Jeremiah 18:1-17 - The Potter And The Clay

¹ This is another communication that God had with Jeremiah, saying, ² "Arise, and go down into the Potter's house, and there shall I tell thee more of my mind." ³ Now when I came to the Potter's house, I found him making his work upon a wheel. ⁴ The vessel that the Potter made of clay, brake among his hands: So he began anew, and made another vessel, according to his mind.

⁵ Then said the LORD thus unto me, ⁶ "May not I do with you, as this Potter doth, O ye house of Israel, sayeth the LORD? Behold, ye house of Israel: ye are in my hand, even as the clay in the Potter's hand. ⁷ When I take in hand to root out, to destroy, or to waste away any people or kingdom; ⁸ if that people against whom I have thus devised convert from their wickedness: Immediately, I repent of the plague, that I devised to bring upon them. ⁹ Again. When I take in hand, to build, or to plant a people or a kingdom: ¹⁰ if the same people do evil before me, and hear not my voice: Immediately, I repent of the good, that I devised to do for them. ¹¹ "Speak now therefore unto whole Judah, and to them that dwell at Jerusalem. Thus sayeth the LORD: Behold, I am devising a plague for you, and am taking a thing in hand against you. Therefore let every man turn from his evil way, take upon you the thing that is good, and do right. ¹² But they say, 'No more of this, we will follow our own imaginations, and do every man according to the wilfulness of his own mind.'

¹³ Therefore thus sayeth the LORD: Ask among the Heathen, if any man hath heard such horrible things, as the Daughter of Zion hath done. ¹⁴ Shall not the snow that melteth upon the stony rocks of Lebanon moisten the fields? Or may the springs of waters be so graven away, that they run no more, give moistness, nor make fruitful? ¹⁵ But my people hath so forgotten me, that they have made sacrifice unto vain gods. And while they followed their own ways they are come out of the high street, and gone into a foot way not used to be trodden. ¹⁶ Wherethrough they have brought their land into an everlasting wilderness and scorn: So that whosoever traveleth thereby, shall be abashed, and wag their heads. ¹⁷ With an East wind will I scatter them, before their enemies. And when their destruction cometh, I will turn my back upon them, but not my face."