1 Nephi 21

Not while I’m around. Which is forever.

Now, speaking for myself as Isaiah, let me just say that my words cut like daggers, my mouth slices your conduct up like a sword. God has overshadowed my mind with his thoughts. I’m now like a smooth arrow ready to be shot from his bow. Here’s some more of what he told me to tell you: You’re still servant class with me, Israel. I made you and I can break you.

I (Isaiah again) said to God: I have wasted a lot of time on these people, your alleged namesakes. Now I get it. Yes, I am your servant.

And God confirmed that he not only made me but he will remake me in his image—glorified in people’s eyes, that is. Unbelievably strong.

God said to me: Don’t think I just want you to enlighten Israel, Isaiah. I want you to illuminate the destiny of all the other nations, too. The whole world will see the things I do, even the aristocracies, and confess that I’m not only good and public, I’m devoted too.

I’m devoted even to the little islands lost in the backwaters of great continents. I say to them: I’ve always heard you and will give you my special servant to enable you to inhabit even the former ghost towns of your lives. That’s my sign to the world.

I’ll say to prisoners, “Get outta here!”—my light humor being a gust of fresh air on this polluted planet. I’ll say to people in darkness, “Lighten up!”—again using my instinctively light touch (pun intended). To the hungry I’ll give not just a meal but whole pastures to till, good ones on high ground. No flooding. In time, hunger and thirst will be things of the past. Mountains won’t be obstacles but thoroughfares.

Obviously, when they hear about all this, people will flock to the miracle sites I’ve made. You name the town and they’ll leave it to come to the places I’ve renewed.

The skies will sing, mountains too, because people won’t feel so unbearably weighed down anymore. They’ll all be able to stand on their own feet. They’ll be able to nurse whatever wounds they have left

But Jerusalem, self-pitying as usual, will say how severely Yahweh has deserted them. I’m here to tell you that’s not the case. Moms don’t forget the babies that have sucked at their breasts. And even if they did, I won’t forget you, Israel. You’re written in the lines of my right and left palms. And I read your lives even through the walls you’ve put up between us.

You can’t see it now, but your own children will rise to your defense. Even your former foes will act toward you like your best children. Your life will be clothed in their goodwill. Your life will be shrouded with praise like lace on a bride. The badlands you’ve walked through will narrow to alleyways. And every once-close enemy will have moved to another country.

Your children will start to complain that they need more space. You’ll look at them and say to yourself: I thought I’d lost my children—whose are these? I felt childless for so long and now I’m surrounded by sons and daughters.

You see, not only will your children come to life again, the nations of the world will carry their children to you on their shoulders. Kings and queens will tend your nurseries, bowing down to you at the doorway and even licking your footprints off of the rug.

Because they all will know that I am the one: I’m God. So they’ll have to serve you because you’re mine. I’ll roll up my sleeves and fight any one of them that dares to fight you. I’ll serve them their own flesh for dinner and blood for a nightcap until everyone gets it at last: I’m Yahweh, the real God. And I’m Jacob’s big-armed bodyguard.