6. Lift up a signal flag toward Zion. Run for cover! Don’t stand still!For I am bringing disaster from the north —a great destruction.
7. A lion has gone up from his thicket; a destroyer of nations has set out.He has left his lairto make your land a waste.Your cities will be reduced to uninhabited ruins.
8. Because of this, put on sackcloth;mourn and wail, for the Lord’s burning anger has not turned away from us.
9. “On that day” — this is the Lord’s declaration — “the king and the officials will lose their courage. The priests will tremble in fear, and the prophets will be scared speechless.”
10. I said, “Oh no, Lord God, You have certainly deceived this people and Jerusalem, by announcing, ‘You will have peace,’ while a sword is at our throats.”
11. “At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem, ‘A searing wind blows from the barren heights in the wilderness on the way to My dear people. It comes not to winnow or to sift;