Jeremiah 24 - Easy To Read Version

¹ The Lord showed me these things: I saw two baskets of figs arranged in front of the temple {\cf2\super [196]} of the Lord. (I saw this vision after Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, took Jeconiah {\cf2\super [197]} as a prisoner. Jeconiah was the son of King Jehoiakim. Jeconiah and his important officials were taken away from Jerusalem. They were taken to Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar also took away all the carpenters and metal-workers of Judah.)

² One basket had very good figs in it. Those figs were like figs that ripen early in the season. But the other basket had rotten figs. They were too rotten to eat.

³ The Lord said to me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I answered, “I see figs. The good figs are very good. And the rotten figs are very rotten. They are too rotten to eat.”

⁴ Then the message of the Lord came to me.

⁵ The Lord, the God of Israel, said: “The people of Judah were taken from their country. Their enemy brought them to Babylon. Those people will be like these good figs. I will be kind to those people.

⁶ I will protect them. I will bring them back to the land of Judah. I will not tear them down—I will build them up. I will not pull them up—I will plant them so they can grow.

⁷ I will make them want to know me. They will know that I am the Lord. They will be my people, and I will be their God. I will do this because those prisoners in Babylon will turn to me with their whole hearts.

⁸ “But Zedekiah king of Judah will be like those figs that are too rotten to eat. Zedekiah, his high officials, all the people that are left in Jerusalem, and those people of Judah that are living in Egypt will be like those rotten figs.

⁹ “I will punish those people. The punishment will shock all the people on earth. People will make fun of those people from Judah. People will tell jokes about them. People will curse them in all the places where I scatter them.

¹⁰ I will send a sword, starvation, and disease against them. I will attack them until they have all been killed. Then they will no longer be on the land which I gave to them and to their ancestors. {\cf2\super [198]}