Isaiah 66:12-24

GOD’s Message: “I’ll pour robust well-being into her like a river, the glory of nations like a river in flood. You’ll nurse at her breasts, nestle in her bosom, and be bounced on her knees. As a mother comforts her child, so I’ll comfort you. You will be comforted in Jerusalem.” You’ll see all this and burst with joy —you’ll feel ten feet tall— As it becomes apparent that GOD is on your side and against his enemies. For GOD arrives like wildfire and his chariots like a tornado, A furious outburst of anger, a rebuke fierce and fiery. For it’s by fire that GOD brings judgment, a death sentence on the human race. Many, oh so many, are under GOD’s sentence of death: “All who enter the sacred groves for initiation in those unholy rituals that climaxed in that foul and obscene meal of pigs and mice will eat together and then die together.” GOD’s Decree. “I know everything they’ve ever done or thought. I’m going to come and then gather everyone—all nations, all languages. They’ll come and see my glory. I’ll set up a station at the center. I’ll send the survivors of judgment all over the world: Spain and Africa, Turkey and Greece, and the far-off islands that have never heard of me, who know nothing of what I’ve done nor who I am. I’ll send them out as missionaries to preach my glory among the nations. They’ll return with all your long-lost brothers and sisters from all over the world. They’ll bring them back and offer them in living worship to GOD. They’ll bring them on horses and wagons and carts, on mules and camels, straight to my holy mountain Jerusalem,” says GOD. “They’ll present them just as Israelites present their offerings in a ceremonial vessel in the Temple of GOD. I’ll even take some of them and make them priests and Levites,” says GOD. “For just as the new heavens and new earth that I am making will stand firm before me” —GOD’s Decree— “So will your children and your reputation stand firm. Month after month and week by week, everyone will come to worship me,” GOD says. “And then they’ll go out and look at what happened to those who rebelled against me. Corpses! Maggots endlessly eating away on them, an endless supply of fuel for fires. Everyone who sees what’s happened and smells the stench retches.”