New Living Translation
Isaiah • Chapter 59
1
Listen! The LORD’s arm is not too weak to save you,<br>nor is his ear too deaf to hear you call.<br>
2
It’s your sins that have cut you off from God (Elohim).<br>Because of your sins, he has turned away<br>and will not listen anymore.<br>
3
Your hands are the hands of murderers,<br>and your fingers are filthy with sin.<br>Your lips are full of lies,<br>and your mouth spews corruption.<br>
4
No one cares about being fair and honest.<br>The people’s lawsuits are based on lies.<br>They conceive evil deeds<br>and then give birth to sin.<br>
5
They hatch deadly snakes<br>and weave spiders’ webs.<br>Whoever eats their eggs will die;<br>whoever cracks them will hatch a viper.<br>
6
Their webs can’t be made into clothing,<br>and nothing they do is productive.<br>All their activity is filled with sin,<br>and violence is their trademark.<br>
7
Their feet run to do evil,<br>and they rush to commit murder.<br>They think only about sinning.<br>Misery and destruction always follow them.<br>
8
They don’t know where to find peace<br>or what it means to be just and good.<br>They have mapped out crooked roads,<br>and no one who follows them knows a moment’s peace.<br>
9
So there is no justice among us,<br>and we know nothing about right living.<br>We look for light but find only darkness.<br>We look for bright skies but walk in gloom.<br>
10
We grope like the blind along a wall,<br>feeling our way like people without eyes.<br>Even at brightest noontime,<br>we stumble as though it were dark.<br>Among the living,<br>we are like the dead.<br>
11
We growl like hungry bears;<br>we moan like mournful doves.<br>We look for justice, but it never comes.<br>We look for rescue, but it is far away from us.<br>
12
For our sins are piled up before God (Elohim)<br>and testify against us.<br>Yes, we know what sinners we are.<br>
13
We know we have rebelled and have denied the LORD.<br>We have turned our backs on our God (Elohim).<br>We know how unfair and oppressive we have been,<br>carefully planning our deceitful lies.<br>
14
Our courts oppose the righteous,<br>and justice is nowhere to be found.<br>Truth stumbles in the streets,<br>and honesty has been outlawed.<br>
15
Yes, truth is gone,<br>and anyone who renounces evil is attacked.<br> The LORD looked and was displeased<br>to find there was no justice.<br>
16
He was amazed to see that no one intervened<br>to help the oppressed.<br>So he himself stepped in to save them with his strong arm,<br>and his justice sustained him.<br>
17
He put on righteousness as his body armor<br>and placed the helmet of salvation on his head.<br>He clothed himself with a robe of vengeance<br>and wrapped himself in a cloak of divine passion.<br>
18
He will repay his enemies for their evil deeds.<br>His fury will fall on his foes.<br>He will pay them back even to the ends of the earth.<br>
19
In the west, people will respect the name of the LORD;<br>in the east, they will glorify him.<br>For he will come like a raging flood tide<br>driven by the breath of the LORD.<br>
20
“The Redeemer will come to Jerusalem<br>to buy back those in Israel<br>who have turned from their sins,”<br>says the LORD.<br>
21
“And this is my covenant with them,” says the LORD. “My Spirit will not leave them, and neither will these words I have given you. They will be on your lips and on the lips of your children and your children’s children forever. I, the LORD, have spoken!