Isaiah 49:17

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

They said to me, “The remnant who are left of the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach. The wall of Jerusalem is also broken down, and its gates are burned with fire.”

Let’s rejoice and be exceedingly glad, and let’s give the glory to him. For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his wife has made herself ready.”

“But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then those you let remain of them will be like pricks in your eyes and thorns in your sides. They will harass you in the land in which you dwell.

know for a certainty that Yahweh your God will no longer drive these nations from out of your sight; but they shall be a snare and a trap to you, a scourge in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good land which Yahweh your God has given you.

Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that Yahweh’s word by Jeremiah’s mouth might be accomplished, Yahweh stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying,

Go out, you daughters of Zion, and see king Solomon, with the crown with which his mother has crowned him, in the day of his weddings, in the day of the gladness of his heart.

Therefore the Lord will not rejoice over their young men, neither will he have compassion on their fatherless and widows; for everyone is profane and an evildoer, and every mouth speaks folly. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

“ ‘Moreover I will make you a desolation and a reproach among the nations that are around you, in the sight of all that pass by.

They will dwell in it securely. Yes, they will build houses, plant vineyards, and will dwell securely, when I have executed judgments on all those who scorn them all around. Then they will know that I am Yahweh their God.” ’ ”

I will bring them again also out of the land of Egypt, and gather them out of Assyria; and I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon; and there won’t be room enough for them.

I went out by night by the valley gate, even toward the jackal’s well, then to the dung gate, and inspected the walls of Jerusalem, which were broken down, and its gates were consumed with fire.

But no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives songs in the night,

He covers himself with light as with a garment. He stretches out the heavens like a curtain.

For you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and have not remembered the rock of your strength. Therefore you plant pleasant plants, and set out foreign seedlings.

It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in,

Yahweh, your Redeemer, and he who formed you from the womb says: “I am Yahweh, who makes all things; who alone stretches out the heavens; who spreads out the earth by myself;

I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people; and the voice of weeping and the voice of crying will be heard in her no more.

For it is God who works in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure.

I will appoint a place for my people Israel, and will plant them, that they may dwell in their own place, and be moved no more. The children of wickedness will not afflict them any more, as at the first,

Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that Yahweh’s word by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, Yahweh stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying,

He alone stretches out the heavens, and treads on the waves of the sea.

Then I beat them small as the dust before the wind. I cast them out as the mire of the streets.

which is as a bridegroom coming out of his room, like a strong man rejoicing to run his course.

You make us a reproach to our neighbors, a scoffing and a derision to those who are around us.

We have become a reproach to our neighbors, a scoffing and derision to those who are around us.

Now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take away its hedge, and it will be eaten up. I will break down its wall, and it will be trampled down.

Let my outcasts dwell with you! As for Moab, be a hiding place for him from the face of the destroyer. For the extortionist is brought to nothing. Destruction ceases. The oppressors are consumed out of the land.

“I have raised up one from the north, and he has come, from the rising of the sun, one who calls on my name, and he shall come on rulers as on mortar, and as the potter treads clay.

I have made the earth, and created man on it. I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens. I have commanded all their army.

I was angry with my people. I profaned my inheritance and gave them into your hand. You showed them no mercy. You laid a very heavy yoke on the aged.

Yes, my hand has laid the foundation of the earth, and my right hand has spread out the heavens. when I call to them, they stand up together.

For Yahweh has comforted Zion. He has comforted all her waste places, and has made her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of Yahweh. Joy and gladness will be found in them, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody.

Have you forgotten Yahweh your Maker, who stretched out the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth? Do you live in fear continually all day because of the fury of the oppressor, when he prepares to destroy? Where is the fury of the oppressor?

Instead of the thorn the cypress tree will come up; and instead of the brier the myrtle tree will come up. It will make a name for Yahweh, for an everlasting sign that will not be cut off.”

Those who will be of you will build the old waste places. You will raise up the foundations of many generations. You will be called Repairer of the Breach, Restorer of Paths with Dwellings.

For as a young man marries a virgin, so your sons will marry you. As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so your God will rejoice over you.

I will even give them up to be tossed back and forth among all the kingdoms of the earth for evil; to be a reproach and a proverb, a taunt and a curse, in all places where I will drive them.

“How can you be quiet, since Yahweh has given you a command? Against Ashkelon, and against the seashore, there has he appointed it.”

to take the plunder and to take prey; to turn your hand against the waste places that are inhabited, and against the people who are gathered out of the nations, who have gotten livestock and goods, who dwell in the middle of the earth.’

By reason of the exceeding greatness of the revelations, that I should not be exalted excessively, a thorn in the flesh was given to me: a messenger of Satan to torment me, that I should not be exalted excessively.

looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising its shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

I will lay your cities waste, and will bring your sanctuaries to desolation. I will not take delight in the sweet fragrance of your offerings.

Saul also went to his house to Gibeah; and the army went with him, whose hearts God had touched.

Nahash the Ammonite said to them, “On this condition I will make it with you, that all your right eyes be gouged out. I will make this dishonor all Israel.”

Then I beat them as small as the dust of the earth. I crushed them as the mire of the streets, and spread them abroad.

It may be Yahweh your God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to defy the living God, and will rebuke the words which Yahweh your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.’ ”

So the God of Israel stirred up the spirit of Pul king of Assyria, and the spirit of Tilgath Pilneser king of Assyria, and he carried them away, even the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh, and brought them to Halah, Habor, Hara, and to the river of Gozan, to this day.

I will appoint a place for my people Israel, and will plant them, that they may dwell in their own place, and be moved no more. The children of wickedness will not waste them any more, as at the first,

I will not any more remove the foot of Israel from off the land which I have appointed for your fathers, if only they will observe to do all that I have commanded them, even all the law, the statutes, and the ordinances given by Moses.”

Then the heads of fathers’ households of Judah and Benjamin, the priests, and the Levites, all whose spirit God had stirred to go up rose up to build Yahweh’s house which is in Jerusalem.

Now these are the heads of their fathers’ households, and this is the genealogy of those who went up with me from Babylon, in the reign of Artaxerxes the king:

Then I said to them, “You see the bad situation that we are in, how Jerusalem lies waste, and its gates are burned with fire. Come, let’s build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we won’t be disgraced.”

Do well in your good pleasure to Zion. Build the walls of Jerusalem.

Through God we will do valiantly, for it is he who will tread down our adversaries.

Lift up your feet to the perpetual ruins, all the evil that the enemy has done in the sanctuary.

Pay back to our neighbors seven times into their bosom their reproach with which they have reproached you, Lord.

No enemy will tax him. No wicked man will oppress him.

All who pass by the way rob him. He has become a reproach to his neighbors.

They are planted in Yahweh’s house. They will flourish in our God’s courts.

For your servants take pleasure in her stones, and have pity on her dust.

Let’s swallow them up alive like Sheol, and whole, like those who go down into the pit.

The plans of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from Yahweh.

It is better to be of a lowly spirit with the poor, than to divide the plunder with the proud.

Ah sinful nation, a people loaded with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly! They have forsaken Yahweh. They have despised the Holy One of Israel. They are estranged and backward.

Their roaring will be like a lioness. They will roar like young lions. Yes, they shall roar, and seize their prey and carry it off, and there will be no one to deliver.

Through Yahweh of Armies’ wrath, the land is burned up; and the people are the fuel for the fire. No one spares his brother.

I will send him against a profane nation, and against the people who anger me I will give him a command to take the plunder and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.

Therefore they will carry away the abundance they have gotten, and that which they have stored up, over the brook of the willows.

The land of Judah will become a terror to Egypt. Everyone to whom mention is made of it will be afraid, because of the plans of Yahweh of Armies, which he determines against it.

For it is a day of confusion, and of treading down, and of perplexity, from the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, in the valley of vision, a breaking down of the walls, and a crying to the mountains.”

The sinners in Zion are afraid. Trembling has seized the godless ones. Who among us can live with the devouring fire? Who among us can live with everlasting burning?

“For, as for your waste and your desolate places, and your land that has been destroyed, surely now that land will be too small for the inhabitants, and those who swallowed you up will be far away.

The captive exile will speedily be freed. He will not die and go down into the pit. His bread won’t fail.

Violence shall no more be heard in your land, nor desolation or destruction within your borders; but you will call your walls Salvation, and your gates Praise.

“I have trodden the wine press alone. Of the peoples, no one was with me. Yes, I trod them in my anger and trampled them in my wrath. Their lifeblood is sprinkled on my garments, and I have stained all my clothing.

Yet for all this her treacherous sister, Judah, has not returned to me with her whole heart, but only in pretense,” says Yahweh.

behold, I will send and take all the families of the north,” says Yahweh, “and I will send to Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against its inhabitants, and against all these nations around. I will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and a hissing, and perpetual desolations.

For there will be a day that the watchmen on the hills of Ephraim cry, ‘Arise! Let’s go up to Zion to Yahweh our God.’ ”

Yes, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will plant them in this land assuredly with my whole heart and with my whole soul.”

Behold, I will command,” says Yahweh, “and cause them to return to this city. They will fight against it, take it, and burn it with fire. I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant.”

The Lord has swallowed up all the dwellings of Jacob without pity. He has thrown down in his wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah. He has brought them down to the ground. He has profaned the kingdom and its princes.

My eye affects my soul, because of all the daughters of my city.

by your wisdom and by your understanding you have gotten yourself riches, and have gotten gold and silver into your treasures;

“ ‘ “There will be no more a pricking brier to the house of Israel, nor a hurting thorn of any that are around them that scorned them. Then they will know that I am the Lord Yahweh.”

I will bring them out from the peoples, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land. I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the watercourses, and in all the inhabited places of the country.

They will dwell in the land that I have given to Jacob my servant, in which your fathers lived. They will dwell therein, they, and their children, and their children’s children, forever. David my servant will be their prince forever.

I will plant them on their land, and they will no more be plucked up out of their land which I have given them,” says Yahweh your God.

A day to build your walls— In that day, he will extend your boundary.

You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying,

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; neither will there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any more. The first things have passed away.”