2. So I bought the loincloth as the lord directed me, and I put it on.
3. Then the lord gave me another message:
4. “Take the linen loincloth you are wearing, and go to the Euphrates River. Hide it there in a hole in the rocks.”
5. So I went and hid it by the Euphrates as the lord had instructed me.
6. A long time afterward the lord said to me, “Go back to the Euphrates and get the loincloth I told you to hide there.”
7. So I went to the Euphrates and dug it out of the hole where I had hidden it. But now it was rotting and falling apart. The loincloth was good for nothing.
8. Then I received this message from the lord:
9. “This is what the lord says: This shows how I will rot away the pride of Judah and Jerusalem.
10. These wicked people refuse to listen to me. They stubbornly follow their own desires and worship other gods. Therefore, they will become like this loincloth—good for nothing!
11. As a loincloth clings to a man’s waist, so I created Judah and Israel to cling to me, says the lord. They were to be my people, my pride, my glory—an honor to my name. But they would not listen to me.
12. “So tell them, ‘This is what the lord, the God of Israel, says: May all your jars be filled with wine.’ And they will reply, ‘Of course! Jars are made to be filled with wine!’
13. “Then tell them, ‘No, this is what the lord means: I will fill everyone in this land with drunkenness—from the king sitting on David’s throne to the priests and the prophets, right down to the common people of Jerusalem.
14. I will smash them against each other, even parents against children, says the lord. I will not let my pity or mercy or compassion keep me from destroying them.’”
15. Listen and pay attention!Do not be arrogant, for the lord has spoken.
16. Give glory to the lord your Godbefore it is too late.Acknowledge him before he brings darkness upon you,causing you to stumble and fall on the darkening mountains.For then, when you look for light,you will find only terrible darkness and gloom.
17. And if you still refuse to listen,I will weep alone because of your pride.My eyes will overflow with tears,because the lord’s flock will be led away into exile.
18. Say to the king and his mother,“Come down from your thronesand sit in the dust,for your glorious crownswill soon be snatched from your heads.”