‘I will make a permanent covenant with them: I will never turn away from doing good to them, and I will put fear of me in their hearts so that they will never again turn away from me.
Who is a God like you, forgiving iniquity and passing over rebellion for the remnant of his inheritance? He does not hold on to his anger for ever because he delights in faithful love.
‘Have you not noticed what these people have said? They say, “The Lord has rejected the two families he had chosen.” My people are treated with contempt and no longer regarded as a nation among them.
‘This is what the Lord says: Only if the heavens above can be measured and the foundations of the earth below explored, will I reject all of Israel’s descendants because of all they have done – this is the Lord’s declaration.
This is what the Lord says: Though they are strong and numerous, they will still be mowed down, and he will pass away. Though I have punished you, , I will punish you no longer.
We will certainly die and be like water poured out on the ground, which can’t be recovered. But God would not take away a life; he would devise plans so that the one banished from him does not remain banished.
