God Himself Is Judge

A Psalm of ^(A)Asaph.

The Eastern Tribes Return Home

22 At that time Joshua summoned the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh, ² and said to them, “You have kept ^(A)all that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you ^(B)and have obeyed my voice in all that I have commanded you. ³ You have not forsaken your brothers these many days, down to this day, but have been careful to keep the charge of the Lord your God. ^4 (C)And now the Lord your God has given rest to your brothers, as he promised them. Therefore turn and go to your tents in the land where your possession lies, ^(D)which Moses the servant of the Lord gave you on the other side of the Jordan. ^5 (E)Only be very careful to observe the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, ^(F)to love the Lord your God, and to walk in all his ways and to keep his commandments and to cling to him and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul.” ⁶ So Joshua ^(G)blessed them and sent them away, and they went to their tents.

⁷ Now to the one half of the tribe of Manasseh Moses had given a possession in Bashan, ^(H)but to the other half Joshua had given a possession beside their brothers in the land west of the Jordan. And when Joshua sent them away to their homes and blessed them, ⁸ he said to them, “Go back to your tents with much wealth and with very much livestock, with silver, gold, bronze, and iron, and with much clothing. ^(I)Divide the spoil of your enemies with your brothers.” ⁹ So the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh returned home, parting from the people of Israel at Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan, to go ^(J)to the land of Gilead, their own land of which they had possessed themselves by command of the Lord through Moses.

The Eastern Tribes' Altar of Witness

¹⁰ And when they came to the region of the Jordan that is in the land of Canaan, the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh built there an altar by the Jordan, an altar of imposing size. ¹¹ And the people of Israel ^(K)heard it said, “Behold, the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh have built the altar at the frontier of the land of Canaan, in the region about the Jordan, on the side that belongs to the people of Israel.” ¹² And when the people of Israel heard of it, ^(L)the whole assembly of the people of Israel gathered at Shiloh to make war against them.

¹³ Then the people of Israel sent to the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh, in the land of Gilead, ^(M)Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest, ¹⁴ and with him ten chiefs, one from each of the tribal families of Israel, ^(N)every one of them the head of a family among the clans of Israel. ¹⁵ And they came to the people of Reuben, the people of Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh, in the land of Gilead, and they said to them, ¹⁶ “Thus says the whole congregation of the Lord, ‘What is this breach of faith that you have committed against the God of Israel in turning away this day from following the Lord by building yourselves an altar this day ^(O)in rebellion against the Lord? ¹⁷ Have we not had enough of ^(P)the sin at Peor from which even yet we have not cleansed ourselves, and for which there came a plague upon the congregation of the Lord, ¹⁸ that you too must turn away this day from following the Lord? And if ^(Q)you too rebel against the Lord today then tomorrow ^(R)he will be angry with the whole congregation of Israel. ¹⁹ But now, if the land of your possession is unclean, pass over into the Lord's land ^(S)where the Lord's tabernacle stands, and take for yourselves a possession among us. ^(T)Only do not rebel against the Lord or make us as rebels by building for yourselves an altar other than the altar of the Lord our God. ^20 (U)Did not Achan the son of Zerah break faith in the matter of the devoted things, and ^(V)wrath fell upon all the congregation of Israel? And he did not perish alone for his iniquity.’”

²¹ Then the people of Reuben, the people of Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh said in answer to the heads of the families of Israel, ²² “The Mighty One, ^(W)God, the Lord! The Mighty One, God, the Lord! ^(X)He knows; and let Israel itself know! If it was in rebellion or in breach of faith against the Lord, do not spare us today ²³ for building an altar to turn away from following the Lord. Or if we did so to offer burnt offerings or grain offerings or peace offerings on it, may the Lord himself ^(Y)take vengeance. ²⁴ No, but we did it from fear that ^(Z)in time to come your children might say to our children, ‘What have you to do with the Lord, the God of Israel? ²⁵ For the Lord has made the Jordan a boundary between us and you, you people of Reuben and people of Gad. You have no portion in the Lord.’ So your children might make our children cease to worship the Lord. ²⁶ Therefore we said, ‘Let us now build an altar, not for burnt offering, nor for sacrifice, ²⁷ but to be ^(AA)a witness between us and you, and between our generations after us, that we ^(AB)do perform the service of the Lord in his presence with our burnt offerings and sacrifices and peace offerings, so your children will not say to our children in time to come, “You have no portion in the Lord.”’ ²⁸ And we thought, ‘If this should be said to us or to our descendants in time to come, we should say, “Behold, the copy of the altar of the Lord, which our fathers made, not for burnt offerings, nor for sacrifice, but to be ^(AC)a witness between us and you.”’ ²⁹ Far be it from us that we should ^(AD)rebel against the Lord and turn away this day from following the Lord ^(AE)by building an altar for burnt offering, grain offering, or sacrifice, other than the altar of the Lord our God that stands before his tabernacle!”

³⁰ When ^(AF)Phinehas the priest and the chiefs of the congregation, the heads of the families of Israel who were with him, heard the words that the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the people of Manasseh spoke, ^(AG)it was good in their eyes. ³¹ And Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest said to the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the people of Manasseh, “Today we know that ^(AH)the Lord is in our midst, because you have not committed this breach of faith against the Lord. Now you have delivered the people of Israel from the hand of the Lord.”

³² Then Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest, and the chiefs, returned from the people of Reuben and the people of Gad ^(AI)in the land of Gilead to the land of Canaan, to the people of Israel, and brought back word to them. ³³ And the report ^(AJ)was good in the eyes of the people of Israel. And the people of Israel ^(AK)blessed God and spoke no more of making war against them to destroy the land where the people of Reuben and the people of Gad were settled. ³⁴ The people of Reuben and the people of Gad called the altar Witness, “For,” they said, ^(AL)“it is a witness between us that the Lord is God.”

The Two Witnesses

11 Then I was given ^(A)a measuring rod like a staff, and I was told, “Rise and measure the temple of God and the altar and those who worship there, ² but do not measure ^(B)the court outside the temple; leave that out, for ^(C)it is given over to the nations, and they will trample the holy city for ^(D)forty-two months. ³ And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for ^(E)1,260 days, ^(F)clothed in sackcloth.”

⁴ These are ^(G)the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. ⁵ And if anyone would harm them, ^(H)fire pours from their mouth and consumes their foes. If anyone would harm them, ^(I)this is how he is doomed to be killed. ⁶ They have the power ^(J)to shut the sky, that no rain may fall during the days of their prophesying, and they have power over the waters to turn them into blood and ^(K)to strike the earth with every kind of plague, as often as they desire. ⁷ And when they have finished their testimony, ^(L)the beast that rises from ^(M)the bottomless pit^{[a] (N)}will make war on them and conquer them and kill them, ⁸ and their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city that symbolically^[b] is called ^(O)Sodom and ^(P)Egypt, where their Lord was crucified. ⁹ For three and a half days some from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations will gaze at their dead bodies and ^(Q)refuse to let them be placed in a tomb, ¹⁰ and ^(R)those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and make merry and ^(S)exchange presents, because these two prophets ^(T)had been a torment to those who dwell on the earth. ¹¹ But after the three and a half days ^(U)a breath of life from God entered them, and they stood up on their feet, and great fear fell on those who saw them. ¹² Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, ^(V)“Come up here!” And ^(W)they went up to heaven ^(X)in a cloud, and their enemies watched them. ¹³ And at that hour there was ^(Y)a great earthquake, and ^(Z)a tenth of the city fell. Seven thousand people were killed in the earthquake, and the rest were terrified and ^(AA)gave glory to ^(AB)the God of heaven.

^14 (AC)The second woe has passed; behold, the third woe is soon to come.

The Seventh Trumpet

¹⁵ Then ^(AD)the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and ^(AE)there were loud voices in heaven, saying, ^(AF)“The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of ^(AG)his Christ, and ^(AH)he shall reign forever and ever.” ¹⁶ And the twenty-four elders ^(AI)who sit on their thrones before God ^(AJ)fell on their faces and worshiped God, ¹⁷ saying,

¹⁹ Then ^(AQ)God's temple in heaven was opened, and ^(AR)the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple. There were flashes of lightning, rumblings,^[c] peals of thunder, an earthquake, and ^(AS)heavy hail.