Yahweh summons his people to return to him

1 I am Zechariah, a prophet, the son of Berekiah and grandson of Iddo. When Darius had been the emperor of Persia for almost two years, during November of that year, Yahweh gave me this message:

2 “I was very angry with your ancestors. 3 So tell this to the people: I, the Commander of the armies of angels, say, ‘Return to me, and if you do that, I will help you again. 4 Do not be like your ancestors. Other prophets, who have now died, continually proclaimed to your ancestors that they should stop doing the evil things that they were continually doing. But they refused to pay attention to what I said. 5 Your ancestors have died and are now in their graves [RHQ]. And the prophets did not [RHQ] live forever, either. 6 But I punished [IDM] the people for disobeying the commands and the decrees which I commanded my servants the prophets to tell to the people.

Then they ◄repented/turned away from their evil behavior► and said, ‘The Commander of the armies of angels has done to us what we deserved for our evil behavior, just like he said that he would do.’ ”