Jeremiah 49; Jeremiah 50; Romans 8; Romans 9

Jeremiah 49

1 Concerning the Ammonites: This is what the LORD says: “Has Israel no sons? Has Israel no heir? Why then has Molek taken possession of Gad? Why do his people live in its towns?

2 But the days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will sound the battle cry against Rabbah of the Ammonites; it will become a mound of ruins, and its surrounding villages will be set on fire. Then Israel will drive out those who drove her out,” says the LORD.

3 “Wail, Heshbon, for Ai is destroyed! Cry out, you inhabitants of Rabbah! Put on sackcloth and mourn; rush here and there inside the walls, for Molek will go into exile, together with his priests and officials.

4 Why do you boast of your valleys, boast of your valleys so fruitful? Unfaithful Daughter Ammon, you trust in your riches and say, ‘Who will attack me?’

5 I will bring terror on you from all those around you,” declares the Lord, the LORD Almighty. “Every one of you will be driven away, and no one will gather the fugitives.

6 “Yet afterward, I will restore the fortunes of the Ammonites,” declares the LORD.

7 Concerning Edom: This is what the LORD Almighty says: “Is there no longer wisdom in Teman? Has counsel perished from the prudent? Has their wisdom decayed?

8 Turn and flee, hide in deep caves, you who live in Dedan, for I will bring disaster on Esau at the time when I punish him.

9 If grape pickers came to you, would they not leave a few grapes? If thieves came during the night, would they not steal only as much as they wanted?

10 But I will strip Esau bare; I will uncover his hiding places, so that he cannot conceal himself. His armed men are destroyed, also his allies and neighbors, so there is no one to say,

11 ‘Leave your fatherless children; I will keep them alive. Your widows too can depend on me.’ ”

12 This is what the LORD says: “If those who do not deserve to drink the cup must drink it, why should you go unpunished? You will not go unpunished, but must drink it.

13 I swear by myself,” declares the LORD, “that Bozrah will become a ruin and a curse, an object of horror and reproach; and all its towns will be in ruins forever.”

14 I have heard a message from the LORD; an envoy was sent to the nations to say, “Assemble yourselves to attack it! Rise up for battle!”

15 “Now I will make you small among the nations, despised by mankind.

16 The terror you inspire and the pride of your heart have deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rocks, who occupy the heights of the hill. Though you build your nest as high as the eagle’s, from there I will bring you down,” declares the LORD.

17 “Edom will become an object of horror; all who pass by will be appalled and will scoff because of all its wounds.

18 As Sodom and Gomorrah were overthrown, along with their neighboring towns,” says the LORD, “so no one will live there; no people will dwell in it.

19 “Like a lion coming up from Jordan’s thickets to a rich pastureland, I will chase Edom from its land in an instant. Who is the chosen one I will appoint for this? Who is like me and who can challenge me? And what shepherd can stand against me?”

20 Therefore, hear what the LORD has planned against Edom, what he has purposed against those who live in Teman: The young of the flock will be dragged away; their pasture will be appalled at their fate.

21 At the sound of their fall the earth will tremble; their cry will resound to the Red Sea.

22 Look! An eagle will soar and swoop down, spreading its wings over Bozrah. In that day the hearts of Edom’s warriors will be like the heart of a woman in labor.

23 Concerning Damascus: “Hamath and Arpad are dismayed, for they have heard bad news. They are disheartened, troubled like the restless sea.

24 Damascus has become feeble, she has turned to flee and panic has gripped her; anguish and pain have seized her, pain like that of a woman in labor.

25 Why has the city of renown not been abandoned, the town in which I delight?

26 Surely, her young men will fall in the streets; all her soldiers will be silenced in that day,” declares the LORD Almighty.

27 “I will set fire to the walls of Damascus; it will consume the fortresses of Ben-Hadad.”

28 Concerning Kedar and the kingdoms of Hazor, which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon attacked: This is what the LORD says: “Arise, and attack Kedar and destroy the people of the East.

29 Their tents and their flocks will be taken; their shelters will be carried off with all their goods and camels. People will shout to them, ‘Terror on every side!’

30 “Flee quickly away! Stay in deep caves, you who live in Hazor,” declares the LORD. “Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has plotted against you; he has devised a plan against you.

31 “Arise and attack a nation at ease, which lives in confidence,” declares the LORD, “a nation that has neither gates nor bars; its people live far from danger.

32 Their camels will become plunder, and their large herds will be spoils of war. I will scatter to the winds those who are in distant placesand will bring disaster on them from every side,” declares the LORD.

33 “Hazor will become a haunt of jackals, a desolate place forever. No one will live there; no people will dwell in it.”

34 This is the word of the LORD that came to Jeremiah the prophet concerning Elam, early in the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah:

35 This is what the LORD Almighty says: “See, I will break the bow of Elam, the mainstay of their might.

36 I will bring against Elam the four winds from the four quarters of heaven; I will scatter them to the four winds, and there will not be a nation where Elam’s exiles do not go.

37 I will shatter Elam before their foes, before those who want to kill them; I will bring disaster on them, even my fierce anger,” declares the LORD. “I will pursue them with the sword until I have made an end of them.

38 I will set my throne in Elam and destroy her king and officials,” declares the LORD.

39 “Yet I will restore the fortunes of Elam in days to come,” declares the LORD.

Jeremiah 50

1 This is the word the LORD spoke through Jeremiah the prophet concerning Babylon and the land of the Babylonians :

2 “Announce and proclaim among the nations, lift up a banner and proclaim it; keep nothing back, but say, ‘Babylon will be captured; Bel will be put to shame, Marduk filled with terror. Her images will be put to shame and her idols filled with terror.’

3 A nation from the north will attack her and lay waste her land. No one will live in it; both people and animals will flee away.

4 “In those days, at that time,” declares the LORD, “the people of Israel and the people of Judah together will go in tears to seek the LORD their God.

5 They will ask the way to Zion and turn their faces toward it. They will come and bind themselves to the LORDin an everlasting covenant that will not be forgotten.

6 “My people have been lost sheep; their shepherds have led them astray and caused them to roam on the mountains. They wandered over mountain and hill and forgot their own resting place.

7 Whoever found them devoured them; their enemies said, ‘We are not guilty, for they sinned against the LORD, their verdant pasture, the LORD, the hope of their ancestors.’

8 “Flee out of Babylon; leave the land of the Babylonians, and be like the goats that lead the flock.

9 For I will stir up and bring against Babylon an alliance of great nations from the land of the north. They will take up their positions against her, and from the north she will be captured. Their arrows will be like skilled warriors who do not return empty-handed.

10 So Babylonia will be plundered; all who plunder her will have their fill,” declares the LORD.

11 “Because you rejoice and are glad, you who pillage my inheritance, because you frolic like a heifer threshing grain and neigh like stallions,

12 your mother will be greatly ashamed; she who gave you birth will be disgraced. She will be the least of the nations— a wilderness, a dry land, a desert.

13 Because of the LORD’s anger she will not be inhabited but will be completely desolate. All who pass Babylon will be appalled; they will scoff because of all her wounds.

14 “Take up your positions around Babylon, all you who draw the bow. Shoot at her! Spare no arrows, for she has sinned against the LORD.

15 Shout against her on every side! She surrenders, her towers fall, her walls are torn down. Since this is the vengeance of the LORD, take vengeance on her; do to her as she has done to others.

16 Cut off from Babylon the sower, and the reaper with his sickle at harvest. Because of the sword of the oppressor let everyone return to their own people, let everyone flee to their own land.

17 “Israel is a scattered flock that lions have chased away. The first to devour them was the king of Assyria; the last to crush their bones was Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon.”

18 Therefore this is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: “I will punish the king of Babylon and his land as I punished the king of Assyria.

19 But I will bring Israel back to their own pasture, and they will graze on Carmel and Bashan; their appetite will be satisfied on the hills of Ephraim and Gilead.

20 In those days, at that time,” declares the LORD, “search will be made for Israel’s guilt, but there will be none, and for the sins of Judah, but none will be found, for I will forgive the remnant I spare.

21 “Attack the land of Merathaim and those who live in Pekod. Pursue, kill and completely destroy them,” declares the LORD. “Do everything I have commanded you.

22 The noise of battle is in the land, the noise of great destruction!

23 How broken and shattered is the hammer of the whole earth! How desolate is Babylon among the nations!

24 I set a trap for you, Babylon, and you were caught before you knew it; you were found and captured because you opposed the LORD.

25 The LORD has opened his arsenal and brought out the weapons of his wrath, for the Sovereign LORD Almighty has work to do in the land of the Babylonians.

26 Come against her from afar. Break open her granaries; pile her up like heaps of grain. Completely destroy her and leave her no remnant.

27 Kill all her young bulls; let them go down to the slaughter! Woe to them! For their day has come, the time for them to be punished.

28 Listen to the fugitives and refugees from Babylon declaring in Zion how the LORD our God has taken vengeance, vengeance for his temple.

29 “Summon archers against Babylon, all those who draw the bow. Encamp all around her; let no one escape. Repay her for her deeds; do to her as she has done. For she has defied the LORD, the Holy One of Israel.

30 Therefore, her young men will fall in the streets; all her soldiers will be silenced in that day,” declares the LORD.

31 “See, I am against you, you arrogant one,” declares the Lord, the LORD Almighty, “for your day has come, the time for you to be punished.

32 The arrogant one will stumble and fall and no one will help her up; I will kindle a fire in her towns that will consume all who are around her.”

33 This is what the LORD Almighty says: “The people of Israel are oppressed, and the people of Judah as well. All their captors hold them fast, refusing to let them go.

34 Yet their Redeemer is strong; the LORD Almighty is his name. He will vigorously defend their cause so that he may bring rest to their land, but unrest to those who live in Babylon.

35 “A sword against the Babylonians!” declares the LORD— “against those who live in Babylon and against her officials and wise men!

36 A sword against her false prophets! They will become fools. A sword against her warriors! They will be filled with terror.

37 A sword against her horses and chariots and all the foreigners in her ranks! They will become weaklings. A sword against her treasures! They will be plundered.

38 A drought on her waters! They will dry up. For it is a land of idols, idols that will go mad with terror.

39 “So desert creatures and hyenas will live there, and there the owl will dwell. It will never again be inhabited or lived in from generation to generation.

40 As I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah along with their neighboring towns,” declares the LORD, “so no one will live there; no people will dwell in it.

41 “Look! An army is coming from the north; a great nation and many kings are being stirred up from the ends of the earth.

42 They are armed with bows and spears; they are cruel and without mercy. They sound like the roaring sea as they ride on their horses; they come like men in battle formation to attack you, Daughter Babylon.

43 The king of Babylon has heard reports about them, and his hands hang limp. Anguish has gripped him, pain like that of a woman in labor.

44 Like a lion coming up from Jordan’s thickets to a rich pastureland, I will chase Babylon from its land in an instant. Who is the chosen one I will appoint for this? Who is like me and who can challenge me? And what shepherd can stand against me?”

45 Therefore, hear what the LORD has planned against Babylon, what he has purposed against the land of the Babylonians: The young of the flock will be dragged away; their pasture will be appalled at their fate.

46 At the sound of Babylon’s capture the earth will tremble; its cry will resound among the nations.

Romans 8

1 Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,

2 because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.

3 For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh,

4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

5 Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.

6 The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace.

7 The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.

8 Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.

9 You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.

10 But if Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life because of righteousness.

11 And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you.

12 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it.

13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.

14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God.

15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”

16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.

17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.

18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

19 For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.

20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope

21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.

23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.

24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have?

25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans.

27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.

28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.

30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?

32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?

33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies.

34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.

35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?

36 As it is written: “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,

39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 9

1 I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit—

2 I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.

3 For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race,

4 the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises.

5 Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.

6 It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel.

7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.”

8 In other words, it is not the children by physical descent who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring.

9 For this was how the promise was stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.”

10 Not only that, but Rebekah’s children were conceived at the same time by our father Isaac.

11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand:

12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told, “The older will serve the younger.”

13 Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all!

15 For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”

16 It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.

17 For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”

18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

19 One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?”

20 But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’ ”

21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?

22 What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction?

23 What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory—

24 even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?

25 As he says in Hosea: “I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people; and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one,”

26 and, “In the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’ ”

27 Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea, only the remnant will be saved.

28 For the Lord will carry out his sentence on earth with speed and finality.”

29 It is just as Isaiah said previously: “Unless the Lord Almighty had left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, we would have been like Gomorrah.”

30 What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith;

31 but the people of Israel, who pursued the law as the way of righteousness, have not attained their goal.

32 Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone.

33 As it is written: “See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes people to stumble and a rock that makes them fall, and the one who believes in him will never be put to shame.”