welcome to today's encouragement from our daily bread my name is Mike Widmer Hope from Gahanna
 in 1979 archaeologists Gabriel Barkay unders two small silver Scrolls it took years to delicately unroll the metal Scrolls and each was found to contain a Hebrew etching of the blessing from numbers 624 through 26 the Lord bless you and keep you the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace
 Scholars date the Scrolls to the 7th Century BC they're the oldest known bits of scripture in the world
 equally interesting is where they were found
 Barca was digging in a cave in the Valley of hinnom the very place where the Prophet Jeremiah told the people of Judah that God would slaughter them for sacrificing their children
 this Valley was the sight of such wickedness that Jesus used the word gehenna a Greek form of the Hebrew name for the valley of he known as a picture of hell
 on this spot about the time Jeremiah Was announcing God's judgement on his Nation someone was catching his future blessing on to Silver Scrolls
 it wouldn't happen in their lifetime but one day on the other side of the Babylonian Invasion God would turn his face toward his people and give them peace
 the lesson for us is clear
 even if we deserve what we have coming we can cling to God's promise
 his heart always yearns for his people
 today's our daily bread devotional scripture reading is from Jeremiah chapter 19 verses 3 through 6 and 14 to 15 hear the word of the Lord you Kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem this is what the Lord Almighty the god of Israel says listen I'm going to bring a disaster on this place will make the ears of everyone who hears of it tingle for they have forsaken me and made this a place of foreign gods they burn incense in it to God that neither they nor their ancestors were the kings of Judah ever knew and they have filled this place with a blood of the innocent
 they have built the high places of Baal to burn their children in the fire as offerings to bail something I did not come in or mention nor did it enter my mind
 so beware the days are coming declares the Lord when people will no longer call this place topheth or the valley of Ben Hino
 but the valley of Slaughter
 now picking up at verse 14
 Jeremiah then return from topheth with the Lord had sent him to prophesy and stood in the court of the Lord's Temple and said to all the people
 this is what the Lord Almighty the god of Israel says listen I'm going to bring on this city and all the villages are rounded every disaster I pronounced again because they were stiff-necked and would not listen to my words
 let's pray
 father
 we confess our sin and the Judgment we deserve
 we cling to your promise to forgive and restore
 in Jesus name we pray amen
 thanks for listening today's encouragement was provided by Our Daily Bread Ministries