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14. Repentance to Bring Blessing

¹ In Hebrew texts 14:1-9 is numbered 14:2-10.Return, Israel, to the LORD your God.
   Your sins have been your downfall!
² Take words with you
   and return to the LORD.
Say to him:
   “Forgive all our sins
and receive us graciously,
   that we may offer the fruit of our lips. Or offer our lips as sacrifices of bulls
³ Assyria cannot save us;
   we will not mount warhorses.
We will never again say ‘Our gods’
   to what our own hands have made,
   for in you the fatherless find compassion.”

    ⁴ “I will heal their waywardness
   and love them freely,
   for my anger has turned away from them.
⁵ I will be like the dew to Israel;
   he will blossom like a lily.
Like a cedar of Lebanon
   he will send down his roots;
    ⁶ his young shoots will grow.
His splendor will be like an olive tree,
   his fragrance like a cedar of Lebanon.
⁷ People will dwell again in his shade;
   they will flourish like the grain,
they will blossom like the vine—
   Israel’s fame will be like the wine of Lebanon.
⁸ Ephraim, what more have I Or Hebrew; Septuagint What more has Ephraim to do with idols?
   I will answer him and care for him.
I am like a flourishing juniper;
   your fruitfulness comes from me.”

    ⁹ Who is wise? Let them realize these things.
   Who is discerning? Let them understand.
The ways of the LORD are right;
   the righteous walk in them,
   but the rebellious stumble in them.

The Prophet goes on with the same subject, but joins the beginning of the first verse with the second clause of the former verse. He had said that the roots of the people would be deep when God should restore them. Now he adds, that their branches shall go on He mentions here “to go on” metaphorically for extending far; for branches of trees seem to go on, when they extend and spread themselves far and wide. His branches, then, shall go on; which means, that a tree, after striking roots, remains not in the same state, but grows and spreads forth its branches in all directions. In short, God promises a daily increase to his blessing, after he has once begun to show himself bountiful to the people of Israel. “I will then be bountiful at the beginning; and further, he says, my blessing shall, as time passes, increase and be multiplied.”

He afterwards adds, His comeliness shall be like the olive The Prophet accumulates similitudes, that he might more fully confirm the people. And we certainly see that the minds of men grow faint, when they look for prosperity from this or that quarter; for there is hardly one in a hundred who is fully persuaded that when God is propitious, all things turn out well and happily: for men regard not the love of God when they wish things to be well with them, but wander here and there through the whole world; and now they seek prosperity from themselves, then from the earth, now from the air, then from the sea. Since then it is so difficult to impress this truth fully on the hearts of men, that the love of God is the fountain of all blessings, the Prophet has collected together a number of similitudes to confirm what he teaches. Then his comeliness, he says, shall be like the olive; and further, his fragrance like that of Libanus: and odoriferous trees, we know, grow on Mount Libanus. But by these various similes the Prophet shows that the state of the people would be prosperous and happy as soon as they should be received by God into favour. He afterwards adds, the dwellers under his shadow shall return; but I defer this till to-morrow.