Voices in the Wilderness

¹“Comfort, comfort my people,” says your God.

²“Speak comfortably to Jerusalem, and call out to her that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received of the LORD’s hand double for all her sins.”

³The voice of one who calls out, “Prepare the way of the LORD in the wilderness! Make a level highway in the desert for our God.

⁴Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low. The uneven shall be made level, and the rough places a plain.

⁵The LORD’s glory shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it.”

⁶The voice of one saying, “Cry out!” One said, “What shall I cry?” “All flesh is like grass, and all its glory is like the flower of the field.

⁷The grass withers, the flower fades, because the LORD’s breath blows on it. Surely the people are like grass.

⁸The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God stands forever.”

⁹You who tell good news to Zion, go up on a high mountain. You who tell good news to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with strength! Lift it up! Don’t be afraid! Say to the cities of Judah, “Behold, your God!”

¹⁰Behold, the Lord GOD will come as a mighty one, and his arm will rule for him. Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.

¹¹He will feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his arm, and carry them in his bosom. He will gently lead those who have their young.

¹²Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and marked off the sky with his span, and calculated the dust of the earth in a measuring basket, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?

¹³Who has directed the LORD’s Spirit, or has taught him as his counselor?

¹⁴Who did he take counsel with, and who instructed him, and taught him in the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and showed him the way of understanding?

¹⁵Behold, the nations are like a drop in a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on a balance. Behold, he lifts up the islands like a very little thing.

¹⁶Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor its animals sufficient for a burnt offering.

¹⁷All the nations are like nothing before him. They are regarded by him as less than nothing, and vanity.

¹⁸To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare to him?

¹⁹A workman has cast an image, and the goldsmith overlays it with gold, and casts silver chains for it.

²⁰He who is too impoverished for such an offering chooses a tree that will not rot. He seeks a skillful workman to set up a carved image for him that will not be moved.

²¹Haven’t you known? Haven’t you heard? Haven’t you been told from the beginning? Haven’t you understood from the foundations of the earth?

²²It 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,

²³who brings princes to nothing, who makes the judges of the earth meaningless.

²⁴They are planted scarcely. They are sown scarcely. Their stock has scarcely taken root in the ground. He merely blows on them, and they wither, and the whirlwind takes them away as stubble.

²⁵“To whom then will you liken me? Who is my equal?” says the Holy One.

²⁶Lift up your eyes on high, and see who has created these, who brings out their army by number. He calls them all by name. By the greatness of his might, and because he is strong in power, not one is lacking.

²⁷Why do you say, Jacob, and speak, Israel, “My way is hidden from the LORD, and the justice due me is disregarded by my God”?

²⁸Haven’t you known? Haven’t you heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth, doesn’t faint. He isn’t weary. His understanding is unsearchable.

²⁹He gives power to the weak. He increases the strength of him who has no might.

³⁰Even the youths faint and get weary, and the young men utterly fall;

³¹but those who wait for the LORD will renew their strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run, and not be weary. They will walk, and not faint.

¹“Keep silent before me, islands, and let the peoples renew their strength. Let them come near, then let them speak. Let’s meet together for judgment.

²Who has raised up one from the east? Who called him to his feet in righteousness? He hands over nations to him and makes him rule over kings. He gives them like the dust to his sword, like the driven stubble to his bow.

³He pursues them and passes by safely, even by a way that he had not gone with his feet.

⁴Who has worked and done it, calling the generations from the beginning? I, the LORD, the first, and with the last, I am he.”

⁵The islands have seen, and fear. The ends of the earth tremble. They approach, and come.

⁶Everyone helps his neighbor. They say to their brothers, “Be strong!”

⁷So the carpenter encourages the goldsmith. He who smooths with the hammer encourages him who strikes the anvil, saying of the soldering, “It is good;” and he fastens it with nails, that it might not totter.

⁸“But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham my friend,

⁹you whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth, and called from its corners, and said to you, ‘You are my servant. I have chosen you and have not cast you away.’

¹⁰Don’t you be afraid, for I am with you. Don’t be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you. Yes, I will help you. Yes, I will uphold you with the right hand of my righteousness.

¹¹Behold, all those who are incensed against you will be disappointed and confounded. Those who strive with you will be like nothing, and shall perish.

¹²You will seek them, and won’t find them, even those who contend with you. Those who war against you will be as nothing, as a nonexistent thing.

¹³For I, the LORD your God, will hold your right hand, saying to you, ‘Don’t be afraid. I will help you.’

¹⁴Don’t be afraid, you worm Jacob, and you men of Israel. I will help you,” says the LORD. “Your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.

¹⁵Behold, I have made you into a new sharp threshing instrument with teeth. You will thresh the mountains, and beat them small, and will make the hills like chaff.

¹⁶You will winnow them, and the wind will carry them away, and the whirlwind will scatter them. You will rejoice in the LORD. You will glory in the Holy One of Israel.

¹⁷The poor and needy seek water, and there is none. Their tongue fails for thirst. I, the LORD, will answer them. I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.

¹⁸I will open rivers on the bare heights, and springs in the middle of the valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water.

¹⁹I will put cedar, acacia, myrtle, and oil trees in the wilderness. I will set cypress trees, pine, and box trees together in the desert;

²⁰that they may see, know, consider, and understand together, that the LORD’s hand has done this, and the Holy One of Israel has created it.

²¹Produce your cause,” says the LORD. “Bring out your strong reasons!” says the King of Jacob.

²²“Let them announce and declare to us what will happen! Declare the former things, what they are, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or show us things to come.

²³Declare the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that you are gods. Yes, do good, or do evil, that we may be dismayed, and see it together.

²⁴Behold, you are nothing, and your work is nothing. He who chooses you is an abomination.

²⁵“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.

²⁶Who has declared it from the beginning, that we may know? and before, that we may say, ‘He is right’? Surely, there is no one who declares. Surely, there is no one who shows. Surely, there is no one who hears your words.

²⁷I am the first to say to Zion, ‘Behold, look at them;’ and I will give one who brings good news to Jerusalem.

²⁸When I look, there is no man, even among them there is no counselor who, when I ask, can answer a word.

²⁹Behold, all of their deeds are vanity and nothing. Their molten images are wind and confusion.