Study Desk

How wonderful and beautiful they will be! The young men will thrive on abundant grain, and the young women will flourish on new wine.

Household gods give worthless advice, fortune-tellers predict only lies, and interpreters of dreams pronounce falsehoods that give no comfort. So my people are wandering like lost sheep; they are attacked because they have no shepherd.

Though I have scattered them like seeds among the nations, they will still remember me in distant lands. They and their children will survive and return again to Israel.

They will pass safely through the sea of distress, for the waves of the sea will be held back, and the waters of the Nile will dry up. The pride of Assyria will be crushed, and the rule of Egypt will end.

By my power I will make my people strong, and by my authority they will go wherever they wish. I, the Lord , have spoken!"

Likewise, I will no longer have pity on the people of the land," says the Lord . "I will let them fall into each other's hands and into the hands of their king. They will turn the land into a wilderness, and I will not rescue them."

I got rid of their three evil shepherds in a single month. But I became impatient with these sheep, and they hated me, too.

That was the end of my covenant with them. The suffering flock was watching me, and they knew that the Lord was speaking through my actions.

And I said to them, "If you like, give me my wages, whatever I am worth; but only if you want to." So they counted out for my wages thirty pieces of silver.

And the Lord said to me, "Throw it to the potter"—this magnificent sum at which they valued me! So I took the thirty coins and threw them to the potter in the Temple of the Lord .

I will make Jerusalem like an intoxicating drink that makes the nearby nations stagger when they send their armies to besiege Jerusalem and Judah.

"On that day I will make the clans of Judah like a flame that sets a woodpile ablaze or like a burning torch among sheaves of grain. They will burn up all the neighboring nations right and left, while the people living in Jerusalem remain secure.

"Then I will pour out a spirit of grace and prayer on the family of David and on the people of Jerusalem. They will look on me whom they have pierced and mourn for him as for an only son. They will grieve bitterly for him as for a firstborn son who has died.

I will bring that group through the fire and make them pure. I will refine them like silver and purify them like gold. They will call on my name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘These are my people,' and they will say, ‘The Lord is our God.'"

Egypt and the other nations will all be punished if they don't go to celebrate the Festival of Shelters.

Esau's descendants in Edom may say, "We have been shattered, but we will rebuild the ruins." But the Lord of Heaven's Armies replies, "They may try to rebuild, but I will demolish them again. Their country will be known as ‘The Land of Wickedness,' and their people will be called ‘The People with Whom the Lord Is Forever Angry.'

But my name is honored by people of other nations from morning till night. All around the world they offer sweet incense and pure offerings in honor of my name. For my name is great among the nations," says the Lord of Heaven's Armies.

"The purpose of my covenant with the Levites was to bring life and peace, and that is what I gave them. This required reverence from them, and they greatly revered me and stood in awe of my name.

They passed on to the people the truth of the instructions they received from me. They did not lie or cheat; they walked with me, living good and righteous lives, and they turned many from lives of sin.

He will sit like a refiner of silver, burning away the dross. He will purify the Levites, refining them like gold and silver, so that they may once again offer acceptable sacrifices to the Lord .