But I thought, ¹  “I have worked in vain; I have expended my energy for absolutely nothing.” ²  But the Lord will vindicate me; my God will reward me. ³ 

Certainly the Lord will console Zion; he will console all her ruins. He will make her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the Garden of the Lord. Happiness and joy will be restored to ¹  her, thanksgiving and the sound of music.

This is what your sovereign master, ¹  the Lord your God, says: “Look, I have removed from your hand the cup of intoxicating wine, ²  the goblet full of my anger. ³  You will no longer have to drink it.

Look, you will summon nations ¹  you did not previously know; nations ²  that did not previously know you will run to you, because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, ³  for he bestows honor on you.

No, this is the kind of fast I want. ¹  I want you ²  to remove the sinful chains, to tear away the ropes of the burdensome yoke, to set free the oppressed, ³  and to break every burdensome yoke.

All the sheep of Kedar will be gathered to you; the rams of Nebaioth will be available to you as sacrifices. ¹  They will go up on my altar acceptably, ²  and I will bestow honor on my majestic temple.

Their descendants will be known among the nations, their offspring among the peoples. All who see them will recognize that the Lord has blessed them.” ¹ 

Look, the Lord announces to the entire earth: ¹  “Say to Daughter Zion, ‘Look, your deliverer comes! Look, his reward is with him and his reward goes before him!’” ² 

Like an animal that goes down into a valley to graze, ¹  so the Spirit of the Lord granted them rest. In this way ²  you guided your people, gaining for yourself an honored reputation. ³ 

Why, Lord, do you make us stray ¹  from your ways, ²  and make our minds stubborn so that we do not obey you? ³  Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your inheritance!

No one invokes ¹  your name, or makes an effort ²  to take hold of you. For you have rejected us ³  and handed us over to our own sins. ⁴ 

Therefore, as flaming fire ¹  devours straw, and dry grass disintegrates in the flames, so their root will rot, and their flower will blow away like dust. ²  For they have rejected the law of the Lord who commands armies, they have spurned the commands ³  of the Holy One of Israel. ⁴ 

Who decreed this from the beginning, so we could know? Who announced it ¹  ahead of time, so we could say, ‘He’s correct’? Indeed, none of them decreed it! Indeed, none of them announced it! Indeed, no one heard you say anything!

Tell me! Present the evidence! ¹  Let them consult with one another! Who predicted this in the past? Who announced it beforehand? Was it not I, the Lord? I have no peer, there is no God but me, a God who vindicates and delivers; ²  there is none but me.

So now the Lord says, the one who formed me from birth ¹  to be his servant – he did this ²  to restore Jacob to himself, so that Israel might be gathered to him; and I will be honored ³  in the Lord’s sight, for my God is my source of strength ⁴  –

Why do you forget ¹  the Lord, who made you, who stretched out the sky ²  and founded the earth? Why do you constantly tremble all day long ³  at the anger of the oppressor, when he makes plans to destroy? Where is the anger of the oppressor? ⁴ 

I will put it into the hand of your tormentors ¹  who said to you, ‘Lie down, so we can walk over you.’ You made your back like the ground, and like the street for those who walked over you.”

They seek me day after day; they want to know my requirements, ¹  like a nation that does what is right and does not reject the law of their God. They ask me for just decrees; they want to be near God.

Is this really the kind of fasting I want? ¹  Do I want a day when people merely humble themselves, ²  bowing their heads like a reed and stretching out ³  on sackcloth and ashes? Is this really what you call a fast, a day that is pleasing to the Lord?

“As for me, this is my promise to ¹  them,” says the Lord. “My spirit, who is upon you, and my words, which I have placed in your mouth, will not depart from your mouth or from the mouths of your children and descendants from this time forward,” ²  says the Lord.