Isaiah 33

33 ¹ Woe to you, destroyer, who have not been destroyed; you betrayer, whom no one has betrayed! When you have finished destroying, you will be destroyed; when you stop betraying, you will be betrayed.

² Our Father, be gracious to us; we wait for you. Be our strength every morning, our salvation in the time of trouble. ³ At the thunder of your voice the peoples flee; when you rise up, the nations scatter. ⁴ Your plunder is gathered as the locust gathers; like swarming locusts, people rush upon it.

⁵ Our Father is exalted, for he dwells on high; he has filled Zion with justice and righteousness. ⁶ He will be the sure foundation of your times, a wealth of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge; the fear of our Father is Zion's treasure.

⁷ Look, their brave men cry out in the streets; the envoys of peace weep bitterly. ⁸ The highways lie deserted; travelers have vanished from the road. The covenant is broken, its cities are despised, no one is respected. ⁹ The land mourns and wastes away; Lebanon is ashamed and withers; Sharon has become like the desert, and Bashan and Carmel shake off their leaves.

¹⁰ "Now I will arise," says our Father, "now I will be exalted, now I will lift myself up." ¹¹ You conceive chaff, you give birth to stubble; your breath is a fire that will consume you. ¹² The peoples will be burned to ash, like thorns cut down and set ablaze. ¹³ Hear, you who are far off, what I have done; and you who are near, acknowledge my might.

¹⁴ The sinners in Zion are terrified; trembling grips the godless: "Who among us can live with the consuming fire? Who among us can live with everlasting flames?" ¹⁵ The one who walks righteously and speaks what is right, who rejects gain from extortion and keeps his hand from taking a bribe, who stops his ears to plots of bloodshed and shuts his eyes to evil— ¹⁶ this is the one who will dwell on the heights, whose refuge will be the mountain fortresses; his bread will be given to him, and his water will not fail.

¹⁷ Your eyes will see the king in his beauty; they will see a land that stretches far away. ¹⁸ Your heart will ponder the former terror: "Where is the one who counted? Where is the one who weighed the tribute? Where is the one who counted the towers?" ¹⁹ You will no longer see those insolent people, a people whose speech is too strange to follow, stammering in a tongue you cannot understand.

²⁰ Look at Zion, the city of our appointed feasts! Your eyes will see Jerusalem, a peaceful home, a tent that will not be moved, whose stakes will never be pulled up and whose cords will never break. ²¹ But there our Father in his majesty will be for us a place of broad rivers and streams, where no galley with oars can go and no mighty ship can pass. ²² For our Father is our judge, our Father is our lawgiver, our Father is our king; he will save us.

²³ Your rigging hangs loose: it cannot hold the mast in place or keep the sail spread. Then an abundance of plunder will be divided, and even the lame will carry off the spoil. ²⁴ And no one living in Zion will say, "I am sick"; the people who dwell there will have their sin forgiven.