The Daily Audio Bible
Today's audio is from the NIV. Switch to the NIV to read along with the audio.
Moab Will Be Punished
15 This is the divine revelation about Moab.
In a single night Ar in Moab is laid waste and destroyed!
In a single night Kir in Moab is laid waste and destroyed!
2 The people of Dibon go to the temple,
to the worship sites, to cry.
Moab wails over Nebo and Medeba.
Every head is shaved bald, and every beard is cut off.[a]
3 In their streets they wear sackcloth.
On their roofs and in their city squares everyone wails and cries.
4 Heshbon and Elealeh also cry out.
Their voices are heard as far away as Jahaz.
Moab’s armed men cry out.
Their courage is gone.
5 My heart cries out for Moab.
Its people flee as far as Zoar at Eglath Shelishiyah.
They go up the mountain road to Luhith.
They cry loudly over the destruction on the way to Horonaim.
6 The Nimrim Brook has run dry!
The grass dries up,
the vegetation withers,
and nothing green is left.
7 That is why they carry the wealth that they have earned and stored up
over Willow Ravine.
8 Cries for help echo throughout the land of Moab.
Their wailing echoes as far as Eglaim.
Their wailing echoes as far as Beer Elim.
9 The water in Dimon is red with blood,
yet I will bring even more on Dimon.
A lion will attack the fugitives from Moab
and the survivors from Adamah.[b]
16 Send lambs to the ruler of the land.[c]
Send lambs from Sela through the desert to my people at Mount Zion.
2 Moab’s daughters are like fluttering birds,
like scattered nestlings,
at the shallow crossings of the Arnon River.
3 Give us advice.
Make a decision.
At high noon make your shadow as dark as night.
Hide the fugitives.
Don’t betray the refugees.
4 Let the fugitives from Moab stay with you a while. Be their refuge from the destroyer.
Ruthless people will come to an end.
The destruction will end.
The one who tramples others will be gone.
5 Then the Lord will set up a trusted king.
He will rule faithfully.
He is from the tent of David.
He judges and searches for justice.
He is quick to do what is right.
6 We’ve heard of the arrogance of Moab’s people.
They are very arrogant.
We’ve heard of their boasting, arrogance, and conceit,
but their boasts aren’t true.
7 That is why Moab will wail.
Everyone will wail for Moab.
Mourn and grieve over the raisin cakes of Kir Hareseth.
8 The fields of Heshbon and the vineyards of Sibmah wither.
Rulers of the nations have cut off their grapes.
The grapevines ⌞once⌟ reached as far as Jazer
and strayed out into the desert.
Their shoots had spread out over the sea.
9 I will cry for the grapevines of Sibmah
as Jazer cries for them.
I will drench you with my tears, Heshbon and Elealeh.
The shouts of joy for your ripened fruits
and your harvest will be silenced.
10 Joy and delight have vanished from the orchards.
No songs are sung.
No shouts are raised.
No one stomps on grapes in the winepresses,
because I have put an end to the shouts of joy.
11 That is why my heart mourns for Moab like a harp.
My soul mourns for Kir Hareseth.
12 When the people of Moab appear at the worship site,
they will only wear themselves out.
They will come into the holy place to pray,
but they won’t be able to.
13 This is the message that the Lord spoke about Moab in the past. 14 But now the Lord says, “Moab’s honor will be despised within three years. I will count them like workers count the years left of their contracts. In spite of their great number, the survivors will be very few and powerless.”
Damascus and Israel Will Be Punished
17 This is the divine revelation about Damascus.
“Damascus will no longer be a city.
It will become a pile of rubble.
2 The cities of Aroer will be deserted.
These cities will be used for sheep, which will lie down in them.
There will be no one to disturb those sheep.
3 Fortified cities will disappear from Ephraim,
and the kingdom will disappear from Damascus.
The remaining few from Aram will share Israel’s honor,”
declares the Lord of Armies.
4 “When that day comes, the honor of Jacob’s people will fade away,
and they will become skin and bones.
5 That time will be like harvesting bundles of grain by the armful.
It will be like gathering grain in the Rephaim Valley.
6 Only a few people will survive.
They will be like an olive tree that has been beaten.
Only two or three olives are left
at the top of the highest branch,
four or five olives on the rest of the branches,”
declares the Lord God of Israel.
7 When that day comes, they will look to their maker,
and their eyes will look to the Holy One of Israel.
8 They won’t look to the altars made by their hands
or to the Asherah poles or incense altars
which their fingers molded.
9 When that day comes, the fortified cities
which other people abandoned because of the Israelites
will be like abandoned woods and undergrowth.
So it will become a wasteland.
10 You have forgotten the God of your salvation.
You haven’t remembered the rock, your stronghold.
Instead, you have planted the best plants
and have set out the imported grapevines.
11 On the day you plant, you will make it grow.
On the morning you set out the seedling, you will make it sprout.
But the harvest will become a [rotting] pile [d]
on a day of grief and incurable pain.
12 How horrible it will be for many people!
They will roar like the roaring sea.
The noise that the people make
will be like the noise from rushing water.
13 The people will make noise like raging water.
But the Lord will yell at them, and they will run far away.
They will be chased away
like husks on the mountains being blown by the wind,
like whirling dust being blown by a storm.
14 In the evening there will be sudden terror.
Before morning they will be gone.
This will be the fate of those who looted us,
the destiny of those who robbed us.
Sudan Will Be Punished
18 How horrible it will be for the land of whirring wings
which lies beyond the rivers of Sudan.
2 It sends messengers by sea
in boats made of reeds
⌞skimming⌟ over the surface of the water.
Go, swift messengers, to a tall and smooth-skinned people,
a people ⌞who are⌟ feared far and near,
a strong and aggressive nation,
whose land is divided by rivers.
3 Look when someone raises a flag on the mountains.
Listen when someone blows a ram’s horn,
all you inhabitants of the world who live on the earth.
4 This is what the Lord says to me:
I will keep quiet and watch from my dwelling place.
My presence will be like scorching heat in the sunshine,
like heavy dew in the heat of the harvest.
5 Before the harvest, when blossoms are gone
and grapes are ripening from blossoms,
he will cut off the shoots with pruning shears
and chop off the spreading branches.
6 They will be left for the birds of prey on the mountains
and the wild animals.
The birds of prey will feed on them in the summer,
and all the wild animals on earth
will feed on them in the winter.
7 At that time gifts will be brought to the Lord of Armies
from a tall and smooth-skinned people,
a people ⌞who are⌟ feared far and near,
a strong and aggressive nation,
whose land is divided by rivers.
They will be brought to Mount Zion,
the place where the name of the Lord of Armies is.
Greeting
1 From Paul—an apostle ⌞chosen⌟ not by any group or individual but by Jesus Christ and God the Father who brought him back to life— 2 and all the believers who are with me.
To the churches in Galatia.
3 Good will [a] and peace are yours from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ! 4 In order to free us from this present evil world, Christ took the punishment for our sins, because that was what our God and Father wanted. 5 Glory belongs to our God and Father forever! Amen.
Follow the Good News We Gave You
6 I’m surprised that you’re so quickly deserting Christ, who called you in his kindness,[b] to follow a different kind of good news. 7 But what some people are calling good news is not really good news at all. They are confusing you. They want to distort the Good News about Christ. 8 Whoever tells you good news that is different from the Good News we gave you should be condemned to hell, even if he is one of us or an angel from heaven. 9 I’m now telling you again what we’ve told you in the past: If anyone tells you good news that is different from the Good News you received, that person should be condemned to hell.
10 Am I saying this now to win the approval of people or God? Am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be Christ’s servant.
Jesus Alone Gave Paul the Good News He Spreads
11 I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the Good News I have spread is not a human message. 12 I didn’t receive it from any person. I wasn’t taught it, but Jesus Christ revealed it to me.
13 You heard about the way I once lived when I followed the Jewish religion. You heard how I violently persecuted God’s church and tried to destroy it. 14 You also heard how I was far ahead of other Jews in my age group in following the Jewish religion. I had become that fanatical for the traditions of my ancestors.
15 But God, who appointed me before I was born and who called me by his kindness, was pleased 16 to show me his Son. He did this so that I would tell people who are not Jewish that his Son is the Good News. When this happened, I didn’t talk it over with any other person. 17 I didn’t even go to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before I was. Instead, I went to Arabia and then came back to Damascus.
18 Then, three years later I went to Jerusalem to become personally acquainted with Cephas.[c] I stayed with him for fifteen days. 19 I didn’t see any other apostle. I only saw James, the Lord’s brother. 20 (God is my witness that what I’m writing is not a lie.) 21 Then I went to the regions of Syria and Cilicia. 22 The churches of Christ in Judea didn’t know me personally. 23 The only thing they had heard was this: “The man who persecuted us is now spreading the faith that he once tried to destroy.” 24 So they praised God for what had happened to me.
For the choir director; al tashcheth; a miktam by David.
58 Do you rulers really give fair verdicts?
Do you judge Adam’s descendants fairly?
2 No, you invent new crimes on earth,
and your hands spread violence.
3 ⌞Even⌟ inside the womb wicked people are strangers ⌞to God⌟.
From their birth liars go astray.
4 They have poisonous venom like snakes.
They are like a deaf cobra that shuts its ears
5 so that it cannot hear the voice of a snake charmer
or of anyone trained to cast spells.
6 O God, knock the teeth out of their mouths.
Break the young lions’ teeth, O Lord.
7 Let them disappear like water that drains away.
When they aim their bows, let their arrows miss the target.
8 Let them become like a snail that leaves behind a slimy trail
or like a stillborn child who never sees the sun.
9 Let ⌞God⌟ sweep them away
faster than a cooking pot is heated by burning twigs.
10 Righteous people will rejoice when they see ⌞God⌟ take revenge.
They will wash their feet in the blood of wicked people.
11 Then people will say,
“Righteous people certainly have a reward.
There is a God who judges on earth.”
Learning from Your Father
12 Live a more disciplined life,
and listen carefully to words of knowledge.
Copyright © 1995, 2003, 2013, 2014, 2019, 2020 by God’s Word to the Nations Mission Society. All rights reserved.