Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him.
For a people shall dwell in Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you.
And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher.
And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.
And he will give rain for the seed with which you sow the ground, and bread, the produce of the ground, which will be rich and plenteous. In that day your livestock will graze in large pastures,
and the oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat seasoned fodder, which has been winnowed with shovel and fork.
And on every lofty mountain and every high hill there will be brooks running with water, in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall.
Moreover, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day when the Lord binds up the brokenness of his people, and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow.
Behold, the name of the Lord comes from afar, burning with his anger, and in thick rising smoke; his lips are full of fury, and his tongue is like a devouring fire;
his breath is like an overflowing stream that reaches up to the neck; to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction, and to place on the jaws of the peoples a bridle that leads astray.
You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, as when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to the mountain of the Lord, to the Rock of Israel.
And the Lord will cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger and a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst and storm and hailstones.
The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the Lord, when he strikes with his rod.
And every stroke of the appointed staff that the Lord lays on them will be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. Battling with brandished arm, he will fight with them.
For a burning place has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, its pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.
Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help and rely on horses, who trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are very strong, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel or consult the Lord!
And yet he is wise and brings disaster; he does not call back his words, but will arise against the house of the evildoers and against the helpers of those who work iniquity.
The Egyptians are man, and not God, and their horses are flesh, and not spirit. When the Lord stretches out his hand, the helper will stumble, and he who is helped will fall, and they will all perish together.
For thus the Lord said to me, “As a lion or a young lion growls over his prey, and when a band of shepherds is called out against him he is not terrified by their shouting or daunted at their noise, so the Lord of hosts will come down to fight on Mount Zion and on its hill.
Like birds hovering, so the Lord of hosts will protect Jerusalem; he will protect and deliver it; he will spare and rescue it.”
“And the Assyrian shall fall by a sword, not of man; and a sword, not of man, shall devour him; and he shall flee from the sword, and his young men shall be put to forced labor.
His rock shall pass away in terror, and his officers desert the standard in panic,” declares the Lord, whose fire is in Zion, and whose furnace is in Jerusalem.
Each will be like a hiding place from the wind, a shelter from the storm, like streams of water in a dry place, like the shade of a great rock in a weary land.
Then the eyes of those who see will not be closed, and the ears of those who hear will give attention.
The heart of the hasty will understand and know, and the tongue of the stammerers will hasten to speak distinctly.
The fool will no more be called noble, nor the scoundrel said to be honorable.
For the fool speaks folly, and his heart is busy with iniquity, to practice ungodliness, to utter error concerning the Lord, to leave the craving of the hungry unsatisfied, and to deprive the thirsty of drink.
As for the scoundrel—his devices are evil; he plans wicked schemes to ruin the poor with lying words, even when the plea of the needy is right.
In little more than a year you will shudder, you complacent women; for the grape harvest fails, the fruit harvest will not come.
Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine,
for the soil of my people growing up in thorns and briers, yes, for all the joyous houses in the exultant city.
For the palace is forsaken, the populous city deserted; the hill and the watchtower will become dens forever, a joy of wild donkeys, a pasture of flocks;
until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, and the fruitful field is deemed a forest.
Then justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness abide in the fruitful field.
And the effect of righteousness will be peace, and the result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever.
And it will hail when the forest falls down, and the city will be utterly laid low.
Happy are you who sow beside all waters, who let the feet of the ox and the donkey range free.
O Lord, be gracious to us; we wait for you. Be our arm every morning, our salvation in the time of trouble.
At the tumultuous noise peoples flee; when you lift yourself up, nations are scattered,
and your spoil is gathered as the caterpillar gathers; as locusts leap, it is leapt upon.
The Lord is exalted, for he dwells on high; he will fill Zion with justice and righteousness,
and he will be the stability of your times, abundance of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge; the fear of the Lord is Zion's treasure.
Behold, their heroes cry in the streets; the envoys of peace weep bitterly.
The highways lie waste; the traveler ceases. Covenants are broken; cities are despised; there is no regard for man.
The land mourns and languishes; Lebanon is confounded and withers away; Sharon is like a desert, and Bashan and Carmel shake off their leaves.
“Now I will arise,” says the Lord, “now I will lift myself up; now I will be exalted.
And the peoples will be as if burned to lime, like thorns cut down, that are burned in the fire.”
The sinners in Zion are afraid; trembling has seized the godless: “Who among us can dwell with the consuming fire? Who among us can dwell with everlasting burnings?”
He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly, who despises the gain of oppressions, who shakes his hands, lest they hold a bribe, who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed and shuts his eyes from looking on evil,
he will dwell on the heights; his place of defense will be the fortresses of rocks; his bread will be given him; his water will be sure.
The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.
ESV® Permanent Text Edition (2016). The ESV® text has been reproduced in cooperation with and by permission of Good News Publishers.
Unauthorized reproduction of this publication is prohibited. All rights reserved.