His breath is like an overflowing torrent that rises to the neck. He comes to sift the nations in a sieve of destruction and to put a bridle on the jaws of the peoples to lead them astray.
You are to say, “This is what the Lord God says: A huge eagle with powerful wings, long feathers, and full plumage of many colours came to Lebanon and took the top of the cedar.
The Lord will bring on you, your people, and your father’s house such a time as has never been since Ephraim separated from Judah: He will bring the king of Assyria.’
I will send him against a godless nation; I will command him to go against a people destined for my rage, to take spoils, to plunder, and to trample them down like clay in the streets.
When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and the rivers will not overwhelm you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, and the flame will not burn you.
This is what the Lord says: Look, water is rising from the north and becoming an overflowing wadi. It will overflow the land and everything in it, the cities and their inhabitants. The people will cry out, and every inhabitant of the land will wail.
For this is what the Lord God says: ‘When I make you a ruined city like other deserted cities, when I raise up the deep against you so that the mighty waters cover you,
‘His sons will mobilise for war and assemble a large number of armed forces. They will advance, sweeping through like a flood, , and will again wage war as far as his fortress.
He will be their peace. When Assyria invades our land, when it marches against our fortresses, we will raise against it seven shepherds, even eight leaders of men.