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12 But they do not know the Lord’s thoughts
    or understand his plan.
These nations don’t know
    that he is gathering them together
to be beaten and trampled
    like sheaves of grain on a threshing floor.

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“My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord.
    “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine.

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11 For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.

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33 Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge! How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways!

34 For who can know the Lord’s thoughts?
    Who knows enough to give him advice?[a]

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Footnotes

  1. 11:34 Isa 40:13 (Greek version).

17 He is ready to separate the chaff from the wheat with his winnowing fork. Then he will clean up the threshing area, gathering the wheat into his barn but burning the chaff with never-ending fire.”

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The Lord Will Rule the Earth

14 Watch, for the day of the Lord is coming when your possessions will be plundered right in front of you! I will gather all the nations to fight against Jerusalem. The city will be taken, the houses looted, and the women raped. Half the population will be taken into captivity, and the rest will be left among the ruins of the city.

Then the Lord will go out to fight against those nations, as he has fought in times past.

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12 “Let the nations be called to arms.
    Let them march to the valley of Jehoshaphat.
There I, the Lord, will sit
    to pronounce judgment on them all.
13 Swing the sickle,
    for the harvest is ripe.[a]
Come, tread the grapes,
    for the winepress is full.
The storage vats are overflowing
    with the wickedness of these people.”

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Footnotes

  1. 3:13 Greek version reads for the harvest time has come. Compare Mark 4:29.

The Harvest of the Earth

14 Then I saw a white cloud, and seated on the cloud was someone like the Son of Man.[a] He had a gold crown on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand.

15 Then another angel came from the Temple and shouted to the one sitting on the cloud, “Swing the sickle, for the time of harvest has come; the crop on earth is ripe.” 16 So the one sitting on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth, and the whole earth was harvested.

17 After that, another angel came from the Temple in heaven, and he also had a sharp sickle. 18 Then another angel, who had power to destroy with fire, came from the altar. He shouted to the angel with the sharp sickle, “Swing your sickle now to gather the clusters of grapes from the vines of the earth, for they are ripe for judgment.” 19 So the angel swung his sickle over the earth and loaded the grapes into the great winepress of God’s wrath. 20 The grapes were trampled in the winepress outside the city, and blood flowed from the winepress in a stream about 180 miles[b] long and as high as a horse’s bridle.

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Footnotes

  1. 14:14 Or like a son of man. See Dan 7:13. “Son of Man” is a title Jesus used for himself.
  2. 14:20 Greek 1,600 stadia [300 kilometers].

10 O my people, threshed and winnowed,
    I have told you everything the Lord of Heaven’s Armies has said,
    everything the God of Israel has told me.

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