25
Because you have forsaken me, I also will forsake you. When you beg mercy of me, I will show you no mercy.
26
When you call to me, I will not listen to you; for you have defiled your hands with blood, and your feet are swift to commit murder.
27
It is not as though you had forsaken me; you have forsaken yourselves, says the Lord.
28
"Thus says the Lord Almighty: Have I not entreated you as a father entreats his sons or a mother her daughters or a nurse her children,
29
so that you should be my people and I should be your God, and that you should be my children and I should be your father?
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.