I will bring them back from the land of Egypt and gather them from Assyria. I will bring them to Gilead and Lebanon until there isn’t enough room for them all.
The smallest family will grow to a thousand. The least important of you will become a powerful nation. I am the Lord, and when it is time, I will make these things happen quickly.”
This is what the Lord says about the palace where the king of Judah lives: “You are tall like the forests of Gilead, like the mountaintops of Lebanon. But I will truly make you into a desert, into towns where no one lives.
But I will bring the people of Israel back to their own pasture. They will eat on Mount Carmel and in Bashan. They will eat and be full on the hills of Ephraim and Gilead.”
People from Israel who once were forced to leave their homes will take the land of the Canaanites, all the way to Zarephath. People from Judah who once were forced to leave Jerusalem and live in Sepharad will take back the cities of southern Judah.
So shepherd your people with your stick; tend the flock of people who belong to you. That flock now lives alone in the forest in the middle of a garden land. Let them feed in Bashan and Gilead as in days long ago.