14 The nations of the world were like a bird's nest, and I gathered their wealth as easily as gathering eggs. Not a wing fluttered to scare me off; no beak opened to scream at me!”
15 But the Lord says, “Can an axe claim to be greater than the man who uses it? Is a saw more important than the man who saws with it? A club doesn't lift up a man; a man lifts up a club.”
16 The Lord Almighty is going to send disease to punish those who are now well fed. In their bodies there will be a fire that burns and burns.
17 God, the light of Israel, will become a fire. Israel's holy God will become a flame, which in a single day will burn up everything, even the thorns and thistles.
18 The rich forests and farmlands will be totally destroyed, in the same way that a fatal sickness destroys a person.
19 There will be so few trees left that even a child will be able to count them.
20 A time is coming when the people of Israel who have survived will no longer rely on the nation that almost destroyed them. They will truly put their trust in the Lord, Israel's holy God.