Isaiah 55

1Oh, all you who are thirsty, come to the water! You who have no money, come, buy grain and eat! Come, buy wine and milk with no money and at no price.

2Why weigh out money for what is not bread, and your hard-earned wages for what never fills you? Listen closely to me and eat what is good, and let your soul revel in rich fare.

3Bend your ear and come to me; hear, and your soul will live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you, the dependable acts of steadfast love I showed David.

4Look, I appointed him as a witness to the peoples, a ruler and commander over the peoples.

5Look, you will summon a nation you do not know, and a nation that does not know you will come running to you, for the sake of Yahweh your God, the Holy One of Israel, because he has made you glorious.

6Seek Yahweh while he can be found; call to him while he is close.

7Let the wicked give up their way and the wrongdoers their thoughts; let them turn back to Yahweh so that he will show them compassion, to our God, for he will be generous in forgiving.

8For my thoughts are nothing like your thoughts, and your ways are nothing like my ways, declares Yahweh.

9For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so high are my ways above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts.

10Just as rain and snow fall from the sky and do not go back there until they have soaked the ground and made it bear and sprout, providing seed for the one who sows and bread for the one who eats,

11so it will be with my word that comes from my mouth: it will not come back to me empty; it will do what I want and will prosper in what I sent it for.

12For you will go out with gladness and be brought along in peace; the mountains and hills will burst out singing in front of you, and every tree in the field will clap its hands.

13In place of the thornbush a cypress will come up, and in place of the nettle a myrtle will come up. It will make a name for Yahweh, a sign for all time that will never be cut off.