“Speak to the heart of Jerusalem and call out to her that her time of forced labor is completed, that her iniquity is paid for, and that she has received of Yahweh’s hand double for all her sins.”
A voice of someone calling out, “Prepare a road for Yahweh in the wilderness! Make a level highway in the desert for our God.
Every valley will be lifted up and every mountain and hill will be made low. The uneven ground will be made level, and the rough places a plain.
The glory of Yahweh will be revealed, and all flesh will see it together, for the mouth of Yahweh has spoken it.”
The Word of God Stands Forever
A voice saying, “Cry out!” I said, “What should I cry out?” “All flesh is like grass, and all its dependability is like the flower of the field.
The grass withers, the flower fades, because Yahweh’s breath blows on it. Surely the people are like grass.
The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever.”
The Greatness of God
You 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. Do not be afraid. Say to the cities of Judah, “Behold, your God!”
Behold, the Lord Yahweh will come as a mighty one, and his arm will rule for him. Behold, his reward is with him and his repayment accompanies him.
He 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.
Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and marked off the heavens with his span, and enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance?
Who has directed the spirit of Yahweh, or who has instructed him as his counselor?
Who was his counselor so he could make him understand? Who taught him the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and showed him the way of understanding?
Behold, 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.
Lebanon would not suffice to burn a sacrifice, nor its animals sufficient for a burnt offering.
All the nations are like nothing before him. They are regarded by him as less than nothing, and emptiness.
To whom then will you compare God? Or to what likeness will you compare him?
A workman has cast an image, and the goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts silver chains for it.
He 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.
Have you not known? Have you not heard? Have you not been told from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
It 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 live in;
who brings rulers to nothing, who makes the judges of the earth nothing at all.
They are barely planted; they are barely sown, their trunk has barely taken root in the ground when he blows on them and they wither and the whirlwind takes them away as stubble.
“To whom then will you compare me? Who is my equal?” says the Holy One.
Lift 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.
Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, “My way is hidden from Yahweh, and the justice due me is disregarded by my God?”
Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, Yahweh, the Creator of the ends of the earth, does not grow faint, he is not weary. His understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the weak. He increases the strength of him who has no might.
Even the youths faint and get weary, and the young men stumble, yes, stumble,
but those who wait for Yahweh 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.