אֵת

Indifferent to her own infidelity, Israel had defiled the land and committed adultery with stones and trees.

Go, proclaim this message toward the north: ‘Return, O faithless Israel,’ declares the LORD. ‘I will no longer look on you with anger, for I am merciful,’ declares the LORD. ‘I will not be angry forever.

Only acknowledge your guilt, that you have rebelled against the LORD your God. You have scattered your favors to foreign gods under every green tree and have not obeyed My voice,’” declares the LORD.

“Return, O faithless children,” declares the LORD, “for I am your master, and I will take you—one from a city and two from a family—and bring you to Zion.

Then I will give you shepherds after My own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding.”

In those days the house of Judah will walk with the house of Israel, and they will come together from the land of the north to the land that I gave to your fathers as an inheritance.

A voice is heard on the barren heights, the children of Israel weeping and begging for mercy, because they have perverted their ways and forgotten the LORD their God.

From our youth, that shameful god has consumed what our fathers have worked for—their flocks and herds, their sons and daughters.

They surround her like men guarding a field, because she has rebelled against Me,” declares the LORD.

“For My people are fools; they have not known Me. They are foolish children, without understanding. They are skilled in doing evil, but they know not how to do good.”

I looked at the earth, and it was formless and void; I looked to the heavens, and they had no light.

O LORD, do not Your eyes look for truth? You struck them, but they felt no pain. You finished them off, but they refused to accept discipline. They have made their faces harder than stone and refused to repent.

I will go to the powerful and speak to them. Surely they know the way of the LORD, the justice of their God.” But they too, with one accord, had broken the yoke and torn off the chains.

“Why should I forgive you? Your children have forsaken Me and sworn by gods that are not gods. I satisfied their needs, yet they committed adultery and assembled at the houses of prostitutes.

Therefore this is what the LORD God of Hosts says: “Because you have spoken this word, I will make My words a fire in your mouth and this people the wood it consumes.

And when the people ask, ‘For what offense has the LORD our God done all these things to us?’ You are to tell them, ‘Just as you have forsaken Me and served foreign gods in your land, so will you serve foreigners in a land that is not your own.’”

Do you not fear Me?” declares the LORD. “Do you not tremble before Me, the One who set the sand as the boundary for the sea, an enduring barrier it cannot cross? The waves surge, but they cannot prevail. They roar but cannot cross it.

They have not said in their hearts, ‘Let us fear the LORD our God, who gives the rains, both autumn and spring, in season, who keeps for us the appointed weeks of harvest.’

Shepherds and their flocks will come against her; they will pitch their tents all around her, each tending his own portion:

Their houses will be turned over to others, their fields and wives as well, for I will stretch out My hand against the inhabitants of the land,” declares the LORD.

They dress the wound of My people with very little care, saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace at all.

Therefore hear, O nations, and learn, O congregations, what will happen to them.

We have heard the report; our hands hang limp. Anguish has gripped us, pain like that of a woman in labor.

“I have appointed you to examine My people like ore, so you may know and try their ways.

“Stand in the gate of the house of the LORD and proclaim this message: Hear the word of the LORD, all you people of Judah who enter through these gates to worship the LORD.

Thus says the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: Correct your ways and deeds, and I will let you live in this place.

For if you really correct your ways and deeds, if you act justly toward one another,

…then I will let you live in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers forever and ever.

…and then come and stand before Me in this house, which bears My Name, and say, ‘We are delivered, so we can continue with all these abominations’?

But go now to the place in Shiloh where I first made a dwelling for My Name, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel.

And now, because you have done all these things, declares the LORD, and because I have spoken to you again and again but you would not listen, and I have called to you but you would not answer,

And I will cast you out of My presence, just as I have cast out all your brothers, all the descendants of Ephraim.

As for you, do not pray for these people, do not offer a plea or petition on their behalf, and do not beg Me, for I will not listen to you.

The sons gather wood, the fathers light the fire, and the women knead the dough to make cakes for the Queen of Heaven; they pour out drink offerings to other gods to provoke Me to anger.

But am I the One they are provoking? declares the LORD. Is it not themselves they spite, to their own shame?

For when I brought your fathers out of the land of Egypt, I did not merely command them about burnt offerings and sacrifices,

…but this is what I commanded them: Obey Me, and I will be your God, and you will be My people. You must walk in all the ways I have commanded you, so that it may go well with you.