So do not listen to your prophets or to those who claim to predict the future by divination, ¹  by dreams, by consulting the dead, ²  or by practicing magic. They keep telling you, ‘You do not need to be ³  subject to the king of Babylon.’

Things will go better for the nation that submits to the yoke of servitude to ¹  the king of Babylon and is subject to him. I will leave that nation ²  in its native land. Its people can continue to farm it and live in it. I, the Lord, affirm it!”’” ³ 

I told King Zedekiah of Judah the same thing. I said, ¹  “Submit ²  to the yoke of servitude to ³  the king of Babylon. Be subject to him and his people. Then you will continue to live.

“For the Lord says, ‘Only when the seventy years of Babylonian rule ¹  are over will I again take up consideration for you. ²  Then I will fulfill my gracious promise to you and restore ³  you to your homeland. ⁴ 

It sprouted and became a vine, spreading low to the ground; ¹  its branches turning toward him, ²  its roots were under itself. ³  So it became a vine; it produced shoots and sent out branches.

Therefore, as surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, I will subject you to bloodshed, and bloodshed will pursue you. Since you did not hate bloodshed, bloodshed will pursue you.

I will no longer subject you to ¹  the nations’ insults; no longer will you bear the shame of the peoples, and no longer will you bereave ²  your nation, declares the sovereign Lord.’”

As a result they ¹  will conquer those left in Edom ²  and all the nations subject to my rule.” ³  The Lord, who is about to do this, is speaking!

Those survivors from ¹  Jacob will live ²  in the midst of many nations. ³  They will be like the dew the Lord sends, like the rain on the grass, that does not hope for men to come or wait around for humans to arrive. ⁴ 

Should you not have obeyed the words that the Lord cried out through the former prophets when Jerusalem ¹  was peacefully inhabited and her surrounding cities, the Negev, and the Shephelah ²  were also populated?

For I too am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me. ¹  I say to this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, ²  and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” ³ 

Then ¹  Jesus ²  said to his ³  disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry ⁴  about your ⁵  life, what you will eat, or about your ⁶  body, what you will wear.

The one who believes in the Son has eternal life. The one who rejects ¹  the Son will not see life, but God’s wrath ²  remains ³  on him.

Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under ¹  the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

For ignoring the righteousness that comes from God, and seeking instead to establish their own righteousness, they did not submit to God’s righteousness.

For if someone weak sees you who possess knowledge dining in an idol’s temple, will not his conscience be “strengthened” ¹  to eat food offered to idols?

To the Jews I became like a Jew to gain the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law) ¹  to gain those under the law.

because I know your eagerness to help. ¹  I keep boasting to the Macedonians about this eagerness of yours, ²  that Achaia has been ready to give ³  since last year, and your zeal to participate ⁴  has stirred up most of them. ⁵ 

Because of this I am writing these things while absent, so that when I arrive ¹  I may not have to deal harshly with you ²  by using my authority – the Lord gave it to me for building up, not for tearing down!

But now that you have come to know God (or rather to be known by God), how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless ¹  basic forces? ²  Do you want to be enslaved to them all over again? ³