Does it make you happy when you crush me? Does it please you to turn your back on what you have made? While you do those things, you smile on the plans of sinful people!
Why should the Egyptians say, ‘He brought them out to hurt them. He wanted to kill them in the mountains. He wanted to wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn away from your great anger. Please take pity on your people. Don’t destroy them!
The Lord who rules over all will bless those three nations. He will say, “Let the Egyptians be blessed. They are my people. Let the Assyrians be blessed. My hands created them. And let the Israelites be blessed. They are my very own people.”
They turn everything upside down. How silly they are to think that potters are like the clay they work with! Can what is made say to the one who made it, “You didn’t make me”? Can the pot say to the potter, “You don’t know anything”?
The Lord says, “Family of Jacob, remember these things. People of Israel, you are my servant. I have made you. You are my servant. Israel, I will not forget you.
The Lord says, “People of Israel, I set you free. I formed you when you were born as a nation. “I am the Lord. I am the Maker of everything. I alone stretch out the heavens. I spread out the earth by myself.
The Lord is the Holy One of Israel. He made them. He says to them, “Are you asking me about what will happen to my children? Are you telling me what I should do with what my hands have made?
How terrible it will be for anyone who argues with their Maker! They are like a broken piece of pottery lying on the ground. Does clay say to a potter, “What are you making?” Does a pot say, “The potter doesn’t have any skill”?
I will not find fault with my people forever. I will not always be angry with them. If I were, I would cause their spirits to grow weak. The people I created would faint away.
Then all your people will do what is right. The land will belong to them forever. They will be like a young tree I have planted. My hands have created them. They will show how glorious I am.
You are our Father. Abraham might not accept us as his children. Jacob might not recognize us as his family. But you are our Father, Lord. Your name is One Who Always Sets Us Free.
A child will be born to us. A son will be given to us. He will rule over us. And he will be called Wonderful Adviser and Mighty God. He will also be called Father Who Lives Forever and Prince Who Brings Peace.
Their eyes will be filled with tears as they come. They will pray as I bring them back. I will lead them beside streams of water. I will lead them on a level path where they will not trip or fall. I am Israel’s father. And Ephraim is my oldest son.
“But the time will come when the people of Israel will be like the sand on the seashore. It can’t be measured or counted. Now it is said about them, ‘You are not my people.’ But at that time they will be called ‘children of the living God.’
People of Judah, all of us have one Father. One God created us. So why do we break the covenant the Lord made with our people of long ago? We do this by being unfaithful to one another.