Isaiah 30

¹Ah , stubborn children , declares the Lord, who carry out a plan , but not mine , and who make an alliance , but not of my Spirit , that they may add sin to sin ;

²who set out to go down to Egypt , without asking for my direction , to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt !

³Therefore shall the protection of Pharaoh turn to your shame , and the shelter in the shadow of Egypt to your humiliation .

⁴For though his officials are at Zoan and his envoys reach Hanes ,

⁵everyone comes to shame through a people that cannot profit them, that brings neither help nor profit , but shame and disgrace .

⁶An oracle on the beasts of the Negeb . Through a land of trouble and anguish , from where come the lioness and the lion , the adder and the flying fiery serpent , they carry their riches on the backs of donkeys , and their treasures on the humps of camels , to a people that cannot profit them.

⁷Egypt’s help is worthless and empty ; therefore I have called her Rahab who sits still.

⁸And now , go , write it before them on a tablet and inscribe it in a book , that it may be for the time to come as a witness forever .

⁹For they are a rebellious people , lying children , children unwilling to hear the instruction of the Lord;

¹⁰who say to the seers , Do not see , and to the prophets , Do not prophesy to us what is right ; speak to us smooth things , prophesy illusions ,

¹¹leave the way , turn aside from the path , let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel .

¹²Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel , Because you despise this word and trust in oppression and perverseness and rely on them,

¹³therefore this iniquity shall be to you like a breach in a high wall , bulging out , and about to collapse , whose breaking comes suddenly , in an instant ;

¹⁴and its breaking is like that of a potter’s vessel that is smashed so ruthlessly that among its fragments not a shard is found with which to take fire from the hearth , or to dip up water out of the cistern .

¹⁵For thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel , In returning and rest you shall be saved ; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength . But you were unwilling ,

¹⁶and you said , No ! We will flee upon horses ; therefore you shall flee away; and, We will ride upon swift steeds; therefore your pursuers shall be swift .

¹⁷A thousand shall flee at the threat of one ; at the threat of five you shall flee , till you are left like a flagstaff on the top of a mountain , like a signal on a hill .

¹⁸Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice ; blessed are all those who wait for him.

¹⁹For a people shall dwell in Zion , in Jerusalem ; you shall weep no more . He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry . As soon as he hears it, he answers you.

²⁰And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction , yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore , but your eyes shall see your Teacher .

²¹And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying , This is the way , walk in it, when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left .

²²Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver and your gold-plated metal images . You will scatter them as unclean things . You will say to them, Be gone !

²³And he will give rain for the seed with which you sow the ground , and bread , the produce of the ground , which will be rich and plenteous . In that day your livestock will graze in large pastures ,

²⁴and the oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat seasoned fodder , which has been winnowed with shovel and fork .

²⁵And on every lofty mountain and every high hill there will be brooks running with water , in the day of the great slaughter , when the towers fall .

²⁶Moreover, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun , and the light of the sun will be sevenfold , as the light of seven days , in the day when the Lord binds up the brokenness of his people , and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow .

²⁷Behold , the name of the Lord comes from afar , burning with his anger , and in thick rising smoke ; his lips are full of fury , and his tongue is like a devouring fire ;

²⁸his breath is like an overflowing stream that reaches up to the neck ; to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction , and to place on the jaws of the peoples a bridle that leads astray .

²⁹You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept , and gladness of heart , as when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to the mountain of the Lord, to the Rock of Israel .

³⁰And the Lord will cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen , in furious anger and a flame of devouring fire , with a cloudburst and storm and hailstones .

³¹The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the Lord, when he strikes with his rod .

³²And every stroke of the appointed staff that the Lord lays on them will be to the sound of tambourines and lyres . Battling with brandished arm, he will fight with them.

³³For a burning place has long been prepared ; indeed , for the king it is made ready , its pyre made deep and wide , with fire and wood in abundance ; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulfur , kindles it.