Iniquity hiding within us all
Eduardo E. 1-31-26
Everybody complains about money, everybody complains about working. Yet don't they all work for their own satisfaction? Aren't they all absorbed into their own selfishness? They eat manna, they eat quails and they still complain. Have they given their lives to a great service, one that is greater than themselves? Are they aristocrats? Do they consider the poor and the enslaved? Do they denounce the sins of their nations and oppose evil with all their strength? Do they do anything other than satisfy their own bellies? They are all greed, vanity, pettiness and selfishness. Each complain about the other, each is continuously offended by the other yet offends others all the same. Each justify themselves in their own works. Each is as self-righteous as they can be. Each uses YHVH to justify their own sins.
"5 Thus saith the YHVH, What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me, and have walked after vanity, and are become vain?
6 Neither said they, Where is the YHVH that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought, and of the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt?
7 And I brought you into a plentiful country, to eat the fruit thereof and the goodness thereof; but when ye entered, ye defiled my land, and made mine heritage an abomination.
8 The priests said not, Where is the YHVH? and they that handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things that do not profit.
9 Wherefore I will yet plead with you, saith the YHVH, and with your children's children will I plead.
10 For pass over the isles of Chittim, and see; and send unto Kedar, and consider diligently, and see if there be such a thing.
11 Hath a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods? but my people have changed their glory for that which doth not profit.
12 Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid, be ye very desolate, saith the YHVH.
13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.
14 Is Israel a servant? is he a homeborn slave? why is he spoiled?
15 The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made his land waste: his cities are burned without inhabitant.
16 Also the children of Noph and Tahapanes have broken the crown of thy head.
17 Hast thou not procured this unto thyself, in that thou hast forsaken YHVH thy God, when he led thee by the way?
18 And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt, to drink the waters of Sihor? or what hast thou to do in the way of Assyria, to drink the waters of the river?
19 Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the YHVH thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith YHVH God of hosts."
