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Judgment on Judah and Jerusalem
3 For now the Lord,
the Lord of Hosts,
takes away from Jerusalem and from Judah
the stock and the store,
the whole supply of bread, and the whole supply of water;
2 the mighty man and the man of war,
the judge and the prophet,
and the prudent and the ancient,
3 the captain of fifty and the honorable man,
the counselor and the skillful artisan, and the eloquent orator.
4 I will give youths to be their princes,
and unweaned children shall rule over them.
5 The people shall be oppressed,
every one by another, and every one by his neighbor;
the youth shall behave himself proudly against the elder,
and the inferior against the honorable.
6 When a man shall take hold of his brother
in the house of his father saying,
“You have clothing; be our ruler,
and let this ruin be under your power,”
7 in that day he shall swear saying,
“I will not be a healer.
For in my house is neither bread nor clothing;
do not make me a ruler of the people.”
8 For Jerusalem is ruined,
and Judah is fallen,
because their tongue and their deeds are against the Lord,
to provoke the eyes of His glory.
9 The expression of their countenance witnesses against them,
and they declare their sin as Sodom;
they hide it not.
Woe to them!
For they have brought evil on themselves.
10 Say to the righteous that it shall be well with them,
for they shall eat the fruit of their deeds.
11 Woe to the wicked! It shall be ill with him,
for the reward of his hands shall be given him.
12 As for My people, children are their oppressors,
and women rule over them.
O My people, those who lead you cause you to err,
and destroy the way of your paths.
13 The Lord stands up to plead
and stands to judge the people.
14 The Lord will enter into judgment
with the elders and the princes of His people:
For you have eaten up the vineyard;
the spoil of the poor is in your houses.
15 What do you mean that you beat My people to pieces
and grind the faces of the poor?
says the Lord God of Hosts.
16 Moreover the Lord says:
Because the daughters of Zion are haughty
and walk with outstretched necks
and wanton eyes,
walking and mincing as they go,
and making a tinkling with their feet,
17 therefore, the Lord will strike with a scab the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion,
and the Lord will make their foreheads bare.
18 In that day the Lord will take away the finery of the ankle ornaments, and the headbands, and the crescent ornaments, 19 the chains, and the bracelets, and the veils, 20 the bonnets, the leg ornaments, the sashes, perfume boxes, amulets, 21 the finger rings, nose rings, 22 festal robes, outer tunics, cloaks, purses, 23 hand mirrors, and undergarments, hoods, and veils.
24 Instead of sweet perfume there shall be a stench;
and instead of a belt, a rope;
and instead of well-set hair, baldness;
and instead of fine clothes, a girding of sackcloth;
and branding instead of beauty.
25 Your men shall fall by the sword,
and your mighty in the war.
26 Her gates shall lament and mourn,
and she, being desolate, shall sit on the ground.
4 And in that day seven women
shall take hold of one man, saying,
“We will eat our own bread,
and wear our own apparel,
only let us be called by your name,
to take away our reproach.”
The Branch of the Lord
2 In that day the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely for those of Israel who have escaped. 3 He who is left in Zion and he who remains in Jerusalem shall be called holy, even everyone who is written among the living in Jerusalem. 4 When the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion and has purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst by the spirit of justice and by the spirit of burning, 5 then the Lord will create upon every dwelling place of Mount Zion, and upon her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night. For over all the glory shall be a covering. 6 There shall be a tabernacle for a shadow in the daytime from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and for a shelter from storm and from rain.
The Song of the Vineyard
5 Now I will sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved
concerning His vineyard:
My well-beloved has a vineyard
in a very fruitful hill.
2 And He fenced it, and removed its stones,
and planted it with the choicest vine.
And He built a tower in the midst of it,
and also made a winepress in it;
and He expected it to bring forth good grapes,
but it brought forth wild grapes.
3 Now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah,
judge between My vineyard and Me.
4 What more could have been done to My vineyard
that I have not done in it?
Why, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes,
did it bring forth wild grapes?
5 So now I will tell you
what I will do to My vineyard:
I will take away its hedge,
and it shall be consumed;
I will break down its wall,
and it shall be trodden down.
6 And I will lay it waste:
It shall not be pruned or dug,
but briers and thorns shall come up.
I will also command the clouds
that they rain no rain on it.
7 For the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts
is the house of Israel,
and the men of Judah
His pleasant plant.
Thus He looked for justice, but saw oppression;
for righteousness, but heard a cry.
Woes and Judgment
8 Woe to those who join house to house,
who add field to field,
until there is no more space
where they may live alone in the midst of the land!
9 In my ears the Lord of Hosts said:
Truly, many houses shall be desolate,
even great and beautiful, without inhabitants.
10 For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath,[a]
and the homer[b] of seed shall yield an ephah.[c]
11 Woe to those who rise up early in the morning
that they may pursue strong drink;
who continue late in the evening
until wine inflames them!
12 The lyre and the harp, the tambourine and pipe,
and wine are in their feasts;
but they do not regard the deeds of the Lord,
or consider the work of His hands.
13 Therefore My people go into captivity
because they have no knowledge;
and their honorable men are famished,
and their multitude dried up with thirst.
14 Therefore Sheol has enlarged itself
and opened its mouth without measure;
so their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp,
and he who rejoices shall descend into it.
15 The common man shall be brought down,
and the great man shall be humbled,
and the eyes of the lofty shall be humbled.
16 But the Lord of Hosts shall be exalted in judgment,
and God who is holy shall be hallowed in righteousness.
17 Then the lambs shall feed in their pasture,
and strangers shall eat in the waste places of the wealthy.
18 Woe to those who draw iniquity with cords of falsehood
and sin as if with a cart rope,
19 who say, “Let Him make speed
and hasten His work,
that we may see it;
and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel
draw near and come,
that we may know it!”
20 Woe to those who call evil good,
and good evil;
who exchange darkness for light,
and light for darkness;
who exchange bitter for sweet,
and sweet for bitter!
21 Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes
and prudent in their own sight!
22 Woe to those who are mighty to drink wine,
and men of strength to mingle strong drink,
23 who justify the wicked for a reward,
and take away the justice of the righteous from him!
24 Therefore, as the fire devours the stubble
and the flame consumes the chaff,
so their root shall be as rottenness,
and their blossom shall go up as dust;
because they have cast away the law of the Lord of Hosts
and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
25 Therefore the anger of the Lord burns against His people,
and He has stretched out His hand against them, and has stricken them,
and the hills trembled.
Their corpses were torn in the midst of the streets.
For all this His anger is not turned away,
and His hand is still stretched out.
26 He will lift up a banner to the nations from afar
and will hiss at them from the ends of the earth;
certainly they shall come
with speed, swiftly.
27 No one shall be weary or stumble among them;
no one shall slumber or sleep;
neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed,
nor the strap of their shoes be broken;
28 their arrows are sharp
and all their bows bent;
their horses’ hooves will seem like flint,
and their wheels like a whirlwind.
29 Their roaring shall be like a lion,
they shall roar like young lions;
they shall roar and lay hold of the prey;
and shall carry it away, and no one shall deliver it.
30 In that day they shall roar against them
like the roaring of the sea.
And if one looks to the land—
only darkness and sorrow,
and the light is darkened by the clouds.
Paul and the False Apostles
11 I would to God you could bear with me a little in my folly. Indeed, bear with me. 2 For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy. For I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. 3 But I fear that somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve through his trickery, so your minds might be led astray from the simplicity that is in Christ. 4 For if he who comes preaches another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if you receive another spirit, which you have not received, or another gospel, which you have not accepted, you might submit to it readily enough.
5 For I think I am not in any way inferior to the most eminent of the apostles. 6 Even though I am unpolished in speech, yet I am not in knowledge. All things about us have been thoroughly revealed to you. 7 Did I commit a sin in abasing myself that you might be exalted, because I preached to you the gospel of God free of charge? 8 I robbed other churches by accepting wages from them to serve you. 9 Furthermore, when I was present with you and was lacking, I was a burden to no one. For the brothers who came from Macedonia supplied what I lacked. In all things I have kept myself from being burdensome to you, and so will I keep myself. 10 As the truth of Christ is in me, no one shall stop me from this boasting in the regions of Achaia. 11 Why? Because I do not love you? God knows.
12 And I will continue doing what I am doing, that I may cut off the opportunity from those who desire an opportunity to be found equal to us in what they boast about. 13 For such are false apostles and deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. 14 And no wonder! For even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. 15 Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also disguise themselves as ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works.
Psalm 53(A)
For the Music Director. According to Mahalath. A Contemplative Maskil of David.
1 The fool has said in his heart,
“There is no God.”
They are corrupt, and have done abhorrent injustice;
there is none who does good.
2 God looked down from heaven
on the children of men,
to see if there were any who have insight,
who seek God.
3 Every one of them has turned aside;
they are altogether corrupt;
there is no one who does good,
not even one.
4 Have the workers of iniquity no knowledge,
who eat up my people as they eat bread,
and do not call on God?
5 There they were in fear,
where there was nothing to fear,
for God has scattered the bones of him who camps against you;
you have put them to shame, because God has rejected them.
6 Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion!
When God brings back the captivity of His people,
Jacob will rejoice and Israel will be glad.
Saying Five
28 Do not remove the ancient landmark
which your fathers have set.
Saying Six
29 Do you see a man diligent in his business?
He will stand before kings;
he will not stand before obscure men.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.