Isaiah 49:13-23

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

¹³ Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth;
    break forth, O mountains, into singing!
For the Lord has comforted his people
    and will have compassion on his suffering ones.^(A)

¹⁴ But Zion said, “The Lord has forsaken me;
    my Lord has forgotten me.”^(B)
15 Can a woman forget her nursing child
    or show no compassion for the child of her womb?
Even these might forget,
    yet I will not forget you.^(C)
16 See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands;
    your walls are continually before me.^(D)
17 Your builders outdo your destroyers,^[a]
    and those who laid you waste go away from you.^(E)
18 Lift up your eyes all around and see;
    they all gather; they come to you.
As I live, says the Lord,
    you shall put all of them on like an ornament,
    and like a bride you shall bind them on.^(F)

¹⁹ For your wastelands, your desolate places,
    and your devastated land—
now you will be too crowded for your inhabitants,
    and those who swallowed you up will be far away.^(G)
20 The children born in the time of your bereavement
    will yet say in your hearing:
“The place is too crowded for me;
    make room for me to settle.”^(H)
21 Then you will say in your heart,
    “Who has borne me these?
I was bereaved and barren,
    exiled and put away—
    so who has reared these?
I was left all alone—
    where, then, have these come from?”^(I)

²² Thus says the Lord God:
I will soon lift up my hand to the nations
    and raise my signal to the peoples,
and they shall bring your sons in their bosom,
    and your daughters shall be carried on their shoulders.^(J)
23 Kings shall be your foster fathers
    and their queens your nursing mothers.
With their faces to the ground they shall bow down to you
    and lick the dust of your feet.
Then you will know that I am the Lord;
    those who wait for me shall not be put to shame.^(K)