10. The people of Israel will return and rebuild your ruined towns and live in them.
11. Children will be born, and animals will give birth to their young. You will no longer be deserted as you are now, but you will be covered with people and treated better than ever. Then you will know that I am the Lord.
12. I will bring my people Israel home, and they will live on you mountains, because you belong to them, and your fertile slopes will never again let them starve.
13. It's true that you have been accused of not producing enough food and of letting your people starve.
14-15. But I, the Lord, promise that you won't hear other nations laugh and sneer at you ever again. From now on, you will always produce plenty of food for your people. I, the Lord God, have spoken.
16. The Lord said:
17. Ezekiel, son of man, when the people of Israel were living in their own country, they made the land unclean by the way they behaved, just as a woman's monthly period makes her unclean.
18. They committed murders and worshipped idols, which made the land even worse. So in my anger, I punished my people
19. and scattered them throughout the nations, just as they deserved.
20. Wherever they went, my name was disgraced, because foreigners insulted my people by saying I had forced them out of their own land.
21. I care what those foreigners think of me,
22. so tell the Israelites that I am saying:You have disgraced my holy name among the nations where you now live. So you don't deserve what I'm going to do for you. I will lead you home to bring honour to my name
23. and to show foreign nations that I am holy. Then they will know that I am the Lord God. I have spoken.
24. I will gather you from the foreign nations and bring you home.
25. I will sprinkle you with clean water, and you will be clean and acceptable to me. I will wash away everything that makes you unclean, and I will remove your disgusting idols.
26. I will take away your stubborn heart and give you a new heart and a desire to be faithful. You will have only pure thoughts,
27. because I will put my Spirit in you and make you eager to obey my laws and teachings.
28. You will once again live in the land I gave your ancestors; you will be my people, and I will be your God.
29. I will protect you from anything that makes you unclean. Your fields will overflow with grain, and no one will starve.