UST ISA Chapter 55

◄ ISA 55 ► ║ ═ ©

55 “Listen! Anyone who is thirsty may come and drink water.

Anyone who is hungry may come and eat

even if he has no money to pay for the food.

Yes, come and drink milk or wine, even if you have no money,

because it does not cost anything.

2 You should not pay money for things that do not nourish you.

You should not work hard to get things that do not satisfy you.

Pay careful attention to what I say.

Get things that are good for you,

and that will richly satisfy you deep inside.

3 Pay attention to me and come to me.

Do what I say, and you will live.

I will make an agreement with you that will last forever.

I will treat you kindly, just as surely as I treated King David kindly.

4 Consider how I used him to show the people of other nations what I am like.

I made him a ruler who governed other nations.

5 In the same way, you will call to the people of nations

you have not heard about before.

Those people will have not heard about you either.

But they will hurry to you

to find out about Yahweh your God. He is the holy God of you Israelites.

People will come to you because he will make you glorious.”

6 Worship Yahweh now while he will accept your worship.

Pray to him now while he is approaching you.

7 Wicked people should stop doing evil things.

Sinful people should stop thinking evil thoughts.

They should repent and ask Yahweh, our God, to forgive them,

because will be merciful to them

and he will forgive them even if they have done very bad things.

8 Yahweh declares, “Recognize that I do not think the way you think,

and I do not do things the way you do things.

9 Recognize that just as the sky is far above the earth,

so the things I do are far greater than the things you do.

The way I think is far beyond the way you think.

10 Consider how rain and snow come down from the sky

and do not go back up again

without soaking the ground

so that plants sprout and grow.

Then the earth produces seeds that farmers plant,

and they grow grain that people use to make bread to eat.

11 The command that I have spoken will be like that.

I will not discover later that it did not make happen what I want to happen.

Instead, it will make happen

the things about which I gave the command.

12 Indeed, you will leave Babylon rejoicing.

I will lead you out of there without any trouble.

It will be as if the mountains and hills celebrate as you pass by.

It will be as if all the trees in the countryside clap their hands.

13 Where thornbushes and briars once grew,

cypress trees and myrtle trees will grow instead.

People will honor Yahweh because of this.

It will always remind people that he does what he promises.”