New King James Version

Hosea 13:3-13 New King James Version (NKJV)

3. Therefore they shall be like the morning cloudAnd like the early dew that passes away,Like chaff blown off from a threshing floorAnd like smoke from a chimney.

4. “Yet I am the Lord your GodEver since the land of Egypt,And you shall know no God but Me;For there is no savior besides Me.

5. I knew you in the wilderness,In the land of great drought.

6. When they had pasture, they were filled;They were filled and their heart was exalted;Therefore they forgot Me.

7. “So I will be to them like a lion;Like a leopard by the road I will lurk;

8. I will meet them like a bear deprived of her cubs;I will tear open their rib cage,And there I will devour them like a lion.The wild beast shall tear them.

9. “O Israel, you are destroyed,But your help is from Me.

10. I will be your King;Where is any other,That he may save you in all your cities?And your judges to whom you said,‘Give me a king and princes’?

11. I gave you a king in My anger,And took him away in My wrath.

12. “The iniquity of Ephraim is bound up;His sin is stored up.

13. The sorrows of a woman in childbirth shall come upon him.He is an unwise son,For he should not stay long where children are born.