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This message for all the people of Judah came to Jeremiah from the Lord during the fourth year of Jehoiakim’s reign over Judah. 1 This was the year when King Nebuchadnezzar 2 of Babylon began his reign.
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Jeremiah the prophet said to all the people in Judah and Jerusalem,
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“For the past twenty-three years - from the thirteenth year of the reign of Josiah son of Amon, 3 king of Judah, until now - the Lord has been giving me his messages. I have faithfully passed them on to you, but you have not listened.
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“Again and again the Lord has sent you his servants, the prophets, but you have not listened or even paid attention.
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Each time the message was this: ‘Turn from the evil road you are traveling and from the evil things you are doing. Only then will I let you live in this land that the Lord gave to you and your ancestors forever.
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Do not provoke my anger by worshiping idols you made with your own hands. Then I will not harm you.’
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“But you would not listen to me,” says the Lord . “You made me furious by worshiping idols you made with your own hands, bringing on yourselves all the disasters you now suffer.
8 And now the Lord of Heaven’s Armies says: Because you have not listened to me, 9 I will gather together all the armies of the north under King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, whom I have appointed as my deputy. I will bring them all against this land and its people and against the surrounding nations. I will completely destroy 4 you and make you an object of horror and contempt and a ruin forever. 10 I will take away your happy singing and laughter. The joyful voices of bridegrooms and brides will no longer be heard. Your millstones will fall silent, and the lights in your homes will go out. 11 This entire land will become a desolate wasteland. Israel and her neighboring lands will serve the king of Babylon for seventy years. 12 “Then, after the seventy years of captivity are over, I will punish the king of Babylon and his people for their sins,” says the Lord . “I will make the country of the Babylonians 5 a wasteland forever. 13 I will bring upon them all the terrors I have promised in this book - all the penalties announced by Jeremiah against the nations. 14 Many nations and great kings will enslave the Babylonians, just as they enslaved my people. I will punish them in proportion to the suffering they cause my people.”