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Isaiah 47

The Fall of Babylon

 ² Take millstones and grind flour;
       take off your veil.
       Lift up your skirts, bare your legs,
       and wade through the streams.

 ³ Your nakedness will be exposed
       and your shame uncovered.
       I will take vengeance;
       I will spare no one."

 ⁴ Our Redeemer—the LORD Almighty is his name—
       is the Holy One of Israel.

 ⁵ "Sit in silence, go into darkness,
       Daughter of the Babylonians;
       no more will you be called
       queen of kingdoms.

 ⁶ I was angry with my people
       and desecrated my inheritance;
       I gave them into your hand,
       and you showed them no mercy.
       Even on the aged
       you laid a very heavy yoke.

 ⁷ You said, 'I will continue forever—
       the eternal queen!'
       But you did not consider these things
       or reflect on what might happen.

 ⁸ "Now then, listen, you wanton creature,
       lounging in your security
       and saying to yourself,
       'I am, and there is none besides me.
       I will never be a widow
       or suffer the loss of children.'

 ⁹ Both of these will overtake you
       in a moment, on a single day:
       loss of children and widowhood.
       They will come upon you in full measure,
       in spite of your many sorceries
       and all your potent spells.

 ¹⁰ You have trusted in your wickedness
       and have said, 'No one sees me.'
       Your wisdom and knowledge mislead you
       when you say to yourself,
       'I am, and there is none besides me.'

 ¹¹ Disaster will come upon you,
       and you will not know how to conjure it away.
       A calamity will fall upon you
       that you cannot ward off with a ransom;
       a catastrophe you cannot foresee
       will suddenly come upon you.

 ¹² "Keep on, then, with your magic spells
       and with your many sorceries,
       which you have labored at since childhood.
       Perhaps you will succeed,
       perhaps you will cause terror.

 ¹³ All the counsel you have received has only worn you out!
       Let your astrologers come forward,
       those stargazers who make predictions month by month,
       let them save you from what is coming upon you.

 ¹⁴ Surely they are like stubble;
       the fire will burn them up.
       They cannot even save themselves
       from the power of the flame.
       Here are no coals to warm anyone;
       here is no fire to sit by.

 ¹⁵ That is all they can do for you—
       these you have labored with
       and trafficked with since childhood.
       Each of them goes on in his error;
       there is not one that can save you.

Isaiah 48

Stubborn Israel

 ² you who call yourselves citizens of the holy city
       and rely on the God of Israel—
       the LORD Almighty is his name:

 ³ I foretold the former things long ago,
       my mouth announced them and I made them known;
       then suddenly I acted, and they came to pass.

 ⁴ For I knew how stubborn you were;
       the sinews of your neck were iron,
       your forehead was bronze.

 ⁵ Therefore I told you these things long ago;
       before they happened I announced them to you
       so that you could not say,
       'My idols did them;
       my wooden image and metal god ordained them.'

 ⁶ You have heard these things; look at them all.
       Will you not admit them?
       "From now on I will tell you of new things,
       of hidden things unknown to you.

 ⁷ They are created now, and not long ago;
       you have not heard of them before today.
       So you cannot say,
       'Yes, I knew of them.'

 ⁸ You have neither heard nor understood;
       from of old your ear has not been open.
       Well do I know how treacherous you are;
       you were called a rebel from birth.

 ⁹ For my own name's sake I delay my wrath;
       for the sake of my praise I hold it back from you,
       so as not to cut you off.

 ¹⁰ See, I have refined you, though not as silver;
       I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.

 ¹¹ For my own sake, for my own sake, I do this.
       How can I let myself be defamed?
       I will not yield my glory to another.

Israel Freed

 ¹³ My own hand laid the foundations of the earth,
       and my right hand spread out the heavens;
       when I summon them,
       they all stand up together.

 ¹⁴ "Come together, all of you, and listen:
       Which of the idols has foretold these things?
       The LORD's chosen ally
       will carry out his purpose against Babylon;
       his arm will be against the Babylonians. ^[b]

 ¹⁵ I, even I, have spoken;
       yes, I have called him.
       I will bring him,
       and he will succeed in his mission.

 ¹⁶ "Come near me and listen to this:
       "From the first announcement I have not spoken in secret;
       at the time it happens, I am there."
       And now the Sovereign LORD has sent me,
       with his Spirit.

 ¹⁷ This is what the LORD says—
       your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
       "I am the LORD your God,
       who teaches you what is best for you,
       who directs you in the way you should go.

 ¹⁸ If only you had paid attention to my commands,
       your peace would have been like a river,
       your righteousness like the waves of the sea.

 ¹⁹ Your descendants would have been like the sand,
       your children like its numberless grains;
       their name would never be cut off
       nor destroyed from before me."

 ²⁰ Leave Babylon,
       flee from the Babylonians!
       Announce this with shouts of joy
       and proclaim it.
       Send it out to the ends of the earth;
       say, "The LORD has redeemed his servant Jacob."

 ²¹ They did not thirst when he led them through the deserts;
       he made water flow for them from the rock;
       he split the rock
       and water gushed out.

 ²² "There is no peace," says the LORD, "for the wicked."

Isaiah 49

The Servant of the LORD

 ² He made my mouth like a sharpened sword,
       in the shadow of his hand he hid me;
       he made me into a polished arrow
       and concealed me in his quiver.

 ³ He said to me, "You are my servant,
       Israel, in whom I will display my splendor."

 ⁴ But I said, "I have labored to no purpose;
       I have spent my strength in vain and for nothing.
       Yet what is due me is in the LORD's hand,
       and my reward is with my God."

 ⁵ And now the LORD says—
       he who formed me in the womb to be his servant
       to bring Jacob back to him
       and gather Israel to himself,
       for I am honored in the eyes of the LORD
       and my God has been my strength-

 ⁶ he says:
       "It is too small a thing for you to be my servant
       to restore the tribes of Jacob
       and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
       I will also make you a light for the Gentiles,
       that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth."

 ⁷ This is what the LORD says—
       the Redeemer and Holy One of Israel—
       to him who was despised and abhorred by the nation,
       to the servant of rulers:
       "Kings will see you and rise up,
       princes will see and bow down,
       because of the LORD, who is faithful,
       the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you."

Restoration of Israel

 ⁹ to say to the captives, 'Come out,'
       and to those in darkness, 'Be free!'
       "They will feed beside the roads
       and find pasture on every barren hill.

 ¹⁰ They will neither hunger nor thirst,
       nor will the desert heat or the sun beat upon them.
       He who has compassion on them will guide them
       and lead them beside springs of water.

 ¹¹ I will turn all my mountains into roads,
       and my highways will be raised up.

 ¹² See, they will come from afar—
       some from the north, some from the west,
       some from the region of Aswan. ^[c] "

 ¹³ Shout for joy, O heavens;
       rejoice, O earth;
       burst into song, O mountains!
       For the LORD comforts his people
       and will have compassion on his afflicted ones.

 ¹⁴ But Zion said, "The LORD has forsaken me,
       the Lord has forgotten me."

 ¹⁵ "Can a mother forget the baby at her breast
       and have no compassion on the child she has borne?
       Though she may forget,
       I will not forget you!

 ¹⁶ See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands;
       your walls are ever before me.

 ¹⁷ Your sons hasten back,
       and those who laid you waste depart from you.

 ¹⁸ Lift up your eyes and look around;
       all your sons gather and come to you.
       As surely as I live," declares the LORD,
       "you will wear them all as ornaments;
       you will put them on, like a bride.

 ¹⁹ "Though you were ruined and made desolate
       and your land laid waste,
       now you will be too small for your people,
       and those who devoured you will be far away.

 ²⁰ The children born during your bereavement
       will yet say in your hearing,
       'This place is too small for us;
       give us more space to live in.'

 ²¹ Then you will say in your heart,
       'Who bore me these?
       I was bereaved and barren;
       I was exiled and rejected.
       Who brought these up?
       I was left all alone,
       but these—where have they come from?' "

 ²² This is what the Sovereign LORD says:
       "See, I will beckon to the Gentiles,
       I will lift up my banner to the peoples;
       they will bring your sons in their arms
       and carry your daughters on their shoulders.

 ²³ Kings will be your foster fathers,
       and their queens your nursing mothers.
       They will bow down before you with their faces to the ground;
       they will lick the dust at your feet.
       Then you will know that I am the LORD;
       those who hope in me will not be disappointed."

 ²⁴ Can plunder be taken from warriors,
       or captives rescued from the fierce ^[d] ?

 ²⁵ But this is what the LORD says:
       "Yes, captives will be taken from warriors,
       and plunder retrieved from the fierce;
       I will contend with those who contend with you,
       and your children I will save.

 ²⁶ I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh;
       they will be drunk on their own blood, as with wine.
       Then all mankind will know
       that I, the LORD, am your Savior,
       your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob."

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1 Thessalonians 4

Living to Please God

 ³It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; ⁴that each of you should learn to control his own body^[a] in a way that is holy and honorable, ⁵not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; ⁶and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him. The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. ⁷For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. ⁸Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit.

 ⁹Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. ¹⁰And in fact, you do love all the brothers throughout Macedonia. Yet we urge you, brothers, to do so more and more.

 ¹¹Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you, ¹²so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.

The Coming of the Lord