A Call to Repentance
The LORD says faithless Israel has proved more righteous than unfaithful Judah, then sends a message north calling for honest return rather than denial. If the faithless acknowledge their guilt, God will gather them to Zion and provide shepherds who feed them with knowledge and understanding.
A11nd the LORD said to me, “Faithless Israel has shown herself more righteous than unfaithful Judah. 12Go, proclaim this message toward the north: 13Only acknowledge your guilt, 14“Return, O faithless children,” declares the LORD, “for I am your master, and I will take you — one from a city and two from a family — and bring you to Zion. 15Then I will give you shepherds after My own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding.”
A future is described in which the ark is no longer central, because Jerusalem itself will be called the throne of the LORD and nations will gather there. In those days Judah and Israel will walk together and come from the north to the inheritance once given to their fathers.
16“In those days, when you multiply and increase in the land,” declares the LORD, “they will no longer discuss the ark of the covenant of the LORD. It will never come to mind, and no one will remember it or miss it, nor will another one be made. 17At that time they will call Jerusalem The Throne of the LORD, and all the nations will be gathered in Jerusalem to honor the name of the LORD. They will no longer follow the stubbornness of their evil hearts. 18In those days the house of Judah will walk with the house of Israel, and they will come together from the land of the north to the land that I gave to your fathers as an inheritance.
The LORD speaks of His desire to receive His people as sons and give them a beautiful land, expecting them to call Him Father and not turn away. Instead, they have betrayed Him like an unfaithful wife departing from her husband.
19Then I said, ‘How I long to make you My sons 20But as a woman may betray her husband,
A cry rises from the heights as the people weep over their crooked ways, and the LORD answers with a call to return that includes healing for their backsliding. The chapter ends with their confession that help from hills and idols is deceptive, that shame has devoured their labor from youth, and that they must lie down in disgrace because they and their fathers sinned against the LORD.
21A voice is heard on the barren heights, 22“Return, O faithless children, 23Surely deception comes from the hills, 24From our youth, that shameful god 25Let us lie down in our shame;