Isaiah
Chapter 64
1 I wish you would tear open the skies and come down, so that the mountains would melt before you.
2 Just like a fire melts things and boiling water bubbles, so you show your power to your enemies, making nations shake before you.
3 When you did amazing things we didn’t expect, you came, and the mountains melted before you.
4 From the start of the world, people have not heard or known by hearing, and no eye has seen, O God, what you have made ready for those who wait for you.
5 You meet those who are happy and do good, who remember you and your paths. But you are angry because we have sinned. Yet if we continue in this, we will be saved.
6 We are all unclean, and our good deeds are like dirty cloths; we all wither like a leaf, and our sins sweep us away like the wind.
7 No one calls on your name or makes an effort to hold on to you, for you have hidden your face from us and have let our sins destroy us.
8 But now, God, you are our father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.
9 Don’t be very angry, God, and don’t remember sins forever. Look, we beg you, we are all your people.
10 Your holy cities are empty, Zion is empty, Jerusalem is destroyed.
11 Our sacred and lovely home, where our ancestors worshiped you, has been destroyed by fire; and all our nice things are ruined.
12 Will you hold back because of these things, God? Will you stay silent and punish us harshly?