Isaiah 51

1Listen to me, you who chase after righteousness, you who seek the LORD: look to the rock you were cut from, to the hollow of the pit you were dug out of. 2Look to Abraham your ancestor and to Sarah, who gave birth to your people. When I called him he was a single man, yet I blessed him and made him many.

3For the LORD will comfort Zion; he will bring comfort to all her ruined places. He will make her wilderness like Eden, her barren plain like the garden of the LORD. Gladness and delight will be found in her, songs of thanks and the sound of music.

4Listen closely to me, my people; hear me, my nation. Instruction will go out from me, and I will make my justice stand firm as a light for the peoples. 5My righteousness is close; my salvation has set out, and my arms will judge the peoples. The coastlands look to me in hope, and they wait for my arm. 6Raise your eyes to the sky and look at the earth below. The sky will drift away like smoke, the earth will fray like old clothing, and those who live on it will die like gnats. But my salvation will remain forever, and my righteousness will never give way.

7Hear me, you who know what is right, you people who carry my instruction in your hearts: do not be afraid when mortals mock you, and do not lose heart at their abuse. 8Like clothing, they will be eaten by moths; like wool, they will be chewed by grubs. But my righteousness will stand forever, my salvation through every generation.

9Awake, awake, put on strength, arm of the LORD! Awake as in days long gone, in ages past! Was it not you who cut Rahab to pieces, who ran the sea monster through? 10Was it not you who drained the sea, the waters of the vast deep, and turned the sea’s depths into a road for the redeemed to cross? 11Those the LORD has ransomed will come back; they will enter Zion with glad shouts, with joy that never ends resting on their heads. Delight and gladness will catch up with them, and grief and groaning will run away.

12I, I am he who comforts you. Who are you, to be afraid of mortals who die, of human beings who wither like grass, 13and you have forgotten the LORD your Maker, who spread out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth? Day after day you live in constant dread of the oppressor’s rage as he takes aim to destroy. But where is the oppressor’s rage now? 14The one bent low in chains will soon be released; he will not die and go down to the pit, nor will he go without bread. 15I am the LORD your God, who stirs up the sea until its waves roar; the LORD of Armies is his name. 16I have put my words in your mouth and sheltered you in the shadow of my hand, to plant the heavens and lay the foundations of the earth, and to say to Zion, “You are my people.”

17Awake, awake! Stand up, Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the LORD’s hand the cup of his wrath, who have drunk the goblet that makes people reel and emptied it to the bottom. 18Of all the children she bore, there is not one to guide her; of all the children she raised, there is no one to take her by the hand. 19These two disasters have come upon you; who will grieve for you? Devastation and ruin, famine and sword: how can I comfort you? 20Your children have collapsed; they lie at the corner of every street like an antelope in a net, filled to the brim with the wrath of the LORD, the rebuke of your God. 21So hear this, you who are afflicted, you who are drunk but not with wine:

22Your Lord, the LORD, your God who takes up his people’s cause, says this: See, I have taken out of your hand the cup that makes you reel. The goblet of my wrath you will never drink again. 23I will put it into the hands of those who tormented you, who said to you, “Lie face down, so we can walk across you.” And you made your back like the ground, like a street for people to walk on.