The Hebrew Prophets

"Briefly I abandoned you, but with great compassion I am taking you back.

I was angry for a moment and hid my face from you; but with everlasting grace I will have compassion on you," says ADONAI your Redeemer.

"For me this is like Noach's flood. Just as I swore that no flood like Noach's would ever again cover the earth, so now I swear that never again will I be angry with you or rebuke you.

For the mountains may leave and the hills be removed, but my grace will never leave you, and my covenant of peace will not be removed," says ADONAI, who has compassion on you.

"Storm-ravaged [city], unconsoled, I will set your stones in the finest way, lay your foundations with sapphires,

make your windows shine with rubies, your gates with garnet, your walls with gemstones.

All your children will be taught by ADONAI; your children will have great peace.

In righteousness you will be established, far from oppression, with nothing to fear; far from ruin, for it will not come near you.

Any alliance that forms against you will not be my doing; whoever tries to form such an alliance will fall because of you.

It is I who created the craftsman who blows on the coals and forges weapons suited to their purpose; I also created the destroyer to work havoc.

No weapon made will prevail against you. In court you will refute every accusation. The servants of ADONAI inherit all this; the reward for their righteousness is from me," says ADONAI.

"All you who are thirsty, come to the water! You without money, come, buy, and eat! Yes, come! Buy wine and milk without money - it's free!

Why spend money for what isn't food, your wages for what doesn't satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and you will eat well, you will enjoy the fat of the land.

Open your ears, and come to me; listen well, and you will live - I will make an everlasting covenant with you, the grace I assured David.

I have given him as a witness to the peoples, a leader and lawgiver for the peoples.

You will summon a nation you do not know, and a nation that doesn't know you will run to you, for the sake of ADONAI your God, the Holy One of Isra'el, who will glorify you."

Seek ADONAI while he is available, call on him while he is still nearby.

Let the wicked person abandon his way and the evil person his thoughts; let him return to ADONAI, and he will have mercy on him; let him return to our God, for he will freely forgive.

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not my ways," says ADONAI.

"As high as the sky is above the earth are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

For just as rain and snow fall from the sky and do not return there, but water the earth, causing it to bud and produce, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater;

so is my word that goes out from my mouth - it will not return to me unfulfilled; but it will accomplish what I intend, and cause to succeed what I sent it to do."

Yes, you will go out with joy, you will be led forth in peace. As you come, the mountains and hills will burst out into song, and all the trees in the countryside will clap their hands.

Cypresses will grow in place of thorns, myrtles will grow instead of briars. This will bring fame to ADONAI as an eternal, imperishable sign.

Here is what ADONAI says: "Observe justice, do what is right, for my salvation is close to coming, my righteousness to being revealed."