oppressed and crushed always,

“Nevertheless they were disobedient, and rebelled against you, cast your law behind their back, killed your prophets that testified against them to turn them again to you, and they committed awful blasphemies.

Yet many years you put up with them, and testified against them by your Spirit through your prophets. Yet they would not listen. Therefore you gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands.

The daughter of Zion is left like a shelter in a vineyard, like a hut in a field of melons, like a besieged city.

For it is a rebellious people, lying children, children who will not hear Yahweh’s law;

“Tell the nations, behold, publish against Jerusalem, ‘Watchers come from a far country, and raise their voice against the cities of Judah.

Jerusalem has grievously sinned. Therefore she has become unclean. All who honored her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness. Yes, she sighs, and turns backward.

“Yahweh is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment. Please hear all you peoples, and see my sorrow. My virgins and my young men have gone into captivity.

“Son of man, you dwell in the middle of the rebellious house, who have eyes to see, and don’t see, who have ears to hear, and don’t hear; for they are a rebellious house.