Isaiah 54:5–6

²⁵Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;

²⁶That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,

²⁷That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.

¹⁹And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies.

²⁰I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know the Lord.

²For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.

³But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.

¹⁷Thus saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; I am the Lord thy God which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.

⁸Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord God, and thou becamest mine.

²⁹Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also:

³⁰Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith.

²⁹He that hath the bride is the bridegroom: but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice: this my joy therefore is fulfilled.

¹⁰Hearken, O daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget also thine own people, and thy father’s house;

¹¹So shall the king greatly desire thy beauty: for he is thy Lord; and worship thou him.

¹²And the daughter of Tyre shall be there with a gift; even the rich among the people shall intreat thy favour.

¹³The king’s daughter is all glorious within: her clothing is of wrought gold.

¹⁴She shall be brought unto the king in raiment of needlework: the virgins her companions that follow her shall be brought unto thee.

¹⁵With gladness and rejoicing shall they be brought: they shall enter into the king’s palace.

¹⁶Instead of thy fathers shall be thy children, whom thou mayest make princes in all the earth.

¹⁷I will make thy name to be remembered in all generations: therefore shall the people praise thee for ever and ever.

⁹And the Lord shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one Lord, and his name one.

³²This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.

¹⁴¶ Thus saith the Lord, your redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; For your sake I have sent to Babylon, and have brought down all their nobles, and the Chaldeans, whose cry is in the ships.

³And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory.

¹⁴Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord; for I am married unto you: and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion:

¹⁹The portion of Jacob is not like them; for he is the former of all things: and Israel is the rod of his inheritance: the Lord of hosts is his name.

³²He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David:

¹⁶The portion of Jacob is not like them: for he is the former of all things; and Israel is the rod of his inheritance: The Lord of hosts is his name.

¹⁵And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.

²For they call themselves of the holy city, and stay themselves upon the God of Israel; The Lord of hosts is his name.

¹⁵But I am the Lord thy God, that divided the sea, whose waves roared: The Lord of hosts is his name.

⁴Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate: but thou shalt be called Hephzi-bah, and thy land Beulah: for the Lord delighteth in thee, and thy land shall be married.

⁹Live joyfully with the wife whom thou lovest all the days of the life of thy vanity, which he hath given thee under the sun, all the days of thy vanity: for that is thy portion in this life, and in thy labour which thou takest under the sun.

¹SAY ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ru-hamah.

²Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

¹⁴¶ Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her.

¹⁵And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.

¹⁸Let thy fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.

¹⁴But Zion said, The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me.

¹⁵Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.

¹⁶Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me.

¹⁷Thy children shall make haste; thy destroyers and they that made thee waste shall go forth of thee.

¹⁸¶ Lift up thine eyes round about, and behold: all these gather themselves together, and come to thee. As I live, saith the Lord, thou shalt surely clothe thee with them all, as with an ornament, and bind them on thee, as a bride doeth.

¹⁹For thy waste and thy desolate places, and the land of thy destruction, shall even now be too narrow by reason of the inhabitants, and they that swallowed thee up shall be far away.

²⁰The children which thou shalt have, after thou hast lost the other, shall say again in thine ears, The place is too strait for me: give place to me that I may dwell.

²¹Then shalt thou say in thine heart, Who hath begotten me these, seeing I have lost my children, and am desolate, a captive, and removing to and fro? and who hath brought up these? Behold, I was left alone; these, where had they been?

⁹Now I rejoice, not that ye were made sorry, but that ye sorrowed to repentance: for ye were made sorry after a godly manner, that ye might receive damage by us in nothing.

¹⁰For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.

¹THUS saith the Lord, Where is the bill of your mother’s divorcement, whom I have put away? or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you? Behold, for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves, and for your transgressions is your mother put away.

²Wherefore, when I came, was there no man? when I called, was there none to answer? Is my hand shortened at all, that it cannot redeem? or have I no power to deliver? behold, at my rebuke I dry up the sea, I make the rivers a wilderness: their fish stinketh, because there is no water, and dieth for thirst.

¹⁴¶ Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the Lord hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant.

²⁸¶ Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

⁶Nevertheless God, that comforteth those that are cast down, comforted us by the coming of Titus;