Isaiah 48

1Hear this, house of Jacob, you who are called by the name of Israel and who came out from the waters of Judah, who swear by the name of Yahweh and invoke the God of Israel, but not in truth or in righteousness.

2For they are called from the holy city, and they lean on the God of Israel; Yahweh of hosts is his name.

3I declared the former things long ago; they went out from my mouth, and I made them heard. Suddenly I acted, and they came to pass.

4Because I knew that you are stubborn, and your neck is an iron sinew, and your forehead is bronze,

5I declared it to you long ago; before it came to pass I made you hear it, lest you say, ‘My idol did them, and my carved image and my cast image commanded them.’

6You have heard; now see all this. And will you not declare it? From now on I make you hear new things, hidden things that you have not known.

7Now they are created, and not from long ago; before today you had not heard them, lest you should say, ‘Look, I knew them.’

8Indeed, you had not heard; indeed, you had not known; indeed, from of old your ear had not been opened. For I knew that you would surely deal treacherously, and that from the womb you would be called a transgressor.

9For the sake of my name I delay my anger, and for my praise I restrain it for you, so as not to cut you off.

10Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have chosen you in the furnace of affliction.

11For my own sake, for my own sake, I will act; for how can it be profaned? And my glory I will not give to another.

12Listen to me, Jacob, and Israel, whom I called: I am he; I am the first, and I am the last.

13Indeed, my hand founded the earth, and my right hand spread out the heavens; when I call to them, they stand together.

14Gather yourselves, all of you, and listen: who among them has declared these things? Yahweh loves him; he will carry out his purpose in Babylon, and his arm will be against the Chaldeans.

15I, I have spoken; indeed, I have called him; I have brought him, and I will make his way prosper.

16Come near to me; hear this: From the beginning I have not spoken in secret; from the time it came to be, I was there. And now the Lord GOD has sent me, and his Spirit.

17Thus says Yahweh, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: I am Yahweh your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you in the way you should go.

18If only you had paid attention to my commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness like the waves of the sea.

19Your offspring would have been like the sand, and the descendants from your body like its grains; their name would not have been cut off or destroyed from before me.

20Go out from Babylon; flee from the Chaldeans! Declare this with a shout of joy; make it heard; send it out to the end of the earth. Say, “Yahweh has redeemed his servant Jacob.”

21They did not thirst when he led them through the deserts; he made water flow for them from the rock; he split the rock, and water gushed out.

22There is no peace," says Yahweh, "for the wicked.