1 “But now, listen to me, Jacob my servant,
    Israel my chosen one.
² The Lord who made you and helps you says:
Do not be afraid, O Jacob, my servant,
    O dear Israel,^[a] my chosen one.
³ For I will pour out water to quench your thirst
    and to irrigate your parched fields.
And I will pour out my Spirit on your descendants,
    and my blessing on your children.
⁴ They will thrive like watered grass,
    like willows on a riverbank.
⁵ Some will proudly claim, ‘I belong to the Lord.’
    Others will say, ‘I am a descendant of Jacob.’
Some will write the Lord’s name on their hands
    and will take the name of Israel as their own.”

“I am the First and the Last;
    there is no other God.
⁷ Who is like me?
    Let him step forward and prove to you his power.
Let him do as I have done since ancient times
    when I established a people and explained its future.
⁸ Do not tremble; do not be afraid.
    Did I not proclaim my purposes for you long ago?
You are my witnesses—is there any other God?
    No! There is no other Rock—not one!”

⁹ How foolish are those who manufacture idols.
    These prized objects are really worthless.
The people who worship idols don’t know this,
    so they are all put to shame.
¹⁰ Who but a fool would make his own god—
    an idol that cannot help him one bit?
¹¹ All who worship idols will be disgraced
    along with all these craftsmen—mere humans—
    who claim they can make a god.
They may all stand together,
    but they will stand in terror and shame.

¹² The blacksmith stands at his forge to make a sharp tool,
    pounding and shaping it with all his might.
His work makes him hungry and weak.
    It makes him thirsty and faint.
¹³ Then the wood-carver measures a block of wood
    and draws a pattern on it.
He works with chisel and plane
    and carves it into a human figure.
He gives it human beauty
    and puts it in a little shrine.
¹⁴ He cuts down cedars;
    he selects the cypress and the oak;
he plants the pine in the forest
    to be nourished by the rain.
¹⁵ Then he uses part of the wood to make a fire.
    With it he warms himself and bakes his bread.
Then—yes, it’s true—he takes the rest of it
    and makes himself a god to worship!
He makes an idol
    and bows down in front of it!
¹⁶ He burns part of the tree to roast his meat
    and to keep himself warm.
    He says, “Ah, that fire feels good.”
¹⁷ Then he takes what’s left
    and makes his god: a carved idol!
He falls down in front of it,
    worshiping and praying to it.
“Rescue me!” he says.
    “You are my god!”

¹⁸ Such stupidity and ignorance!
    Their eyes are closed, and they cannot see.
    Their minds are shut, and they cannot think.
¹⁹ The person who made the idol never stops to reflect,
    “Why, it’s just a block of wood!
I burned half of it for heat
    and used it to bake my bread and roast my meat.
How can the rest of it be a god?
    Should I bow down to worship a piece of wood?”
²⁰ The poor, deluded fool feeds on ashes.
    He trusts something that can’t help him at all.
Yet he cannot bring himself to ask,
    “Is this idol that I’m holding in my hand a lie?”

²³ Sing, O heavens, for the Lord has done this wondrous thing.
    Shout for joy, O depths of the earth!
Break into song,
    O mountains and forests and every tree!
For the Lord has redeemed Jacob
    and is glorified in Israel.

²⁴ This is what the Lord says—
    your Redeemer and Creator:
“I am the Lord, who made all things.
    I alone stretched out the heavens.
Who was with me
    when I made the earth?
²⁵ I expose the false prophets as liars
    and make fools of fortune-tellers.
I cause the wise to give bad advice,
    thus proving them to be fools.
²⁶ But I carry out the predictions of my prophets!
    By them I say to Jerusalem, ‘People will live here again,’
and to the towns of Judah, ‘You will be rebuilt;
    I will restore all your ruins!’
²⁷ When I speak to the rivers and say, ‘Dry up!’
    they will be dry.
²⁸ When I say of Cyrus, ‘He is my shepherd,’
    he will certainly do as I say.
He will command, ‘Rebuild Jerusalem’;
    he will say, ‘Restore the Temple.’”

³ Listen! It’s the voice of someone shouting,
“Clear the way through the wilderness
    for the Lord!
Make a straight highway through the wasteland
    for our God!
⁴ Fill in the valleys,
    and level the mountains and hills.
Straighten the curves,
    and smooth out the rough places.
⁵ Then the glory of the Lord will be revealed,
    and all people will see it together.
    The Lord has spoken!”^[a]

⁶ A voice said, “Shout!”
    I asked, “What should I shout?”

“Shout that people are like the grass.
    Their beauty fades as quickly
    as the flowers in a field.
⁷ The grass withers and the flowers fade
    beneath the breath of the Lord.
    And so it is with people.
⁸ The grass withers and the flowers fade,
    but the word of our God stands forever.”

⁹ O Zion, messenger of good news,
    shout from the mountaintops!
Shout it louder, O Jerusalem.^[b]
    Shout, and do not be afraid.
Tell the towns of Judah,
    “Your God is coming!”
¹⁰ Yes, the Sovereign Lord is coming in power.
    He will rule with a powerful arm.
    See, he brings his reward with him as he comes.
¹¹ He will feed his flock like a shepherd.
    He will carry the lambs in his arms,
holding them close to his heart.
    He will gently lead the mother sheep with their young.

¹⁵ No, for all the nations of the world
    are but a drop in the bucket.
They are nothing more
    than dust on the scales.
He picks up the whole earth
    as though it were a grain of sand.
¹⁶ All the wood in Lebanon’s forests
    and all Lebanon’s animals would not be enough
    to make a burnt offering worthy of our God.
¹⁷ The nations of the world are worth nothing to him.
    In his eyes they count for less than nothing—
    mere emptiness and froth.

¹⁸ To whom can you compare God?
    What image can you find to resemble him?
¹⁹ Can he be compared to an idol formed in a mold,
    overlaid with gold, and decorated with silver chains?
²⁰ Or if people are too poor for that,
    they might at least choose wood that won’t decay
and a skilled craftsman
    to carve an image that won’t fall down!

²¹ Haven’t you heard? Don’t you understand?
    Are you deaf to the words of God—
the words he gave before the world began?
    Are you so ignorant?
²² God sits above the circle of the earth.
    The people below seem like grasshoppers to him!
He spreads out the heavens like a curtain
    and makes his tent from them.
²³ He judges the great people of the world
    and brings them all to nothing.
²⁴ They hardly get started, barely taking root,
    when he blows on them and they wither.
    The wind carries them off like chaff.

²⁵ “To whom will you compare me?
    Who is my equal?” asks the Holy One.

²⁶ Look up into the heavens.
    Who created all the stars?
He brings them out like an army, one after another,
    calling each by its name.
Because of his great power and incomparable strength,
    not a single one is missing.
²⁷ O Jacob, how can you say the Lord does not see your troubles?
    O Israel, how can you say God ignores your rights?
²⁸ Have you never heard?
    Have you never understood?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
    the Creator of all the earth.
He never grows weak or weary.
    No one can measure the depths of his understanding.
²⁹ He gives power to the weak
    and strength to the powerless.
³⁰ Even youths will become weak and tired,
    and young men will fall in exhaustion.
³¹ But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength.
    They will soar high on wings like eagles.
They will run and not grow weary.
    They will walk and not faint.

¹⁰ I said, “In the prime of my life,
    must I now enter the place of the dead?^[b]
    Am I to be robbed of the rest of my years?”
¹¹ I said, “Never again will I see the Lord God
    while still in the land of the living.
Never again will I see my friends
    or be with those who live in this world.
¹² My life has been blown away
    like a shepherd’s tent in a storm.
It has been cut short,
    as when a weaver cuts cloth from a loom.
    Suddenly, my life was over.
¹³ I waited patiently all night,
    but I was torn apart as though by lions.
    Suddenly, my life was over.
¹⁴ Delirious, I chattered like a swallow or a crane,
    and then I moaned like a mourning dove.
My eyes grew tired of looking to heaven for help.
    I am in trouble, Lord. Help me!”

¹⁵ But what could I say?
    For he himself sent this sickness.
Now I will walk humbly throughout my years
    because of this anguish I have felt.
¹⁶ Lord, your discipline is good,
    for it leads to life and health.
You restore my health
    and allow me to live!
¹⁷ Yes, this anguish was good for me,
    for you have rescued me from death
    and forgiven all my sins.
¹⁸ For the dead^[c] cannot praise you;
    they cannot raise their voices in praise.
Those who go down to the grave
    can no longer hope in your faithfulness.
¹⁹ Only the living can praise you as I do today.
    Each generation tells of your faithfulness to the next.
²⁰ Think of it—the Lord is ready to heal me!
    I will sing his praises with instruments
every day of my life
    in the Temple of the Lord.

“The virgin daughter of Zion
    despises you and laughs at you.
The daughter of Jerusalem
    shakes her head in derision as you flee.

²³ “Whom have you been defying and ridiculing?
    Against whom did you raise your voice?
At whom did you look with such haughty eyes?
    It was the Holy One of Israel!
²⁴ By your messengers you have defied the Lord.
    You have said, ‘With my many chariots
I have conquered the highest mountains—
    yes, the remotest peaks of Lebanon.
I have cut down its tallest cedars
    and its finest cypress trees.
I have reached its farthest heights
    and explored its deepest forests.
²⁵ I have dug wells in many foreign lands^[e]
    and refreshed myself with their water.
With the sole of my foot,
    I stopped up all the rivers of Egypt!’

²⁶ “But have you not heard?
    I decided this long ago.
Long ago I planned it,
    and now I am making it happen.
I planned for you to crush fortified cities
    into heaps of rubble.
²⁷ That is why their people have so little power
    and are so frightened and confused.
They are as weak as grass,
    as easily trampled as tender green shoots.
They are like grass sprouting on a housetop,
    scorched^[f] before it can grow lush and tall.

²⁸ “But I know you well—
    where you stay
and when you come and go.
    I know the way you have raged against me.
²⁹ And because of your raging against me
    and your arrogance, which I have heard for myself,
I will put my hook in your nose
    and my bit in your mouth.
I will make you return
    by the same road on which you came.”

“This year you will eat only what grows up by itself,
    and next year you will eat what springs up from that.
But in the third year you will plant crops and harvest them;
    you will tend vineyards and eat their fruit.
³¹ And you who are left in Judah,
    who have escaped the ravages of the siege,
will put roots down in your own soil
    and grow up and flourish.
³² For a remnant of my people will spread out from Jerusalem,
    a group of survivors from Mount Zion.
The passionate commitment of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies
    will make this happen!

“‘His armies will not enter Jerusalem.
    They will not even shoot an arrow at it.
They will not march outside its gates with their shields
    nor build banks of earth against its walls.
³⁴ The king will return to his own country
    by the same road on which he came.
He will not enter this city,’
    says the Lord.
³⁵ ‘For my own honor and for the sake of my servant David,
    I will defend this city and protect it.’”