The Unlikely Deliverer

¹The LORD says to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have held to subdue nations before him and strip kings of their armor, to open the doors before him, and the gates shall not be shut:

²“I will go before you and make the rough places smooth. I will break the doors of bronze in pieces and cut apart the bars of iron.

³I will give you the treasures of darkness and hidden riches of secret places, that you may know that it is I, the LORD, who calls you by your name, even the God of Israel.

⁴For Jacob my servant’s sake, and Israel my chosen, I have called you by your name. I have given you a title, though you have not known me.

⁵I am the LORD, and there is no one else. Besides me, there is no God. I will strengthen you, though you have not known me,

⁶that they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is no one besides me. I am the LORD, and there is no one else.

⁷I form the light and create darkness. I make peace and create calamity. I am the LORD, who does all these things.

⁸Rain, you heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness. Let the earth open, that it may produce salvation, and let it cause righteousness to spring up with it. I, the LORD, have created it.

⁹Woe to him who strives with his Maker— a clay pot among the clay pots of the earth! Shall the clay ask him who fashions it, ‘What are you making?’ or your work, ‘He has no hands’?

¹⁰Woe to him who says to a father, ‘What have you become the father of?’ or to a mother, ‘What have you given birth to?’”

¹¹The LORD, the Holy One of Israel and his Maker says: “You ask me about the things that are to come, concerning my sons, and you command me concerning the work of my hands!

¹²I have made the earth, and created man on it. I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens. I have commanded all their army.

¹³I have raised him up in righteousness, and I will make all his ways straight. He shall build my city, and he shall let my exiles go free, not for price nor reward,” says the LORD of Armies.

¹⁴The LORD says: “The labor of Egypt, and the merchandise of Ethiopia, and the Sabeans, men of stature, will come over to you, and they will be yours. They will go after you. They shall come over in chains. They will bow down to you. They will make supplication to you: ‘Surely God is in you; and there is no one else. There is no other god.

¹⁵Most certainly you are a God who has hidden yourself, God of Israel, the Savior.’”

¹⁶They will be disappointed, yes, confounded, all of them. Those who are makers of idols will go into confusion together.

¹⁷Israel will be saved by the LORD with an everlasting salvation. You will not be disappointed nor confounded to ages everlasting.

¹⁸For the LORD who created the heavens, the God who formed the earth and made it, who established it and didn’t create it a waste, who formed it to be inhabited says: “I am the LORD. There is no other.

¹⁹I have not spoken in secret, in a place of the land of darkness. I didn’t say to the offspring of Jacob, ‘Seek me in vain.’ I, the LORD, speak righteousness. I declare things that are right.

²⁰“Assemble yourselves and come. Draw near together, you who have escaped from the nations. Those have no knowledge who carry the wood of their engraved image, and pray to a god that can’t save.

²¹Declare and present it. Yes, let them take counsel together. Who has shown this from ancient time? Who has declared it of old? Haven’t I, the LORD? There is no other God besides me, a just God and a Savior. There is no one besides me.

²²“Look to me, and be saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other.

²³I have sworn by myself. The word has gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and will not be revoked, that to me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall take an oath.

²⁴They will say of me, ‘There is righteousness and strength only in the LORD.’” Even to him will men come. All those who raged against him will be disappointed.

²⁵All the offspring of Israel will be justified in the LORD, and will rejoice!

¹Bel bows down. Nebo stoops. Their idols are carried by animals, and on the livestock. The things that you carried around are heavy loads, a burden for the weary.

²They stoop and they bow down together. They could not deliver the burden, but they have gone into captivity.

³“Listen to me, house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel, that have been carried from their birth, that have been carried from the womb.

⁴Even to old age I am he, and even to gray hairs I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear. Yes, I will carry, and will deliver.

⁵“To whom will you compare me, and consider my equal, and compare me, as if we were the same?

⁶Some pour out gold from the bag, and weigh silver in the balance. They hire a goldsmith, and he makes it a god. They fall down— yes, they worship.

⁷They bear it on their shoulder. They carry it, and set it in its place, and it stands there. It cannot move from its place. Yes, one may cry to it, yet it can not answer. It cannot save him out of his trouble.

⁸“Remember this, and show yourselves men. Bring it to mind again, you transgressors.

⁹Remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other. I am God, and there is none like me.

¹⁰I declare the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done. I say: My counsel will stand, and I will do all that I please.

¹¹I call a ravenous bird from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country. Yes, I have spoken. I will also bring it to pass. I have planned. I will also do it.

¹²Listen to me, you stubborn-hearted, who are far from righteousness!

¹³I bring my righteousness near. It is not far off, and my salvation will not wait. I will grant salvation to Zion, my glory to Israel.

¹“Come down and sit in the dust, virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, daughter of the Chaldeans. For you will no longer be called tender and delicate.

²Take the millstones and grind flour. Remove your veil, lift up your skirt, uncover your legs, and wade through the rivers.

³Your nakedness will be uncovered. Yes, your shame will be seen. I will take vengeance, and will spare no one.”

⁴Our Redeemer, the LORD of Armies is his name, is the Holy One of Israel.

⁵“Sit in silence, and go into darkness, daughter of the Chaldeans. For you shall no longer be called the mistress of kingdoms.

⁶I 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.

⁷You said, ‘I will be a princess forever,’ so that you didn’t lay these things to your heart, nor did you remember the results.

⁸“Now therefore hear this, you who are given to pleasures, who sit securely, who say in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me. I won’t sit as a widow, neither will I know the loss of children.’

⁹But these two things will come to you in a moment in one day: the loss of children and widowhood. They will come on you in their full measure, in the multitude of your sorceries, and the great abundance of your enchantments.

¹⁰For you have trusted in your wickedness. You have said, ‘No one sees me.’ Your wisdom and your knowledge has perverted you. You have said in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me.’

¹¹Therefore disaster will come on you. You won’t know when it dawns. Mischief will fall on you. You won’t be able to put it away. Desolation will come on you suddenly, which you don’t understand.

¹²“Stand now with your enchantments and with the multitude of your sorceries, in which you have labored from your youth, as if you might profit, as if you might prevail.

¹³You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels. Now let the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators stand up and save you from the things that will happen to you.

¹⁴Behold, they are like stubble. The fire will burn them. They won’t deliver themselves from the power of the flame. It won’t be a coal to warm at or a fire to sit by.

¹⁵The things that you labored in will be like this: those who have trafficked with you from your youth will each wander in his own way. There will be no one to save you.

¹“Hear this, house of Jacob, you who are called by the name of Israel, and have come out of the waters of Judah. You swear by the LORD’s name, and make mention of the God of Israel, but not in truth, nor in righteousness—

²for they call themselves citizens of the holy city, and rely on the God of Israel; the LORD of Armies is his name.

³I have declared the former things from of old. Yes, they went out of my mouth, and I revealed them. I did them suddenly, and they happened.

⁴Because I knew that you are obstinate, and your neck is an iron sinew, and your brow bronze;

⁵therefore I have declared it to you from of old; before it came to pass I showed it to you; lest you should say, ‘My idol has done them. My engraved image and my molten image has commanded them.’

⁶You have heard it. Now see all this. And you, won’t you declare it? “I have shown you new things from this time, even hidden things, which you have not known.

⁷They are created now, and not from of old. Before today, you didn’t hear them, lest you should say, ‘Behold, I knew them.’

⁸Yes, you didn’t hear. Yes, you didn’t know. Yes, from of old your ear was not opened, for I knew that you dealt very treacherously, and were called a transgressor from the womb.

⁹For my name’s sake, I will defer my anger, and for my praise, I hold it back for you so that I don’t cut you off.

¹⁰Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver. I have chosen you in the furnace of affliction.

¹¹For my own sake, for my own sake, I will do it; for how would my name be profaned? I will not give my glory to another.

¹²“Listen to me, O Jacob, and Israel my called: I am he. I am the first. I am also the last.

¹³Yes, 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.

¹⁴“Assemble yourselves, all of you, and hear! Who among them has declared these things? He whom the LORD loves will do what he likes to Babylon, and his arm will be against the Chaldeans.

¹⁵I, even I, have spoken. Yes, I have called him. I have brought him and he shall make his way prosperous.

¹⁶“Come near to me and hear this: “From the beginning I have not spoken in secret; from the time that it happened, I was there.” Now the Lord GOD has sent me with his Spirit.

¹⁷The LORD, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, says: “I am the LORD your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you by the way that you should go.

¹⁸Oh that you had listened to my commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river and your righteousness like the waves of the sea.

¹⁹Your offspring also would have been as the sand and the descendants of your body like its grains. His name would not be cut off nor destroyed from before me.”

²⁰Leave Babylon! Flee from the Chaldeans! With the sound of joyful shouting announce this, tell it even to the end of the earth; say, “The LORD has redeemed his servant Jacob!”

²¹They didn’t thirst when he led them through the deserts. He caused the waters to flow out of the rock for them. He also split the rock and the waters gushed out.

²²“There is no peace”, says the LORD, “for the wicked.”