“After all that has happened to us because of the evil things we have done and because of our overwhelming guilt, you, our God, have punished us far less than we deserve and have permitted a few of us to survive.
and said, “I am ashamed, my God. I am embarrassed to look at you. Our sins have piled up over our heads, and our guilt is so overwhelming that it reaches heaven.
“How horrible it will be for a nation that sins. ⌞Its⌟ people are loaded down with guilt. They are descendants of evildoers and destructive children. They have abandoned the Lord. They have despised the Holy One of Israel. They have turned their backs on him.
The look on their faces will be held against them. They boast about their sins, which are like ⌞those of the people of⌟ Sodom. They don’t even bother to hide them. How horrible it will be for these people, because they have brought disaster on themselves.
“Look at the bare hills, and see. You have had sex with men in every place. You sat by the roadside waiting for them like a nomad in the desert. You have polluted the land with your prostitution and wickedness.
The people of Jerusalem have rebelled against my rules and my laws more than the surrounding nations. They have rejected my rules, and they don’t live by my laws.
That is why your teaching is numbed, and justice is never carried out. Wicked people surround righteous people so that when justice is carried out, it’s perverted.