Woe to me! For I have become like the gatherings of summer fruit, like the gleanings of the grape harvest — there is no cluster to eat, no early fig that my being craved.
The loyal one has perished from the earth, and there is no upright among mankind. All of them lie in wait for blood; each hunts his brother with a net.
Their hands are on evil to do it well: the official asks, and the judge is there for a payment, and the great man speaks the craving of his being — and so they weave it together.
The best of them is like a brier, the most upright worse than a thorn hedge. The day of your watchmen, your reckoning, has come; now their confusion will come.
Do not trust in a companion, do not rely on a close friend; from her who lies in your bosom guard the openings of your mouth.
For a son treats a father with contempt, a daughter rises against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man’s enemies are the men of his own house.
Israel’s Confession and Comfort
But as for me, I will watch for the LORD; I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me.
Do not rejoice over me, my enemy. Though I have fallen, I have risen; though I sit in the darkness, the LORD is a light to me.
I will bear the rage of the LORD, because I have sinned against him, until he contends my case and does my judgment. He will bring me out to the light; I will look on his righteousness.
And my enemy will see, and shame will cover her who said to me, “Where is the LORD your God?” My eyes will look on her; now she will be a trampling place, like the mud of the streets.
A day for building your walls — that day the boundary will be far off.
That is a day when they will come to you, from Assyria and the cities of Egypt, and from Egypt as far as the River, and sea from sea, and mountain from mountain.
And the earth will become a desolation because of its inhabitants, from the fruit of their deeds.
God’s Compassion on Israel
Shepherd your people with your rod, the flock of your inheritance, dwelling alone in a forest in the midst of Carmel. Let them graze in Bashan and Gilead as in the days of eternity.
As in the days of your coming out from the land of Egypt, I will show him wonders.
Nations will see and be ashamed of all their might; they will put a hand on the mouth, their ears will go deaf.
They will lick dust like the serpent; like crawlers of the ground they will come trembling out of their strongholds. To the LORD our God they will come in dread, and they will be afraid of you.
Who is a God like you, bearing iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? He has not held on to his anger forever, for he delights in loyal love.
He will return, he will have compassion on us; he will subdue our iniquities. And you will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
You will give truth to Jacob, loyal love to Abraham, which you swore to our fathers from the days of old.
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