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Thus says the Lord: Bend your shoulders and serve the king of Babylon, and you will remain in the land that I gave to your ancestors.
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But if you will not obey the voice of the Lord and will not serve the king of Babylon,
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I will make to cease from the towns of Judah and from the region around Jerusalem the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, and the whole land will be a desolation without inhabitants.
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But we did not obey your voice, to serve the king of Babylon; and you have carried out your threats, which you spoke by your servants the prophets, that the bones of our kings and the bones of our ancestors would be brought out of their resting place;
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and indeed they have been thrown out to the heat of day and the frost of night. They perished in great misery, by famine and sword and pestilence.
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And the house that is called by your name you have made as it is today, because of the wickedness of the house of Israel and the house of Judah.
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Yet you have dealt with us, O Lord our God, in all your kindness and in all your great compassion,
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as you spoke by your servant Moses on the day when you commanded him to write your law in the presence of the people of Israel, saying,
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"If you will not obey my voice, this very great multitude will surely turn into a small number among the nations, where I will scatter them.
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For I know that they will not obey me, for they are a stiff-necked people. But in the land of their exile they will come to themselves
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and know that I am the Lord their God. I will give them a heart that obeys and ears that hear;