3. For a nation will attack her from the northand bring such destruction that no one will live there again.Everything will be gone;both people and animals will flee.
4. “In those coming days,”says the lord,“the people of Israel will return hometogether with the people of Judah.They will come weepingand seeking the lord their God.
5. They will ask the way to Jerusalemand will start back home again.They will bind themselves to the lordwith an eternal covenant that will never be forgotten.
6. “My people have been lost sheep.Their shepherds have led them astrayand turned them loose in the mountains.They have lost their wayand can’t remember how to get back to the sheepfold.
7. All who found them devoured them.Their enemies said,‘We did nothing wrong in attacking them,for they sinned against the lord,their true place of rest,and the hope of their ancestors.’
8. “But now, flee from Babylon!Leave the land of the Babylonians.Like male goats at the head of the flock,lead my people home again.
9. For I am raising up an armyof great nations from the north.They will join forces to attack Babylon,and she will be captured.The enemies’ arrows will go straight to the mark;they will not miss!
10. Babylonia will be looteduntil the attackers are glutted with loot.I, the lord, have spoken!
11. “You rejoice and are glad,you who plundered my chosen people.You frisk about like a calf in a meadowand neigh like a stallion.
12. But your homeland will be overwhelmedwith shame and disgrace.You will become the least of nations—a wilderness, a dry and desolate land.
13. Because of the lord’s anger,Babylon will become a deserted wasteland.All who pass by will be horrifiedand will gasp at the destruction they see there.
14. “Yes, prepare to attack Babylon,all you surrounding nations.Let your archers shoot at her; spare no arrows.For she has sinned against the lord.
15. Shout war cries against her from every side.Look! She surrenders!Her walls have fallen.It is the lord’s vengeance,so take vengeance on her.Do to her as she has done to others!
16. Take from Babylon all those who plant crops;send all the harvesters away.Because of the sword of the enemy,everyone will run away and rush back to their own lands.
17. “The Israelites are like sheepthat have been scattered by lions.First the king of Assyria ate them up.Then King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon cracked their bones.”
18. Therefore, this is what the lord of Heaven’s Armies,the God of Israel, says:“Now I will punish the king of Babylon and his land,just as I punished the king of Assyria.
19. And I will bring Israel home again to its own land,to feed in the fields of Carmel and Bashan,and to be satisfied once morein the hill country of Ephraim and Gilead.
20. In those days,” says the lord,“no sin will be found in Israel or in Judah,for I will forgive the remnant I preserve.
21. “Go up, my warriors, against the land of Merathaimand against the people of Pekod.Pursue, kill, and completely destroy them,as I have commanded you,” says the lord.