Bible Strands
Jeremiah 3:22
“Return, O faithless children, and I will heal your faithlessness.” “Here we are. We come to You, for You are the LORD our God.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — God speaks to the children of Israel immediately after they weep and beg for mercy on barren heights for having perverted their ways and forgotten Him.
The words — The text foregrounds שׁוּבוּ (Shu.vu) meaning return and אֶרְפָּ֖ה ('er.Pah) meaning I will heal, structuring the divine response around a call to turn back and a promise of repair.
The thread — This dialogue parallels Hosea 14:1 and Hosea 14:4, which pair the command to return with the pledge to heal apostasy, and anticipates the refinement motif in Zechariah 13:9.
Why it lands — It demands a concrete acknowledgment of failure and a direct turning toward God, establishing that restoration originates solely from His authority rather than human merit.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings. Behold, we come unto thee; for thou art the Lord our God.
Cross-references
- Hosea 14:1 Return, O Israel, to the LORD your God, for you have stumbled by your iniquity.
- Hosea 14:4 I will heal their apostasy; I will freely love them, for My anger has turned away from them.
- Zechariah 13:9 This third I will bring through the fire; I will refine them like silver and test them like gold. They will call on My name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘They are My people,’ and they will say, ‘The LORD is our God.’”
- Jeremiah 30:17 But I will restore your health and heal your wounds, declares the LORD, because they call you an outcast, Zion, for whom no one cares.”
- Hosea 6:1 Come, let us return to the LORD. For He has torn us to pieces, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bind up our wounds.
- Hosea 3:5 Afterward, the people of Israel will return and seek the LORD their God and David their king. They will come trembling to the LORD and to His goodness in the last days.
- Hosea 13:4 Yet I am the LORD your God ever since the land of Egypt; you know no God but Me, for there is no Savior besides Me.
- Song of Solomon 1:4 Take me away with you—let us hurry! May the king bring me to his chambers. We will rejoice and delight in you; we will praise your love more than wine. It is only right that they adore you.
- Jeremiah 31:18 I have surely heard Ephraim’s moaning: ‘You disciplined me severely, like an untrained calf. Restore me, that I may return, for You are the LORD my God.
- Jeremiah 33:6 Nevertheless, I will bring to it health and healing, and I will heal its people and reveal to them the abundance of peace and truth.