The Daily Audio Bible
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A Vision of God in the Temple
6 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty, and the hem of his robe filled the temple.(A) 2 Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew.(B) 3 And one called to another and said,
“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory.”(C)
4 The pivots[a] on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. 5 And I said, “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”(D)
6 Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. 7 The seraph[b] touched my mouth with it and said, “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.”(E) 8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I; send me!”(F) 9 And he said, “Go and say to this people:
‘Keep listening, but do not comprehend;
keep looking, but do not understand.’(G)
10 Make the mind of this people dull,
and stop their ears,
and shut their eyes,
so that they may not look with their eyes
and listen with their ears
and comprehend with their minds
and turn and be healed.”(H)
11 Then I said, “How long, O Lord?” And he said,
“Until cities lie waste
without inhabitant,
and houses without people,
and the land is utterly desolate;(I)
12 until the Lord sends everyone far away,
and vast is the emptiness in the midst of the land.(J)
13 Even if a tenth part remain in it,
it will be burned again,
like a terebinth or an oak
whose stump remains standing
when it is felled.”[c]
(The holy seed is its stump.)(K)
Isaiah Reassures King Ahaz
7 In the days of Ahaz son of Jotham son of Uzziah, king of Judah, King Rezin of Aram and King Pekah son of Remaliah of Israel went up to attack Jerusalem but could not conquer it.(L) 2 When the house of David heard that Aram had allied itself with Ephraim, the heart of Ahaz[d] and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.(M)
3 Then the Lord said to Isaiah, “Go out to meet Ahaz, you and your son Shear-jashub,[e] at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the fuller’s field,(N) 4 and say to him: Take heed, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of these two smoldering stumps of firebrands, because of the fierce anger of Rezin and Aram and the son of Remaliah.(O) 5 Because Aram—with Ephraim and the son of Remaliah—has plotted evil against you, saying, 6 ‘Let us go up against Judah and terrify it[f] and conquer it for ourselves and make the son of Tabeel king in it’; 7 therefore thus says the Lord God:
It shall not stand,
and it shall not come to pass.(P)
8 For the head of Aram is Damascus,
and the head of Damascus is Rezin.
(Within sixty-five years Ephraim will be shattered, no longer a people.)(Q)
9 The head of Ephraim is Samaria,
and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah.
If you do not stand firm in faith,
you shall not stand at all.”(R)
Isaiah Gives Ahaz the Sign of Immanuel
10 Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz, saying, 11 “Ask a sign of the Lord your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.”(S) 12 But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test.” 13 Then Isaiah[g] said, “Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary mortals that you weary my God also? 14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son and shall name him Immanuel.[h](T) 15 He shall eat curds and honey by the time he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good.(U) 16 For before the child knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land before whose two kings you are in dread will be deserted.(V) 17 The Lord will bring on you and on your people and on your ancestral house such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah—the king of Assyria.”(W)
18 On that day the Lord will whistle for the fly that is at the sources of the streams of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria.(X) 19 And they will all come and settle in the steep ravines and in the clefts of the rocks and on all the thornbushes and on all the watering holes.[i](Y)
20 On that day the Lord will shave with a razor hired beyond the River—with the king of Assyria—the head and the hair of the feet, and it will take off the beard as well.(Z)
21 On that day one will keep alive a young cow and two sheep 22 and will eat curds because of the abundance of milk that they give, for everyone left in the land shall eat curds and honey.
23 On that day every place where there used to be a thousand vines, worth a thousand shekels of silver, will become briers and thorns. 24 With bow and arrows one will go there, for all the land will be briers and thorns, 25 and as for all the hills that used to be hoed with a hoe, you will not go there for fear of briers and thorns, but they will become a place where cattle are let loose and where sheep tread.
Paul’s Sufferings as an Apostle
16 I repeat, let no one think that I am a fool, but if you do, then accept me as a fool, so that I, too, may boast a little. 17 What I am saying in regard to this boastful undertaking, I am saying not with the Lord’s authority but as a fool;(A) 18 since many boast according to human standards,[a] I will also boast. 19 For you gladly put up with fools, being wise yourselves! 20 For you put up with it when someone makes slaves of you or preys upon you or takes advantage of you or puts on airs or gives you a slap in the face. 21 To my shame, I must say, we were too weak for that!
But whatever anyone dares to boast of—I am speaking as a fool—I also dare to boast of that.(B) 22 Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they descendants of Abraham? So am I.(C) 23 Are they ministers of Christ? I am talking like a madman—I am a better one: with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless floggings, and often near death.(D) 24 Five times I have received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one.(E) 25 Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I received a stoning. Three times I was shipwrecked; for a night and a day I was adrift at sea;(F) 26 on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from bandits, danger from my own people, danger from gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers and sisters;(G) 27 in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, hungry and thirsty, often without food,[b] cold and naked.(H) 28 And, besides other things, I am under daily pressure because of my anxiety for all the churches. 29 Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I am not indignant?(I)
30 If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness.(J) 31 The God and Father of the Lord Jesus (blessed be he forever!) knows that I do not lie.(K) 32 In Damascus, the governor under King Aretas guarded the city of Damascus in order to[c] seize me,(L) 33 but I was let down in a basket through a window in the wall[d] and escaped from his hands.
Psalm 54
Prayer for Vindication
To the leader: with stringed instruments. A Maskil of David, when the Ziphites went and told Saul, “David is in hiding among us.”
1 Save me, O God, by your name,
and vindicate me by your might.(A)
2 Hear my prayer, O God;
give ear to the words of my mouth.(B)
3 For the insolent have risen against me;
the ruthless seek my life;
they do not set God before them. Selah(C)
New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.