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¹ COMFORT ye, comfort ye my people, says your God.² Speak comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry to her, for she was filled with violence and delighted in sin; and she has received from the LORDS hand double punishment for all her sins.

³ The voice of him that cries in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.⁴ Every valley shall be filled up, and every mountain and hill shall be made low; and the steep place shall be made straight, and the rough places smooth;⁵ And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it.⁶ The voice says, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is like the flower of the field;⁷ The grass withers, the flower fades, because the breath of the LORD blows upon it; surely this people is like the grass.⁸ The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God shall stand for ever.

⁹ O Zion, that brings good tidings, get you up upon the high mountain; O Jerusalem, that brings good tidings, lift up your voice with strength; lift it up, be not afraid; say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God!¹⁰ Behold, the LORD God will come with might, and his arm with strength; behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him.¹¹ He shall feed his flock like a shepherd; he shall gather the lambs with his arm and carry them in his bosom, and shall feed again those who give suck.

¹² Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and meted out heaven with a span and gathered the dust of the earth in a measure and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance?¹³ Who has directed the Spirit of the LORD or who has been to him a counsellor?¹⁴ With whom took he counsel, and who instructed him and made him to understand the path of justice and taught him knowledge and showed him the way of understanding?¹⁵ Behold, the nations are like a drop out of a bucket, and are counted as the dipping of the balance; behold, the isles shall be cast away like fine dust.¹⁶ And Lebanon is not sufficient for the fuel, nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt offering.¹⁷ All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him for destruction and the sword.

¹⁸ To whom then will you liken God? Or to what likeness will you compare him?¹⁹ Is he an image which the carpenter has made and the goldsmith has overlaid with gold and fastened with silver chains?²⁰ He selects wood that is not worm-eaten; then chooses a carpenter, who fashions it with his skill, to make an image that will not be moved.²¹ Have you not heard? Have you not known? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?²² It is he who sits upon the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens as a curtain and spreads them as a tent to dwell in;²³ Who brings princes to nought; and makes the judges of the earth as if they were nothing.²⁴ Yea, they shall not be planted; yea, they shall not be sown; yea, their stock shall not take root in the earth; and he shall blow upon them and they shall wither, and the whirlwind shall take them away as stubble.²⁵ To whom then will you liken me, or to whom shall I be equal? says the Holy One.²⁶ Lift up your eyes on high, and behold: who has created these things? Who brings out their host by number; he called them all by name, by the greatness of his glory and the strength of his power; not one is missing.

²⁷ Why do you say, O Jacob, and say, O Israel, My way is hidden from the LORD and justice is not rendered by my God?²⁸ Have you not known, have you not heard, that God is the LORD for ever, who has created the ends of the earth? that he does not faint, neither is weary? and that there is no searching of his understanding?²⁹ He gives power to the weary, and to them that are stricken with disease he increases strength.³⁰ Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall helplessly stumble;³¹ But they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall grow wings as a dove; they shall run and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint.