10. Many foreign rulers will ruin the land where I planted my people.They will trample all over my chosen land.They will turn my beautiful landinto a desolate wasteland.
11. They will lay it waste.It will lie parched and empty before me.The whole land will be laid waste.But no one living in it will pay any heed.
12. A destructive army will come marchingover the hilltops in the desert.For the Lord will use them as his destructive weaponagainst everyone from one end of the land to the other.No one will be safe.
13. My people will sow wheat, but will harvest weeds.They will work until they are exhausted, but will get nothing from it.They will be disappointed in their harvestsbecause the Lord will take them away in his fierce anger.
14. “I, the Lord, also have something to say concerning the wicked nations who surround my land and have attacked and plundered the land that I gave to my people as a permanent possession. I say: ‘I will uproot the people of those nations from their lands and I will free the people of Judah who have been taken there.
15. But after I have uprooted the people of those nations, I will relent and have pity on them. I will restore the people of each of those nations to their own lands and to their own country.
16. But they must make sure you learn to follow the religious practices of my people. Once they taught my people to swear their oaths using the name of the god Baal. But then, they must swear oaths using my name, saying, “As surely as the Lord lives, I swear.” If they do these things, then they will be included among the people I call my own.
17. But I will completely uproot and destroy any of those nations that will not pay heed,’” says the Lord.