The Prophet Micaiah Warns Ahab^(A)

18 When King Jehoshaphat of Judah became rich and famous, he arranged a marriage between a member of his family and the family of King Ahab of Israel. ² A number of years later Jehoshaphat went to the city of Samaria to visit Ahab. To honor Jehoshaphat and those with him, Ahab had a large number of sheep and cattle slaughtered for a feast. He tried to persuade Jehoshaphat to join him in attacking the city of Ramoth in Gilead. ³ He asked, “Will you go with me to attack Ramoth?”

Jehoshaphat replied, “I am ready when you are, and so is my army. We will join you.” ⁴ Then he added, “But first let's consult the Lord.”

⁵ So Ahab called in the prophets, about four hundred of them, and asked them, “Should I go and attack Ramoth, or not?”

“Attack it,” they answered. “God will give you victory.”

⁶ But Jehoshaphat asked, “Isn't there another prophet through whom we can consult the Lord?”

⁷ Ahab answered, “There is one more, Micaiah son of Imlah. But I hate him because he never prophesies anything good for me; it's always something bad.”

“You shouldn't say that!” Jehoshaphat replied.

⁸ So King Ahab called in a court official and told him to go and get Micaiah at once.

⁹ The two kings, dressed in their royal robes, were sitting on their thrones at the threshing place just outside the gate of Samaria, and all the prophets were prophesying in front of them. ¹⁰ One of them, Zedekiah son of Chenaanah, made iron horns and said to Ahab, “This is what the Lord says, ‘With these you will fight the Syrians and totally defeat them.’” ¹¹ All the other prophets said the same thing. “March against Ramoth and you will win,” they said. “The Lord will give you victory.”

¹² Meanwhile, the official who had gone to get Micaiah said to him, “All the other prophets have prophesied success for the king, and you had better do the same.”

¹³ But Micaiah answered, “By the living Lord I will say what my God tells me to!”

¹⁴ When he appeared before King Ahab, the king asked him, “Micaiah, should King Jehoshaphat and I go and attack Ramoth, or not?”

“Attack!” Micaiah answered. “Of course you'll win. The Lord will give you victory.”

¹⁵ But Ahab replied, “When you speak to me in the name of the Lord, tell the truth! How many times do I have to tell you that?”

^16 (B)Micaiah answered, “I can see the army of Israel scattered over the hills like sheep without a shepherd. And the Lord said, ‘These men have no leader; let them go home in peace.’”

¹⁷ Ahab said to Jehoshaphat, “I told you that he never prophesies anything good for me; it's always something bad!”

¹⁸ Micaiah went on: “Now listen to what the Lord says! I saw the Lord sitting on his throne in heaven, with all his angels standing beside him. ¹⁹ The Lord asked, ‘Who will deceive Ahab so that he will go and get killed at Ramoth?’ Some of the angels said one thing, and others said something else, ²⁰ until a spirit stepped forward, approached the Lord, and said, ‘I will deceive him.’ ‘How?’ the Lord asked. ²¹ The spirit replied, ‘I will go and make all of Ahab's prophets tell lies.’ The Lord said, ‘Go and deceive him. You will succeed.’”

²² And Micaiah concluded: “This is what has happened. The Lord has made these prophets of yours lie to you. But he himself has decreed that you will meet with disaster!”

²³ Then the prophet Zedekiah went up to Micaiah, slapped his face, and asked, “Since when did the Lord's spirit leave me and speak to you?”

²⁴ “You will find out when you go into some back room to hide,” Micaiah replied.

²⁵ Then King Ahab ordered one of his officers, “Arrest Micaiah and take him to Amon, the governor of the city, and to Prince Joash. ²⁶ Tell them to throw him in prison and to put him on bread and water until I return safely.”

²⁷ “If you return safely,” Micaiah exclaimed, “then the Lord has not spoken through me!” And he added, “Listen, everyone, to what I have said!”

The Death of Ahab^(C)

²⁸ Then King Ahab of Israel and King Jehoshaphat of Judah went to attack the city of Ramoth in Gilead. ²⁹ Ahab said to Jehoshaphat, “As we go into battle, I will disguise myself, but you wear your royal garments.” So the king of Israel went into battle in disguise.

³⁰ The king of Syria had ordered his chariot commanders to attack no one else except the king of Israel. ³¹ So when they saw King Jehoshaphat, they all thought that he was the king of Israel, and they turned to attack him. But Jehoshaphat gave a shout, and the Lord God rescued him and turned the attack away from him. ³² The chariot commanders saw that he was not the king of Israel, so they stopped pursuing him. ³³ By chance, however, a Syrian soldier shot an arrow which struck King Ahab between the joints of his armor. “I'm wounded!” he cried out to his chariot driver. “Turn around and pull out of the battle!” ³⁴ While the battle raged on, King Ahab remained propped up in his chariot, facing the Syrians. At sunset he died.

The 144,000 People of Israel

7 ^(A)After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds so that no wind should blow on the earth or the sea or against any tree. ² And I saw another angel coming up from the east with the seal of the living God. He called out in a loud voice to the four angels to whom God had given the power to damage the earth and the sea. ^3 (B)The angel said, “Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees, until we mark the servants of our God with a seal on their foreheads.” ⁴ And I was told that the number of those who were marked with God's seal on their foreheads was 144,000. They were from the twelve tribes of Israel, ^5-8 twelve thousand from each tribe: Judah, Reuben, Gad, Asher, Naphtali, Manasseh, Simeon, Levi, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph, and Benjamin.

The Enormous Crowd

^9 (C)After this I looked, and there was an enormous crowd—no one could count all the people! They were from every race, tribe, nation, and language, and they stood in front of the throne and of the Lamb, dressed in white robes and holding palm branches in their hands. ¹⁰ They called out in a loud voice: “Salvation comes from our God, who sits on the throne, and from the Lamb!” ¹¹ All the angels stood around the throne, the elders, and the four living creatures. Then they threw themselves face downward in front of the throne and worshiped God, ¹² saying, “Amen! Praise, glory, wisdom, thanksgiving, honor, power, and might belong to our God forever and ever! Amen!”

¹³ One of the elders asked me, “Who are these people dressed in white robes, and where do they come from?”

^14 (D)“I don't know, sir. You do,” I answered.

He said to me, “These are the people who have come safely through the terrible persecution. They have washed their robes and made them white with the blood of the Lamb. ¹⁵ That is why they stand before God's throne and serve him day and night in his temple. He who sits on the throne will protect them with his presence. ^16 (E)Never again will they hunger or thirst; neither sun nor any scorching heat will burn them, ^17 (F)because the Lamb, who is in the center of the throne, will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of life-giving water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

The Prophet's Vision of the High Priest

3 ^(A)In another vision the Lord showed me the High Priest Joshua standing before the angel of the Lord. And there beside Joshua stood Satan,^[a] ready to bring an accusation against him. ^2 (B)The angel of the Lord^[b] said to Satan, “May the Lord condemn you, Satan! May the Lord, who loves Jerusalem, condemn you. This man is like a stick snatched from the fire.”

³ Joshua was standing there, wearing filthy clothes. ⁴ The angel said to his heavenly attendants, “Take away the filthy clothes this man is wearing.” Then he said to Joshua, “I have taken away your sin and will give you new clothes to wear.”

⁵ He commanded the attendants to put^[c] a clean turban on Joshua's head. They did so, and then they put the new clothes on him while the angel of the Lord stood there.

⁶ Then the angel told Joshua that ⁷ the Lord Almighty had said: “If you obey my laws and perform the duties I have assigned you, then you will continue to be in charge of my Temple and its courts, and I will hear your prayers, just as I hear the prayers of the angels who are in my presence. ^8 (C)Listen then, Joshua, you who are the High Priest; and listen, you fellow priests of his, you that are the sign of a good future: I will reveal my servant, who is called The Branch! ⁹ I am placing in front of Joshua a single stone with seven facets. I will engrave an inscription on it, and in a single day I will take away the sin of this land. ^10 (D)When that day comes, each of you will invite your neighbor to come and enjoy peace and security, surrounded by your vineyards and fig trees.”

Jesus Feeds Five Thousand^(A)

6 After this, Jesus went across Lake Galilee (or, Lake Tiberias, as it is also called). ² A large crowd followed him, because they had seen his miracles of healing the sick. ³ Jesus went up a hill and sat down with his disciples. ⁴ The time for the Passover Festival was near. ⁵ Jesus looked around and saw that a large crowd was coming to him, so he asked Philip, “Where can we buy enough food to feed all these people?” (⁶ He said this to test Philip; actually he already knew what he would do.)

⁷ Philip answered, “For everyone to have even a little, it would take more than two hundred silver coins^[a] to buy enough bread.”

⁸ Another one of his disciples, Andrew, who was Simon Peter's brother, said, ⁹ “There is a boy here who has five loaves of barley bread and two fish. But they will certainly not be enough for all these people.”

¹⁰ “Make the people sit down,” Jesus told them. (There was a lot of grass there.) So all the people sat down; there were about five thousand men. ¹¹ Jesus took the bread, gave thanks to God, and distributed it to the people who were sitting there. He did the same with the fish, and they all had as much as they wanted. ¹² When they were all full, he said to his disciples, “Gather the pieces left over; let us not waste a bit.” ¹³ So they gathered them all and filled twelve baskets with the pieces left over from the five barley loaves which the people had eaten.

¹⁴ Seeing this miracle that Jesus had performed, the people there said, “Surely this is the Prophet^[b] who was to come into the world!” ¹⁵ Jesus knew that they were about to come and seize him in order to make him king by force; so he went off again to the hills by himself.

Jesus Walks on the Water^(B)

¹⁶ When evening came, Jesus' disciples went down to the lake, ¹⁷ got into a boat, and went back across the lake toward Capernaum. Night came on, and Jesus still had not come to them. ¹⁸ By then a strong wind was blowing and stirring up the water. ¹⁹ The disciples had rowed about three or four miles when they saw Jesus walking on the water, coming near the boat, and they were terrified. ²⁰ “Don't be afraid,” Jesus told them, “it is I!” ²¹ Then they willingly took him into the boat, and immediately the boat reached land at the place they were heading for.

The People Seek Jesus

²² Next day the crowd which had stayed on the other side of the lake realized that there had been only one boat there. They knew that Jesus had not gone in it with his disciples, but that they had left without him. ²³ Other boats, which were from Tiberias, came to shore near the place where the crowd had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. ²⁴ When the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they got into those boats and went to Capernaum, looking for him.

Jesus the Bread of Life

²⁵ When the people found Jesus on the other side of the lake, they said to him, “Teacher, when did you get here?”

²⁶ Jesus answered, “I am telling you the truth: you are looking for me because you ate the bread and had all you wanted, not because you understood my miracles. ^27 (C)Do not work for food that spoils; instead, work for the food that lasts for eternal life. This is the food which the Son of Man will give you, because God, the Father, has put his mark of approval on him.”

²⁸ So they asked him, “What can we do in order to do what God wants us to do?”

²⁹ Jesus answered, “What God wants you to do is to believe in the one he sent.”

³⁰ They replied, “What miracle will you perform so that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? ^31 (D)Our ancestors ate manna in the desert, just as the scripture says, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”

³² “I am telling you the truth,” Jesus said. “What Moses gave you was not^[c] the bread from heaven; it is my Father who gives you the real bread from heaven. ³³ For the bread that God gives is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

³⁴ “Sir,” they asked him, “give us this bread always.”

³⁵ “I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “Those who come to me will never be hungry; those who believe in me will never be thirsty. ³⁶ Now, I told you that you have seen me but will not believe. ³⁷ Everyone whom my Father gives me will come to me. I will never turn away anyone who comes to me, ³⁸ because I have come down from heaven to do not my own will but the will of him who sent me. ³⁹ And it is the will of him who sent me that I should not lose any of all those he has given me, but that I should raise them all to life on the last day. ⁴⁰ For what my Father wants is that all who see the Son and believe in him should have eternal life. And I will raise them to life on the last day.”

⁴¹ The people started grumbling about him, because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” ⁴² So they said, “This man is Jesus son of Joseph, isn't he? We know his father and mother. How, then, does he now say he came down from heaven?”

⁴³ Jesus answered, “Stop grumbling among yourselves. ⁴⁴ People cannot come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them to me; and I will raise them to life on the last day. ^45 (E)The prophets wrote, ‘Everyone will be taught by God.’ Anyone who hears the Father and learns from him comes to me. ⁴⁶ This does not mean that anyone has seen the Father; he who is from God is the only one who has seen the Father. ⁴⁷ I am telling you the truth: he who believes has eternal life. ⁴⁸ I am the bread of life. ⁴⁹ Your ancestors ate manna in the desert, but they died. ⁵⁰ But the bread that comes down from heaven is of such a kind that whoever eats it will not die. ⁵¹ I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If you eat this bread, you will live forever. The bread that I will give you is my flesh, which I give so that the world may live.”

⁵² This started an angry argument among them. “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” they asked.

⁵³ Jesus said to them, “I am telling you the truth: if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you will not have life in yourselves. ⁵⁴ Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them to life on the last day. ⁵⁵ For my flesh is the real food; my blood is the real drink. ⁵⁶ Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood live in me, and I live in them. ⁵⁷ The living Father sent me, and because of him I live also. In the same way whoever eats me will live because of me. ⁵⁸ This, then, is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the bread that your ancestors ate, but then later died. Those who eat this bread will live forever.”

⁵⁹ Jesus said this as he taught in the synagogue in Capernaum.

The Words of Eternal Life

⁶⁰ Many of his followers heard this and said, “This teaching is too hard. Who can listen to it?”

⁶¹ Without being told, Jesus knew that they were grumbling about this, so he said to them, “Does this make you want to give up? ⁶² Suppose, then, that you should see the Son of Man go back up to the place where he was before? ^63 (F)What gives life is God's Spirit; human power is of no use at all. The words I have spoken to you bring God's life-giving Spirit. ⁶⁴ Yet some of you do not believe.” (Jesus knew from the very beginning who were the ones that would not believe and which one would betray him.) ⁶⁵ And he added, “This is the very reason I told you that no people can come to me unless the Father makes it possible for them to do so.”

⁶⁶ Because of this, many of Jesus' followers turned back and would not go with him any more. ⁶⁷ So he asked the twelve disciples, “And you—would you also like to leave?”

^68 (G)Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life. ⁶⁹ And now we believe and know that you are the Holy One who has come from God.”

⁷⁰ Jesus replied, “I chose the twelve of you, didn't I? Yet one of you is a devil!” ⁷¹ He was talking about Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. For Judas, even though he was one of the twelve disciples, was going to betray him.