Faithless Israel

6 Then the Lord said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Have you seen what faithless Israel did? She awent up on every high hill and under every green tree, and she was a harlot there.

7 “aI 1thought, ‘After she has done all these things she will return to Me’; but she did not return, and her btreacherous sister Judah saw it.

8 “And I saw that for all the adulteries of faithless Israel, I had sent her away and agiven her a writ of divorce, yet her btreacherous sister Judah did not fear; but she went and was a harlot also.

9 “Because of the lightness of her harlotry, she apolluted the land and committed adultery with bstones and trees.

10 “Yet in spite of all this her treacherous sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but rather in adeception,” declares the Lord.

God Invites Repentance

11 And the Lord said to me, “aFaithless Israel has proved herself more righteous than treacherous Judah.

12 “Go and proclaim these words toward the north and say,

‘aReturn, faithless Israel,’ declares the Lord;

‘bI will not 1look upon you in anger.

For I am cgracious,’ declares the Lord;

‘I will not be angry forever.

13 ‘Only 1aacknowledge your iniquity,

That you have transgressed against the Lord your God

And have bscattered your 2favors to the strangers cunder every green tree,

And you have not obeyed My voice,’ declares the Lord.

14 ‘Return, O faithless sons,’ declares the Lord;

‘For I am a amaster to you,

And I will take you one from a city and two from a family,

And bI will bring you to Zion.’

15 “Then I will give you ashepherds after My own heart, who will bfeed you on knowledge and understanding.

16 “It shall be in those days when you are multiplied and increased in the land,” declares the Lord, “they will ano longer say, ‘The ark of the covenant of the Lord.’ And it will not come to mind, nor will they remember it, nor will they miss it, nor will it be made again.

17 “At that time they will call Jerusalem ‘The aThrone of the Lord,’ and ball the nations will be gathered to it, to Jerusalem, for the cname of the Lord; nor will they dwalk anymore after the stubbornness of their evil heart.

18 “aIn those days the house of Judah will walk with the house of Israel, and they will come together bfrom the land of the north to the cland that I gave your fathers as an inheritance.

19 “Then I said,

‘How I would set you among 1My sons

And give you a pleasant land,

The most abeautiful inheritance of the nations!’

And I said, ‘You shall call Me, bMy Father,

And not turn away from following Me.’