Study Desk

"Then one will become king in his place, who will send a man through his great nation to make the people pay taxes. Yet within a short time that king will be killed, but not in anger or in battle.

He will set up his tents made for kings between the sea and the beautiful holy mountain. Yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him.

"Yet the number of the people of Israel will be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered. And in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,' it will be said to them, ‘You are the sons of the living God.'

"Yet let no one put blame or guilt upon another. For your people are like those who argue with the religious leader.

Strangers destroy his strength, yet he does not know it. White hairs come upon him, yet he does not know it.

Israel's pride speaks against him, yet they do not return to the Lord their God. Even for all this, they do not look for Him.

I taught them and gave strength to their arms, yet they make sinful plans against Me.

Ephraim was meant to be a watchman who would speak for God. Yet there is a net in all his ways, and only anger in the house of his God.

Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk. I took them in My arms. But they did not know that I healed them.

"Yet even now," says the Lord, "return to Me with all your heart, crying in sorrow and eating no food.

I will punish the ones who killed them, whom I have not yet punished, for the Lord lives in Zion."

"I kept food from your teeth in all your cities. I did not let you have enough bread in all your places. Yet you have not returned to Me," says the Lord.

People would go from city to city to drink water, but would not get enough. Yet you have not returned to Me," says the Lord.

"I sent hot wind to dry up your fields. The locust destroyed your many gardens and grape-fields, fig trees and olive trees. Yet you have not returned to Me," says the Lord.

"I sent a very bad disease upon you as I had done to Egypt. I killed your young men with the sword and took your horses away. I filled your nose with the bad smell of your camp. Yet you have not returned to Me," says the Lord.

"I destroyed some of you as I destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. You were like a burning stick pulled out of the fire. Yet you have not returned to Me," says the Lord.

You drink wine from the holy dishes, and pour the best oil on yourselves. Yet you are not filled with sorrow because Joseph has been destroyed!

Do horses run on rocks? Does one plow them with oxen? Yet you have turned what is fair into poison. You have turned what is right and good into something bitter.

Yet you hate good and love sin. You tear off the skin from my people and the flesh from their bones.

Her leaders take pay in secret for doing wrong. Her religious leaders teach for a price. Her men who tell what is going to happen in the future do it for money. Yet they rest upon the Lord and say, "Is not the Lord among us? No trouble will come to us."