1. The Lord says, “People of Judah, your sin is written with an iron pen; it is engraved on your hearts with a diamond point and carved on the corners of your altars.
2. Your people worship at the altars and the symbols that have been set up for the goddess Asherah by every green tree, on the hilltops
3. and on the mountains in the open country. I will make your enemies take away your wealth and your treasures because of all the sins you have committed throughout your land.
4. You will have to give up the land I gave you, and I will make you serve your enemies in a land you know nothing about, because my anger is like a fire, and it will burn for ever.”
5. The Lord says,“I will condemn thosewho turn away from meand put their trust in human beings,in the strength of mortals.
6. They are like bushes in the desert,which grow in the dry wilderness,on salty ground where nothing else grows.Nothing good ever happens to them.
7. “But I will bless thosewho put their trust in me.
8. They are like trees growing near a streamand sending out roots to the water.They are not afraid when hot weather comes,because their leaves stay green;they have no worries when there is no rain;they keep on bearing fruit.
9. “Who can understand the human heart?There is nothing else so deceitful;it is too sick to be healed.
10. I, the Lord, search human mindsand test human hearts.I treat each one according to the way he lives,according to what he does.”
11. The person who gets money dishonestlyis like a bird that hatches eggs it didn't lay.In the prime of life he will lose his riches,and in the end he is nothing but a fool.