Repentance and Return in the Bible

6I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places; yet have you not returned to me, says Yahweh.

7I also have withheld the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest; and I caused it to rain on one city, and caused it not to rain on another city: one piece was rained on, and the piece whereupon it didn`t rain withered.

8So two or three cities wandered to one city to drink water, and were not satisfied: yet have you not returned to me, says Yahweh.

9I have struck you with blasting and mildew: the multitude of your gardens and your vineyards and your fig-trees and your olive-trees has the swarming locust devoured: yet have you not returned to me, says Yahweh.

10I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have carried away your horses; and I have made the stench of your camp to come up even into your nostrils: yet have you not returned to me, says Yahweh.

11I have overthrown [cities] among you, as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were as a brand plucked out of the burning: yet have you not returned to me, says Yahweh.

14Seek good, and not evil, that you may live; and so Yahweh, the God of hosts, will be with you, as you say.

15Hate the evil, and love the good, and establish justice in the gate: it may be that Yahweh, the God of hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.

4For thus says Yahweh to the house of Israel, Seek you me, and you shall live;

6Seek Yahweh, and you shall live; lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph, and it devour, and there be none to quench it in Bethel.

16For I hate putting away, says Yahweh, the God of Israel, and him who covers his garment with violence, says Yahweh of Hosts: therefore take heed to your spirit, that you don`t deal treacherously.

10Bring the whole tithe into the store-house, that there may be food in my house, and prove me now herewith, says Yahweh of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough [to receive it].

16Then those who feared Yahweh spoke one with another; and Yahweh listened, and heard, and a book of memory was written before him, for those who feared Yahweh, and that thought on his name.

7From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my ordinances, and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says Yahweh of Hosts. But you say, Wherein shall we return?

4Remember you the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded to him in Horeb for all Israel, even statutes and ordinances.

5Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of Yahweh come.

6He shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers; lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.

3Therefore say you to them, Thus says Yahweh of Hosts: Return to me, says Yahweh of Hosts, and I will return to you, says Yahweh of Hosts.

4Don`t you be as your fathers, to whom the former prophets cried, saying, Thus says Yahweh of hosts, Return you now from your evil ways, and from your evil doings: but they did not hear, nor listen to me, says Yahweh.

6But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did they not overtake your fathers? and they turned and said, Like as Yahweh of Hosts thought to do to us, according to our ways, and according to our doings, so has he dealt with us.

6I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph, and I will bring them back; for I have mercy on them; and they shall be as though I had not cast them off: for I am Yahweh their God, and I will hear them.

1In that day there shall be a spring opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness.

9I will bring the third part into the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people; and they shall say, Yahweh is my God.

8The word of Yahweh came to Zechariah, saying,

9Thus has Yahweh of Hosts spoken, saying, Execute true judgment, and show kindness and compassion every man to his brother;

10and don`t oppress the widow, nor the fatherless, the sojourner, nor the poor; and let none of you devise evil against his brother in your heart.

14For thus says Yahweh of hosts: As I thought to do evil to you, when your fathers provoked me to wrath, says Yahweh of Hosts, and I didn`t repent;

15so again have I thought in these days to do good to Jerusalem and to the house of Judah: don`t you fear.

16These are the things that you shall do: speak you every man the truth with his neighbor; execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates;

17and let none of you devise evil in your hearts against his neighbor; and love no false oath: for all these are things that I hate, says Yahweh.