Hey everyone, this is Mary Demuth and this is Pray Every Day, where I have the joy and the privilege of praying you through the Bible verse by verse. We're going through the prophet Jeremiah this month, and we will actually make it all the way through and we will jump to the New Testament in about two-thirds of the way through the month. So if you're getting tired of poor Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, it will come to an end

and we'll jump to the New Testament. All right. So today I'm reading from Jeremiah 44 versus 16 through 30.

I'm going to back up to 15 because it won't make much sense in the world English Bible. And this is what it says.

Then all the men who knew that their wives burned incense to other gods and all the women

who stood by, a great assembly, even all the people who lived in the land of Egypt in Pathbrose,

answered Jeremiah saying, as for the word that you have spoken to us in Yahweh's name, we will not listen to you.

But we will certainly perform every word that has gone out of our mouth

to burn incense to the queen of the sky and to pour out drink offerings to her, as we have done.

We and our fathers, our kings and our princes in the cities of Judah and in the streets of

Jerusalem. For then we had plenty of food and we were well and saw no evil, but since we

stopped burning incense to the queen of the sky and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have

lacked all things and have been consumed by the sword and by famine. The women said, when we

burned incense to the queen of the sky and poured out drink offerings to her,

did we make her cakes to worship her and pour out drink offerings to her without our husbands?

Then Jeremiah said to all the people, to the men and to the women, even to all the people who had given him an answer, saying,

The incense that you burned in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem,

you and your fathers, your kings, and your princes and the people of the land, didn't

Yahweh remember them? And didn't it come into his mind? Thus, Yahweh could no longer bear it

because of the evil of your doings and because of the

abominations which you have committed. Therefore, your land has become a desolation, an astonishment,

and a curse without inhabitant as it is today. Because you have burned incense and because you

have sinned against Yahweh and have not obeyed Yahweh's voice,

...