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Hope for Israel and Judah

“In those coming days,”
    says the Lord,
“the people of Israel will return home
    together with the people of Judah.
They will come weeping
    and seeking the Lord their God.
They will ask the way to Jerusalem[a]
    and will start back home again.
They will bind themselves to the Lord
    with an eternal covenant that will never be forgotten.

“My people have been lost sheep.
    Their shepherds have led them astray
    and turned them loose in the mountains.
They have lost their way
    and can’t remember how to get back to the sheepfold.
All who found them devoured them.
    Their enemies said,
‘We did nothing wrong in attacking them,
    for they sinned against the Lord,
their true place of rest,
    and the hope of their ancestors.’

“But now, flee from Babylon!
    Leave the land of the Babylonians.
Like male goats at the head of the flock,
    lead my people home again.
For I am raising up an army
    of great nations from the north.
They will join forces to attack Babylon,
    and she will be captured.
The enemies’ arrows will go straight to the mark;
    they will not miss!
10 Babylonia[b] will be looted
    until the attackers are glutted with loot.
    I, the Lord, have spoken!

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Footnotes

  1. 50:5 Hebrew Zion; also in 50:28.
  2. 50:10 Or Chaldea.

Then the people of Israel and Judah shall join together, weeping and seeking the Lord their God. They shall ask the way to Zion and start back home again. “Come,” they will say, “let us be united to the Lord with an eternal pledge that will never be broken again.”

My people have been lost sheep. Their shepherds led them astray and then turned them loose in the mountains. They lost their way and didn’t remember how to get back to the fold. All who found them devoured them and said, “We are permitted to attack them freely, for they have sinned against the Lord, the God of justice, the hope of their fathers.”

But now, flee from Babylon, the land of the Chaldeans; lead my people home again. For see, I am raising up an army of great nations from the north, and I will bring them against Babylon to attack her, and she shall be destroyed. The enemies’ arrows go straight to the mark; they do not miss! 10 And Babylon shall be sacked until everyone is sated with loot,” says the Lord.

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