2How terrible it will be for those who lie awake and plan evil! When morning comes, as soon as they have the chance, they do the evil they planned. ²When they want fields, they seize them; when they want houses, they take them. No one’s family or property is safe.

³And so the Lord says, “I am planning to bring disaster on you, and you will not be able to escape it. You are going to find yourselves in trouble, and then you will not walk so proudly any more. ⁴When that time comes, people will use your story as an example of disaster, and they will sing this song of despair about your experience:

We are completely ruined!

The Lord has taken our land away

And given it to those who took us captive.”^b

⁵So then, when the time comes for the land to be given back to the Lord’s people, there will be no share for any of you.

⁶The people preach at me and say, “Don’t preach at us. Don’t preach about all that. God is not going to disgrace us. ⁷Do you think the people of Israel are under a curse?^c Has the Lord lost his patience? Would he really do such things? Doesn’t he^d speak kindly to those who do right?”

⁸The Lord replies, “You attack my people^e like enemies. Men return from battle, thinking they are safe at home, but there you are, waiting to steal the coats off their backs. ⁹You drive the women of my people out of the homes they love, and you have robbed their children of my blessings for ever. ¹⁰Get up and go; there is no safety here any more. Your sins have doomed this place to destruction.

¹¹“These people want the kind of prophet who goes about full of lies and deceit and says, ‘I prophesy that wine and liquor will flow for you.’

¹²“But I will gather you together, all you people of Israel that are left. I will bring you together like sheep returning to the fold. Like a pasture full of sheep, your land will once again be filled with many people.”

¹³God will open the way for them and lead them out of exile. They will break out of the city gates and go free. Their king, the Lord himself, will lead them out.

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Footnotes

bProbable text those who took us captive; Hebrew rebels.
cProbable text under a curse; Hebrew unclear.
dOne ancient translation Doesn’t he; Hebrew Don’t I.
eProbable text You attack my people; Hebrew Recently my people have attacked.