God’s People Anticipate Vindication

7 The way of the righteous is level,

the path of the righteous that you make is straight.

8 Yes, as your judgments unfold,

O Lord, we wait for you.

We desire your fame and reputation to grow.

9 I look for you during the night,

my spirit within me seeks you at dawn,

for when your judgments come upon the earth,

those who live in the world learn about justice.

10 If the wicked are shown mercy,

they do not learn about justice.

Even in a land where right is rewarded, they act unjustly;

they do not see the Lord’s majesty revealed.

11 O Lord, you are ready to act,

but they don’t even notice.

They will see and be put to shame by your angry judgment against humankind,

yes, fire will consume your enemies.

12 O Lord, you make us secure,

for even all we have accomplished, you have done for us.

13 O Lord, our God,

masters other than you have ruled us,

but we praise your name alone.

14 The dead do not come back to life,

the spirits of the dead do not rise.

That is because you came in judgment and destroyed them,

you wiped out all memory of them.

15 You have made the nation larger, O Lord,

you have made the nation larger and revealed your splendor,

you have extended all the borders of the land.

16 O Lord, in distress they looked for you;

they uttered incantations because of your discipline.

17 As when a pregnant woman gets ready to deliver

and strains and cries out because of her labor pains,

so were we because of you, O Lord.

18 We were pregnant, we strained,

we gave birth, as it were, to wind.

We cannot produce deliverance on the earth;

people to populate the world are not born.

19 

Your dead will come back to life;

your corpses will rise up.

Wake up and shout joyfully, you who live in the ground!

For you will grow like plants drenched with the morning dew,

and the earth will bring forth its dead spirits.

20 Go, my people! Enter your inner rooms!

Close your doors behind you!

Hide for a little while,

until his angry judgment is over!

21 For look, the Lord is coming out of the place where he lives,

to punish the sin of those who live on the earth.

The earth will display the blood shed on it;

it will no longer cover up its slain.

27 At that time the Lord will punish

with his destructive, great, and powerful sword

Leviathan the fast-moving serpent,

Leviathan the squirming serpent;

he will kill the sea monster.

2 When that time comes,

sing about a delightful vineyard!

3 I, the Lord, protect it;

I water it regularly.

I guard it night and day,

so no one can harm it.

4 I am not angry.

I wish I could confront some thorns and briers!

Then I would march against them for battle;

I would set them all on fire,

5 unless they became my subjects

and made peace with me;

let them make peace with me.

6 The time is coming when Jacob will take root;

Israel will blossom and grow branches.

The produce will fill the surface of the world.

7 Has the Lord struck down Israel like he did their oppressors?

Has Israel been killed like their enemies?

8 When you summon her for divorce, you prosecute her;

he drives her away with his strong wind in the day of the east wind.

9 So in this way Jacob’s sin will be forgiven,

and this is how they will show they are finished sinning:

They will make all the stones of the altars

like crushed limestone,

and the Asherah poles and the incense altars will no longer stand.

10 For the fortified city is left alone;

it is a deserted settlement

and abandoned like the desert.

Calves graze there;

they lie down there

and eat its branches bare.

11 When its branches get brittle, they break;

women come and use them for kindling.

For these people lack understanding,

therefore the one who made them has no compassion on them;

the one who formed them has no mercy on them.

12 At that time the Lord will shake the tree, from the Euphrates River to the Stream of Egypt. Then you will be gathered up one by one, O Israelites. 13 At that time a large trumpet will be blown, and the ones lost in the land of Assyria will come, as well as the refugees in the land of Egypt. They will worship the Lord on the holy mountain in Jerusalem.

28 The splendid crown of Ephraim’s drunkards is doomed,

the withering flower, its beautiful splendor,

situated at the head of a rich valley,

the crown of those overcome with wine.

2 Look, the sovereign master sends a strong, powerful one.

With the force of a hailstorm or a destructive windstorm,

with the might of a driving, torrential rainstorm,

he will knock that crown to the ground with his hand.

3 The splendid crown of Ephraim’s drunkards

will be trampled underfoot.

4 The withering flower, its beautiful splendor,

situated at the head of a rich valley,

will be like an early fig before harvest –

as soon as someone notices it,

he grabs it and swallows it.

5 At that time the Lord who commands armies will become a beautiful crown

and a splendid diadem for the remnant of his people.

6 He will give discernment to the one who makes judicial decisions,

and strength to those who defend the city from attackers.

7 Even these men stagger because of wine,

they stumble around because of beer –

priests and prophets stagger because of beer,

they are confused because of wine,

they stumble around because of beer;

they stagger while seeing prophetic visions,

they totter while making legal decisions.

8 Indeed, all the tables are covered with vomit;

no place is untouched.

9 Who is the Lord trying to teach?

To whom is he explaining a message?

Those just weaned from milk!

Those just taken from their mother’s breast!

10 Indeed, they will hear meaningless gibberish,

senseless babbling,

a syllable here, a syllable there.

11 For with mocking lips and a foreign tongue

he will speak to these people.

12 In the past he said to them,

“This is where security can be found.

Provide security for the one who is exhausted!

This is where rest can be found.”

But they refused to listen.

13 So the Lord’s word to them will sound like

meaningless gibberish,

senseless babbling,

a syllable here, a syllable there.

As a result, they will fall on their backsides when they try to walk,

and be injured, ensnared, and captured.