For the sake of my servant Jacob, Israel, my chosen one, I call you by name and give you a title of respect, even though you do not recognize ¹  me.

“Indeed, the Lord will call you back like a wife who has been abandoned and suffers from depression, ¹  like a young wife when she has been rejected,” says your God.

Then you will call out, and the Lord will respond; you will cry out, and he will reply, ‘Here I am.’ You must ¹  remove the burdensome yoke from among you and stop pointing fingers and speaking sinfully.

The children of your oppressors will come bowing to you; all who treated you with disrespect will bow down at your feet. They will call you, ‘The City of the Lord, Zion of the Holy One of Israel.’ ¹ 

I brought you ¹  into a fertile land so you could enjoy ²  its fruits and its rich bounty. But when you entered my land, you defiled it; ³  you made the land I call my own ⁴  loathsome to me.

Then the Lord said to me, ¹  “When you tell them all this, they will not listen to you. When you call out to them, they will not respond to you.

The Lord who rules over all ¹  told me to say to this people, ²  “Take note of what I say. ³  Call for the women who mourn for the dead! Summon those who are the most skilled at it!” ⁴ 

The people I call my own ¹  have turned on me like a lion ²  in the forest. They have roared defiantly ³  at me. So I will treat them as though I hate them. ⁴ 

I also call on you ¹  to love the Lord your God, to obey him and be loyal to him, for he gives you life and enables you to live continually ²  in the land the Lord promised to give to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”

In those days Israel had no king. And in those days the Danite tribe was looking for a place ¹  to settle, because at that time they did not yet have a place to call their own among the tribes of Israel. ² 

Is this not the time of the wheat harvest? I will call on the Lord so that he makes it thunder and rain. Realize and see what a great sin you have committed before the Lord by asking for a king for yourselves.”

Now Absalom used to get up early and stand beside the road that led to the city gate. Whenever anyone came by who had a complaint to bring to the king for arbitration, Absalom would call out to him, “What city are you from?” The person would answer, “I, your servant, ¹  am from one of the tribes of Israel.”

He said to the king, “Don’t think badly of me, my lord, and don’t recall the sin of your servant on the day when you, my lord the king, left ¹  Jerusalem! ²  Please don’t call it to mind!

“Note well, you still have to contend with Shimei son of Gera, the Benjaminite from Bahurim, ¹  who tried to call down upon me a horrible judgment when I went to Mahanaim. ²  He came down and met me at the Jordan, and I solemnly promised ³  him by the Lord, ‘I will not strike you down ⁴  with the sword.’

For the music director, to be accompanied by stringed instruments; a psalm of David. When I call out, answer me, O God who vindicates me! ²  Though I am hemmed in, you will lead me into a wide, open place. ³  Have mercy on me ⁴  and respond to ⁵  my prayer!

Why does no one challenge me when I come? Why does no one respond when I call? ¹  Is my hand too weak ²  to deliver ³  you? Do I lack the power to rescue you? Look, with a mere shout ⁴  I can dry up the sea; I can turn streams into a desert, so the fish rot away and die from lack of water. ⁵ 

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?

In those days, your population will greatly increase ¹  in the land. At that time,” says the Lord, “people will no longer talk about having the ark ²  that contains the Lord’s covenant with us. ³  They will not call it to mind, remember it, or miss it. No, that will not be done any more! ⁴ 

“I thought to myself, ¹  ‘Oh what a joy it would be for me to treat you like a son! ²  What a joy it would be for me to give ³  you a pleasant land, the most beautiful piece of property there is in all the world!’ ⁴  I thought you would call me, ‘Father’ ⁵  and would never cease being loyal to me. ⁶ 

Children are gathering firewood, fathers are building fires with it, and women are mixing dough to bake cakes to offer to the goddess they call the Queen of Heaven. ¹  They are also pouring out drink offerings to other gods. They seem to do all this just ²  to trouble me.