Jeremiah 13:21-23
The Message
20-22 Look, look, Jerusalem!
Look at the enemies coming out of the north!
What will become of your flocks of people,
the beautiful flocks in your care?
How are you going to feel when the people
you’ve played up to, looked up to all these years
Now look down on you? You didn’t expect this?
Surprise! The pain of a woman having a baby!
Do I hear you saying,
“What’s going on here? Why me?”
The answer’s simple: You’re guilty,
hugely guilty.
Your guilt has your life endangered,
your guilt has you writhing in pain.
23 Can an African change skin?
Can a leopard get rid of its spots?
So what are the odds on you doing good,
you who are so long-practiced in evil?
Jeremiah 13:21-23
New International Version
21 What will you say when the Lord sets over you
those you cultivated as your special allies?(A)
Will not pain grip you
like that of a woman in labor?(B)
22 And if you ask yourself,
“Why has this happened to me?”(C)—
it is because of your many sins(D)
that your skirts have been torn off(E)
and your body mistreated.(F)
23 Can an Ethiopian[a] change his skin
or a leopard its spots?
Neither can you do good
who are accustomed to doing evil.(G)
Footnotes
- Jeremiah 13:23 Hebrew Cushite (probably a person from the upper Nile region)
Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson
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NIV Reverse Interlinear Bible: English to Hebrew and English to Greek. Copyright © 2019 by Zondervan.