Ezekiel 20:30-38

New Living Translation

³⁰ “Therefore, give the people of Israel this message from the Sovereign Lord: Do you plan to pollute yourselves just as your ancestors did? Do you intend to keep prostituting yourselves by worshiping vile images? ³¹ For when you offer gifts to them and give your little children to be burned as sacrifices,^[a] you continue to pollute yourselves with idols to this day. Should I allow you to ask for a message from me, O people of Israel? As surely as I live, says the Sovereign Lord, I will tell you nothing.

³² “You say, ‘We want to be like the nations all around us, who serve idols of wood and stone.’ But what you have in mind will never happen. ³³ As surely as I live, says the Sovereign Lord, I will rule over you with an iron fist in great anger and with awesome power. ³⁴ And in anger I will reach out with my strong hand and powerful arm, and I will bring you back^[b] from the lands where you are scattered. ³⁵ I will bring you into the wilderness of the nations, and there I will judge you face to face. ³⁶ I will judge you there just as I did your ancestors in the wilderness after bringing them out of Egypt, says the Sovereign Lord. ³⁷ I will examine you carefully and hold you to the terms of the covenant. ³⁸ I will purge you of all those who rebel and revolt against me. I will bring them out of the countries where they are in exile, but they will never enter the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord.