¹Thus says the LORD to me, “Go and buy a linen waistcloth, and put it on your loins, and do not dip it in water.” ²So I bought a waistcloth according to the word of the LORD, and put it on my loins. ³And the word of the LORD came to me a second time, ⁴“Take the waistcloth which you have bought, which is upon your loins, and arise, go to the Euphraʹtes, and hide it there in a cleft of the rock.” ⁵So I went, and hid it by the Euphraʹtes, as the LORD commanded me. ⁶And after many days the LORD said to me, “Arise, go to the Euphraʹtes, and take from there the waistcloth which I commanded you to hide there.” ⁷Then I went to the Euphraʹtes, and dug, and I took the waistcloth from the place where I had hidden it. And behold, the waistcloth was spoiled; it was good for nothing. ⁸Then the word of the LORD came to me: ⁹“Thus says the LORD: Even so will I spoil the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem. ¹⁰This evil people, who refuse to hear my words, who stubbornly follow their own heart and have gone after other gods to serve them and worship them, shall be like this waistcloth, which is good for nothing. ¹¹For as the waistcloth clings to the loins of a man, so I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, says the LORD, that they might be for me a people, a name, a praise, and a glory, but they would not listen.

¹⁸You were unmindful of the Rock that begot you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth. ¹⁹“The LORD saw it, and spurned them, because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters. ²⁰And he said, ‘I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end will be, For they are a perverse generation, children in whom is no faithfulness. ²¹They have stirred me to jealousy with what is no god; they have provoked me with their idols. So I will stir them to jealousy with those who are no people; I will provoke them with a foolish nation.

¹⁹and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. ²⁰When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary sat in the house. ²¹Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. ²²And even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” ²³Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” ²⁴Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.” ²⁵Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, ²⁶and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” ²⁷She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, he who is coming into the world.”